Replies to Queries proposed by the Select Committee of the Provincial Council upon Message No. 4
1. | I am the Resident Magistrate of Dunedin, and Commissioner for Native Reserves for the Province of Otago. |
2. | I first arrived in this Province in the month of April, 1848. |
3. | I have no knowledge of the purpose for which the piece of land referred to was originally laid off. As one of the general public, I was always led to understand it was a Public Reserve. |
4. | I do not know when the reserve was originally laid off, nor by whose authority it was so done. |
5 and 6. | I recollect being informed, I think in the year 1853, by Mr. Mantell, the then Commissioner of Crown Lands for this Province, that he had recommended for the consideration of the Governor-in-Chief, that the piece of land indicated should be appropriated as a Native Reserve; and I also recollect Mr. Mantell subsequently informing me that his suggestion had been approved of, and that the land was consequently set apart for the purposes of a Native Reserve. |
Dunedin,
4th May, 1865.
A. Chetham-Strole.