Missionary Henry Williams’ home now historic reserve

Church Missionary Society leader Henry Williams had a big impact on this country's early history. He was responsible for New Zealand's first cricket match being played at Horotutu Beach at Paihia, on December 20, 1832, when Williams gave the male pupils (Māori and Pākehā) of his mission school there a rare day off. They had sat exams the previous day. Their reward was an opportunity to play cricket on the foreshore at Horotutu.

It’s taken 40 years of battling bureaucracy, but they’ve done it.

The descendants of pioneering missionary Henry Williams have finally persuaded the authorities to declare their ancestral home, long since gifted to the people of Northland, an historic reserve.

The decision by the Far North District Council marked the end of a process which began 44 years earlier.

In 1967, brother and sister Patrick and Mary Williams agreed to sell the house and what is now Paihia’s Village Green to the then Northland Harbour Board.

The conditions were that Mary Williams live out her days in her ancestor’s house, that the green and gardens remain open space, and that the property be declared a reserve.

The family handed over the house within a month of Mary Williams’ death in 1993.

The building was converted into a library and gallery, with the gardens maintained by the Friends of Williams House.

However, progress on making the house and gardens an historic reserve stalled.

Last week, a group of descendants led by Henry Williams’ great-great-granddaughter Susan Williams, who had flown up from Christchurch, put their case to the council.

She urged councillors to honour the contract signed by her father and the harbour board to protect a “wonderful piece of Northland history for future generations”.

Williams said many submitters wanted the same status for the Village Green, but that should not be allowed to distract from the key issue of the house and gardens.

Asked whether the family was happy with the building’s role as library and community space, Williams said that was exactly how they had envisaged it.

Councillors voted unanimously to grant the house and gardens historic reserve status. They left the Green’s status as a recreation reserve unchanged, saying it was already protected and that changing it to an historic reserve would make it harder to use the space for markets and other events.

Far North Mayor Wayne Brown said the proposal effectively had 150% support, because the objectors wanted more than the council had agreed to.

He apologised on behalf of those who had come before him for taking so long to honour the agreement with the Williams family.

“I’m sorry about that. There’s a long history of doing things slowly here ... Henry faced a few difficulties too.”

An emotional Williams said the decision had been “an incredibly long time coming”.

“This is what it was meant to be. The family sold it for land value only, so it would be protected as open space, preserved forever.”

Her sister, Rosemary Hedge of Auckland, put the delay down to bureaucracy and a lack of appreciation for history in the past.

For years, Paihia residents wanted the house demolished, and wheels only started turning in the early 2000s when a new community board realised its importance.

Hedge said she had spent all her summers in the house and the atmosphere today was exactly as she remembered it.

“Whatever’s been done hasn’t take away its soul. The ghosts of the past appreciate its future.”

The missionary Henry Williams (1792-1867) settled in Paihia in 1823. Williams House was built in 1920 by his grandson Percy Williams.