Heaphy, Charles 1820-1881 :Cowdie forest on the Wairoa River, Kaipara (Col. Wakefield proceeding to the Bay of Islands) / Chas Heaphy 1840.

Shows a still dark green river with a virgin kauri forest, low scrub and flax on its far bank. In the centre of the view is a row-boat, with Colonel William Wakefield in top hat seated in the stern, trailing an oar. The other occupants of the boat are a Maori named Te Whare, a Rotuman named Saturday, Dr George Robinson, Dr John Dorset and Charles Heaphy. Heaphy is thought to be the fourth from the right, the young man with brown hair and a moustache. There are several ducks on the river to the left.

The scene is almost certainly the upper Wairoa River, as described by Colonel William Wakefield ' Higher up, where the river narrows to the breadth of the Thames at Kew, both sides presented magnificent forest - some entirely of kauri in a state of the greatest profusion' (quoted in The unknown Kaipara by Brian Byrne, p. 166).

Shows an incident that occurred after the grounding of the Tory on 19 December 1839. Painted after the event and dated 1840. See Wakefield, E. J. Adventure in New Zealand, vol. 1 p. 156ff. The boat was being rowed from Te Kopuru up the Wairoa River.

Other Titles - Kauri forest Colonel Wakefield

Inscriptions: Recto - bottom right - signature and date; Recto - beneath image - title

Quantity: 1 watercolour(s).

Physical Description: Watercolour 287 x 457 mm on sheet 347 x 485 mm

Provenance: Commissioned and owned by the New Zealand Company, London, until purchase in 1915 by Alexander Horsburgh Turnbull per dealer Francis Edwards.