I.
TAKING POSSESSION: “TIT FOR TAT.”
A FEW weeks after my return to Sydney, private news came to hand that the French Government contemplated taking possession of New Caledonia. Admiral Février Despointes made an appointment with us to meet him at Port St. Vincent at a given date, with a supply of coals, stores, live stock, &c. I chartered the Athenian, an old East Indiaman, and the Pocklington, a Newcastle collier, and sailed for the rendezvous—a fine harbour on the east coast of New Caledonia—where our arrival excited some astonishment amongst the natives, being the first ships they had seen since Captain Cook’s last visit in 1779.
We had to lay there a fortnight before the Catinat—a smart steam corvette—made her appearance with the admiral’s flag at the fore.
We sailed in company for the Isle of Pines—off the southern end of New Caledonia—where the Marists’ Catholic Mission had an established station. On the morning of the 19th of September, 1853, Sir Everard Home arrived at the Isle of Pines on board the Calliope. Visits were exchanged between the two men-of-war. During his call Sir Everard committed the same blunder which thirty years before caused the loss of New Zealand to France—he mentioned before us that his instructions were to take possession of New Caledonia in the name of Her Majesty’s Government. With the assistance of the French missionaries the chiefs of the island were mustered, a deed drawn up during the day, and at daylight on the 20th we read the proclamation, hoisted the tricolor flag on shore, and saluted it with a salvo of 21 guns from the Catinat.
Poor old Sir Everard never got over the shock. He sailed for Sydney, and died during the passage; while the French admiral steamed for Balade, a port on the N.W. coast of New Caledonia, where he repeated the ceremony enacted at the Isle of Pines, thus securing the whole group from any other Power’s aggression.
During our stay at Balade, and with a view to learn something of the new country, we formed a party to visit the interior, more particularly the extent of the “Giahot”—a broad stream which empties itself into the sea west of Balade Harbour. Duly equipped and well armed we started on our cruise. Eight officers of the French Navy, Captain Case of the Athenian, four natives belonging to the French Mission, and myself. We certainly thought that fourteen men would be a sufficient number to cope with any number of savages, more particularly in a part of the island where the missionaries had been safely established for a couple of years already.
We sailed or pulled up stream for some twelve or fourteen miles, until snags and shoals rendered the navigation tedious; and, moreover, our orders were not to keep the boat after dark. Having ascertained by observations that owing to the windings of the river we had reached a point distant from Balade six miles by land, the natives assuring us that they would guide us there in a couple of hours, we made up our minds to land, send back the boat, explore the country, and camp when night came.