The Colony in 1874

Transcript of main text and captions

Main text from Plate 4: The Colony in 1874

In 1858 the non-Maori population was 60,000. By 1874 this figure had reached 300,000. There were estimated to be only 48,000 Maori.

Almost half the Pakeha population were aged under 21. Because there were twice as many men as women in the adult population, a high proportion of colonial women were married. The goldfields had the oldest and most male populations, and the towns the most female.

Dunedin had a population of just 1700 in 1858, but by 1874 it had displaced Auckland as the largest urban centre and its port was the busiest in the colony. The southern gold rushes were responsible for this transformation.

The towns were of three types. Towns on or near the coast included Invercargill, Oamaru, Timaru, Christchurch, Blenheim, Nelson, Wellington, Wanganui, New Plymouth, Napier and Auckland. Some were served by specialist ports like Port Chalmers, Lyttelton, Picton and Onehunga. This was the golden age for these port towns, the second type of town, as the colonial economy boomed. The third type, goldfield towns, while smaller than they had been in the 1860s, were still sizeable.

All the major towns had suburban areas between town and country whose inhabitants pursued a mixture of rural and urban occupations.

Three-quarters of Maori lived in the central North Island and most of the rest in the Far North.

Caption text for map titled 'Birthplace of Colonists by Province, 1874'

Non-Maori New Zealanders were overwhelmingly of local or British origin. The proportion who were New Zealand-born was highest in struggling provinces which had received fewer recent immigrants. The significance of the Scottish-born in Otago was still evident. The only significant groupings of foreigners (non-Britons) were the Chinese in Westland and Otago (all on the goldfields), Germans in Nelson (members of a community which had arrived in the 1840s) and the recent Swedish, Norwegian and Danish migrants to Hawke's Bay (and also Wellington).

Captions for map and graphs under the title 'Demography 1874'

Percentage of Women by Electorate, 1874

The non-Maori population of the colony was predominantly male; women were most numerous in the towns, less so in the country districts and least so on the goldfields and in some remote rural areas.

Marital status of adults

The imbalance between the sexes meant that a far higher proportion of women than men were married, with the proportion being highest where there were the fewest women — on the goldfields.