1840 Early 1840 William Purves buys 2560 acres near Banks ...

5 May The Comte de Paris is off Teneriffe. The Maori of Akaroa are seen by the
Neptune burning their dead.
8 May The Neptune gets some potatoes from on shore. The Adèle, Captain Walch,
catches a whale off Peraki. A boat crew from Sandy Beach (Goashore) come to
Akaroa in search of recruits and take back two men from the Neptune.
9 May A boat from the Neptune leaves Akaroa for Goashore via Peraki (where it finds
the French whaler, Pauline, Captain Billard), captures Woods and a boat and
returns with them to Akaroa. Woods promises to return the men.
10 May The Grétry begins whaling from Port Cooper [CC5 611]. The Washington,
Neptune, Cosmopolite and Gustave leave Akaroa Harbour. Woods provides the
Neptune with two other men, and his boat is returned.
11 May The French whaler, Cosmopolite, anchors at Peraki to begin whaling there
[CC5 611].
13 May The French whaler Asia, Captain T. Jay, begins whaling in Pegasus Bay [CC5
611]. The American whaler France, Captain Howell, anchors in Akaroa
Harbour.
14 May The French whaler Ernest, Captain Caubrière, arrives at Akaroa for wood and
water [CC5 611]. The main mast of the Comte de Paris is broken and the
foremast split in a thunderstorm. Men from the American France go to the west
side of Akaroa Harbour to cut wood.
15 May A meeting of merchants, bankers, manufacturers and shipowners in Glasgow
petitions the Queen and both houses of Parliament to take measures to prevent
the colonization of N.Z. by the French and to impose British law: “were we
tamely to allow that beautiful island to become the dunghill of France?”
16 May Rev. James Watkin arrives at Waikouaiti to establish the first European mission
station in the South Island. The N.Z. Journal publishes the objections of the
Directors of the N.Z. Company to the French government’s backing of the
Banks Peninsula expedition and to their alleged intention of establishing a penal
colony there. The French whaler Gustave, Captain Desclos, anchors in Akaroa
Harbour.
17 May J. Hamilton, H. Wilson and P. Kelly desert from the France.
18 May Captain Pierre Darmandaritz buys land at Otago.
20 May N.Z. Co. issues “Lands in N.Z. Emigration to N.Z.” [ALG, D23].
21 May Hobson declares British sovereignty over the North Island on the grounds of the
Treaty of Waitangi, and over the South Island and Stewart Island by the right of
discovery by Cook. 4 more men desert from the France.