Pioneer (paddle-steamer)

Pioneer was a 19th-century paddle-steamer gunboat used in New Zealand. Built-in Sydney to the order of the New Zealand colonial government by the Australian Steam Navigation Company, she cost £9,500. Launched in 1863, she was towed across the Tasman Sea by HMS Eclipse, leaving Sydney on 22 September and arriving at Onehunga on 3 October 1863.[1]

The gunboat Pioneer at Meremere during the Invasion of the Waikato.

She was a flat-bottomed, stern-wheel paddle-steamer of 304 tons, made of 3/8 inch (9.5 mm) iron. She was 42.6 m long, 6 m beam, and drew only 0.9 m fully laden for travel on the Waikato River. With twin 30  hp engines and a 3.7 m (12  foot) stern wheel she had a speed of 9 knots. She had two iron cupolas or turrets, which were pierced for rifles and 12 PDR guns. The cupolas were 2.4 m (8 feet) high and 3.6 m (12 feet) in diameter.[1]

She was manned by officers and men of the Royal Navy, two companies from HMS Curacoa; and flew the pendant of Commodore Sir William Wiseman of Curacoa. She proved of immense service in the skirmishing on the Waikato River in 1863 during the Waikato Campaign of the New Zealand Wars.

On 24 December 1866, whilst awaiting repair, she broke her mooring at Port Waikato, drifted out to sea and, during an attempt to steam her into Manukau Harbour, was wrecked on the Manukau bar.[2][3]

The two turrets are on display in Mercer (as part of the war memorial)[4] and Ngāruawāhia.[1] There are two engravings of her in action on the Waikato River in Ross and Howard, from the Illustrated London News.

  • Pioneer, 1863–1866, was New Zealand's first purpose-built warship
  • A turret on display at Ngāruawāhia

See also

References
  1. "Pioneer turret NZ Wars memorial, Ngāruawāhia". nzhistory.govt.nz. Retrieved 10 December 2018.
  2. "Port Waikato". NEW ZEALAND HERALD. 26 February 1867. Retrieved 10 December 2018.
  3. Ingram & Wheatley, p. 140.
  4. "Mercer First World War memorial". nzhistory.govt.nz. Retrieved 10 December 2018.

Bibliography
  • Howard, Grant (1981): The Navy in New Zealand pages 11–12 (Reed, Wellington) ISBN 0-589-01355-6
  • Ingram, C. W. N., and Wheatley, P. O., (1936) Shipwrecks: New Zealand disasters 1795–1936. Dunedin, NZ: Dunedin Book Publishing Association.
  • Ross, J O’C (1967): The White Ensign in New Zealand pages 87–88 (Reed, Wellington)
  • Taylor, T D (1948): New Zealand’s Naval Story pages 108-109 (Reed, Wellington)
  • Entry in the Miramar Index
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