"For God's sake send us some help"

In April 1897, a fair bit of New Zealand suffered under a huge storm, running ships aground, rivers rising and the little settlement of Clive, just out of Hastings, was in dire straits.
At one point on April 16, a cable was sent - “For God's sake send us some help” - then the telegraphic cable from Clive went dead.
Storm warnings were issued on April 14 and over the next two days the rain poured in. The New Plymouth-Whanganui train was hit by a huge slip and derailed. It was a miracle no one died.
The 1000 tonne iron ship Zuleika ran aground near Cape Palliser and began to break apart. Of the 21 crew, only 12 survived.
Flooding washed out bridges around Bulls, damage to the Takapu rail bridge and at Waitangi the rail embankment was washed away. Huge areas of land around Hastings, Napier and Waipawa were under water - with one station reporting the loss of 15,000 sheep. Napier residents used boats to get around main streets.
Clive was almost completely under water. The Napier pilot boat was sent to rescue those it could. And two more boats with private citizens onboard raced to help.
Ten men took the boats from Waitangi which linked several main rivers. As the boats approached part of the banks gave way and the resulting surge of water swept the boats out to sea.
All 10 men drowned.
One of these was Arthur McCartney, the licensee of the Albion Hotel, who was a prominent local resident. Born on January 17, 1846 in Preston, Lancashire, England, he came to New Zealand in 1867.
In 1883 he ran the Caledonia Hotel in Napier, but went bankrupt. Later he was discharged from that bankruptcy and took up the licence for the Albion Hotel.
McCartney was the chairman of the Taradale Board of river conservators and a Captain of the Artillery and Rifle volunteers. He left a wife and four children.
Also on one of the boats was Sergeant Florence O’Donovan from County Waterford, Ireland. He had been clerk of the court at Waipawa, married Julia Sarah Ann S Cecelia O’Connor in 1883.
McCartney and O’Donovan’s bodies were the only ones recovered. O’Donovan was buried in the Old Napier Cemetery but records do not show where McCartney was buried.
The other men were Constable Alfred Stephenson, clerk Frederick Cassin, labourer John Henry Prebble, carpenter Frederick James Ansell, wheelwright Henry Brierly, blacksmith George Chambers, Henry George Oborn - who had very recently arrived in HB to work as a draper in the branch store of Kirkcaldie and Stains that had opened the same year and a commercial traveller for a Sydney firm John Rose.
Between them, they left 20 children.
They were not the only fatalities. There were reports from throughout Hawke’s Bay of people being swept away in the waters.
The landscape of Hawke’s Bay was forever changed by the flood with the course of the Tutaekuri river altered and a new river mouth created.
Shortly after, despite efforts to prevent it, there was also an outbreak of diphtheria resulting in even more deaths.
The 10 men were remembered by a memorial that even today sits on Marine Parade opposite Ocean Spa with their names and the legend “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”
Photo by Lindsay Morris.