 How did a kind man go from being a respected businessman to a mass murderer in just a few months?
Those who worked for James Reid Baxter thought him a kind man, a well-off floristry businessman who worked hard. But in the middle of the night on April 7, 1907, Baxter went on a killing spree. It was only with hindsight that a number of things were shown to have led to his insanity. Baxter was born in Banffshire, Scotland on April 6, 1864, to Thomas and Matilda. He worked as a seed and corn merchant and married Elizabeth Markham in England in 1894. The first three of their five children were born there before the couple brought their growing family to New Zealand. They moved to Invercargill where Baxter set up a small floristry business. It made sense, he had worked with plants and seeds his whole life. No one predicted what was to come, but there were warnings. In the few months before the tragedy, Baxter became sick, first with influenza then cholera, then he slipped on a rock and sustained a head injury which he never got treated. He began to complain about head pain, sometimes refused to get out of bed or work. A close friend of the family later said he stole a bottle of laudanum (a strong opioid) from her. On April 3, 1907 Baxter suddenly bought a rifle then exchanged it on April 6 for a shotgun. The next day the family went to bed as normal. Sons Basil, 9, and Roy, 4, shared a front bedroom while 11-year-old Phyllis shared hers with two year old Ronald. Baxter, Elizabeth and six-week-old baby John were in the main bedroom. While they all slept, Baxter got up again and got an iron stove scraper. He went to each bedroom and smashed it into the head of every member of his family. Baxter then got the gun, locked himself in the bathroom, filled the bathtub and shot himself. His watch, in his vest, stopped at 2.50am. The next morning about 10.45am next door neighbour and friend Archibald McLean went looking for the family and, on peering through the window, realised he could see bodies. With a police officer, they broke into the house. Basil, Ronald and Roy died in their beds. Elizabeth, Phyllis and John were, extraordinarily, still alive. But despite help, Elizabeth died three days later, and John a couple of days later. Phyllis lived for about three weeks partly paralysed but died on April 22. A coroner's jury found Baxter suffered from temporary insanity. The whole family is buried in the Eastern cemetery in Invercargill. There was no funeral, and the grave was initially unmarked. However a headstone now lists all the victims first and Baxter’s name last. Photo from Te Papa's collection.
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 David Russell was one of the bravest men to ever fight for New Zealand and he is barely remembered.
It was only after his extraordinary bravery and death that he was recognised with the George Cross - for acts of heroism in the face of extreme danger- because David was shot as a spy by German Forces during the Second World War. David was born March 30, 1911, in Ayr, Scotland to James and Jessie Russell. He headed for Australia with his elder brother. And for years he lived on the swag, moving from place to place and turning his hand to anything. He and a mate heard of great opportunities in New Zealand and came to Wellington, immediately hopping the train to Napier where David began work at the Napier Hospital as an orderly. He wasn’t there long, war broke out and 11 days after it did in 1939, David had enlisted (after a brief standdown to get some varicose veins dealt with). In May 1940 he was shipped out and after a training stop in Scotland was sent to Egypt. He served through campaigns in Greece and Crete, saving a buddy’s life during a retreat when his mate was weakened by dysentery. He refused to leave him, carrying and dragging him to safety. He served at the New Zealand School of Instruction in Egypt and was promoted to Lance Corporal. David was taken prisoner in 1942 and transferred to a camp in Italy. He escaped in 1943 and began moving about, helping others get away. In 1944 he contacted a British team and could have left. Instead he chose to return to find and assist other escaped prisoners. He was a master of eluding patrols, often riding away on a bicycle. With Arch Scott - another Kiwi - he began working on a plan to organise escapes but ended up captured again before yet another daring escape. It wasn’t long before he was again taken prisoner, and this time taken to the German commander in the area, Oberleutenant Haupt, who believed him a spy and resistor. Haupt brutally beat David for information, chained him to a wall in a stable, beat him again, left him without food or water and even brought in people to persuade him to talk. He said he would not tell them and let them shoot me. He never did talk. It was likely David knew the names of many involved in plans to help prisoners, including the locals who were helping him. On February 28, 1945, they took him to the garden, let him have a cigarette before he stood rigidly to attention and they shot him. He was the first New Zealander (he served with our forces) to be awarded - posthumously - the George Cross. The locals took the body and buried him at the Ponte de Piave cemetery. Much later a memorial was put up for him. In 1949, Napier hospital named a ward after him and a plaque for many years was on the wall. When the hospital closed it was stored but has now been restored and put up in a special area for the history of the hospital service in HB at the chapel at the hospital in Hastings. The chapel is currently closed to the public. His George Cross had been at the Waiouru War memorial and was among a group stolen in 2007. It was recovered months later with many others. In 1950 , David was exhumed and his body reburied at the Imperial War Graves cemetery in Udine, Italy.  There is a great deal of talk these days about freedom of speech. It’s generally held that we have freedom of speech - but that we don’t have freedom from its consequences.
And it's nothing new. Do you speak out against what you see as wrong? Or do you say nothing? It’s worse during times of crisis like wars. In wartime censorship applied even to personal letters and there were a great many things never published even in newspapers. In 1914 the War Regulations Act was passed. The wide reaching legislation included the suppression of the seditious activity which could be anything injurious to public safety. This could be almost anything depending on how it was seen. And it was an imprisonable offence. By the end of the First World War there were 102 successful prosecutions, 67 people were jailed, 29 filed and eight convicted and discharged. One often mentioned, as a way to illustrate how over the top the prosecutions were, was a 70-year-old woman called Ellen Fuller. But who she was is missing. She was born Elen Brigitte Larson on July 20, 1847, Oslo, Oslo Fylke, Norway, to Lars Hansen and Johanne Elisabeth Olsdatter. Elen had a brother and sister. In 1872, Elen had a child out of wedlock to Otto Christian Smith - a sea captain. At the time she was 25 and working as the domestic servant of Nils and Ragnild Gundersen. They fostered the child, a boy called Otto. Meanwhile Elen boarded the Albion in 1876 as a single woman and came to Australia. In Melbourne she met Walter Fuller (who had come to Australia from England). They married in 1878 in Melbourne before eventually coming to New Zealand. Walter was a printer by trade and worked for the Government Printing Office. For years they went about their lives until Ellen - as she was now called - came to the attention of the authorities in 1916 for what called seditious utterings at the Palmerston North Railway Station, saying the Kaiser was her lord and master and insulting the King. She was charged, and when she did not turn up in court was given a sentence of two months hard labour - jail. It turned out Wellington police had failed to serve the court summons on her in time for her to go to court. Ellen denied the charges and when she did make it to court her lawyer argued the words did not breach the War Regulation Act. A rehearing was granted but with the same result and an appeal to reduce the sentence because of her age and mental capacity was rejected. In reality Ellen had become a slightly senile, bad tempered, eccentric old woman who shouted a lot. It had gotten so bad she had been separated from Walter for some time. Only a few years later in 1919 Ellen died on February 17. Her son, who at first used the last name Gundersen, but later reverted to Smith, also came to New Zealand and raised a huge family. Walter outlived Ellen and despite being separated for many years, they are buried together at Karori Cemetery.  New Zealand has some of the strangest creatures on earth. From flightless birds to the prehistoric looking weta.
And one of the freakiest is the giant carnivorous snail. Considered endangered, it’s unlikely they get noticed. To a nation of gardeners, snails are the enemy, but these native wonders aren’t eating your cabbages. They’re eating your earthworms, sucking them up like strands of spaghetti. There are 16 species and 57 subspecies. A small colony even lives in the Wellington suburb of Khandallah. Reaching up to 9cm, they are considerably bigger than the average snail and can live to the 20-year mark. Legally protected but not cute or quirky like other endangered NZ species, their conservation has been haphazard. The Powelliphanta genus of snails is named for the New Zealand scientist Arthur William Baden Powell, born on April 4, 1901 in Wellington, to Arthur Powell and Minne Sablofski. Powell was educated in Auckland. After a printing apprenticeship and being a commercial artist, he became absorbed by shells, beginning his lifelong passion of conchology. By age 20, he had published his first paper on mollusca and by 29 was appointed to the Auckland War Memorial Museum as conchologist and palaeontologist. Snails were a specialty, including giant flax snails and the tiny rissoid sea snails. He used his art to good effect, with beautiful illustrations. During his trip on the British research ship Discovery II around the Northland coast he revealed 128 new species in 1937 and in 1940 another 66. He also conducted studies at Stewart Island, the Chathams and the Kermadecs. Over his lifetime he named hundreds of species (over 800) and created exhibitions for the museum. He received an honorary science doctorate and only six years before he died was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire for services to marine science. He married Isabel Essie Gittos on December 19, 1928 and they had a son. She died in 1976. He remarried two years later, Ida Madoline Worthy. Powell died on July 1, 1987 and was cremated and his remains interred at Purewa Cemetery. Photo of snail from the Te Papa collection.  When Queen Elizabeth II bit into the red apple, it was immediately clear she liked it. She asked for more.
The apple was a variant of the most famous New Zealand apple ever and that moment with Her Majesty gave it its name. Royal Gala. While it was missionary Samuel Marsden who bought and planted the first apple trees in the country, it was James Hutton Kidd who is directly responsible for the variety of apples we know and love today. Born on September 12, 1877, in Northumberland, England to James and Harriet, the family emigrated to New Zealand when he was a child, starting out in Christchurch before heading to Whanganui. Known as Hutton (rather than James) he trained in horticultural work before becoming interested in orcharding. He and his brother Wilfred set up small orchards. In 1906 he moved to Greytown, initially buying a five-acre-block before expanding it into 20 acres and in 1916 married Ethel Laura (Lola) Gilbert. They had no children. He began experimenting with new techniques in growing apples and advocated research into disease prevention - supporting the establishment of the then DSIR Plant Diseases Division. But what was to make him iconic was the recognition of the need for new varieties of apple. Unsatisfied with the flavour of new varieties on the market - mainly from America, he began a breeding programme. He kept diligent records and had success with a cross pollination of Delicious with Cox’s Orange Pippin. Called Delco, he sold the propagation rights to a nursery. But the apple that would become synonymous with his name came after his death. Before he died he transferred seedings from his apple-breeding programme to the DSIR to be evaluated. By 1950 there were a couple of varieties viable but one stood out. It was sent for trials in Havelock North and was declared outstanding. The Gala. It was released on to the market in the 1960’s and quickly became one of the world’s most popular apples. Its red variant is the one we know as the Royal Gala today, given the name after its approval by Queen Elizabeth II. Kidd died October 12, 1945 and is buried in Greytown Cemetery. With great sadness for a great woman. RIP Your Majesty.  On many graves in many cemeteries are the names of those who served but who are not lying peacefully in that grave.
So many families added the names of their loved ones to a headstone when there was no place for them to visit in a war torn world. Some were found and later interred in war graveyards overseas. But sometimes not only are their bodies missing - but also exactly what happened. In a quiet part of Karori Cemetery is the headstone to George Ludwig Boeson, an engineer from Petone who was a member of the reserves in World War One. George worked at the Gear meatworks - one of the largest employers in the area. He was married to Vinola (nee Edwards). Also on his headstone is his son, Jack Ludwig Boeson, who is listed as missing from air operations in World War Two. In fact, there are three other kiwi airmen missing with Jack - whose names are barely remembered - if only because of the mystery of what happened to them. They were Warrant Officer Jack Ludwig Boeson, 26, of Wellington, Flight Sergeant Alister Bain Pinching, 26 - married to Olga - from Gisborne, Flight Sergeant Cyril Laurie Corbett, 24, from Lower Hutt who left a twin and his wife Jean and Flight Sergeant Anthony Victor Peter Madsen, about 23 from Palmerston North. All four were members of the 4th Squadron stationed in Nausori, Fiji during World War Two. On January 2, 1944 they took off in their Hudson 111A aircraft on an anti-submarine patrol. After a routine wireless test they were never heard from again although another patrol saw them and believed they were on the right course. A search found nothing. They are remembered now on the Bourail Memorial in New Caledonia. And Jack, Alister and Anthony on the headstones of their parents. Normally we finish with a grave, and we have a picture of George’s. But for Jack, Alister, Cyril and Anthony, where they lie is unknown. Wherever that is, RIP.  We’ve told a couple of stories about those held on Matiu/Somes Island, but few were as mysterious as Hjelmar von Danneville.
When she arrived in Wellington in 1911 she caused a fuss. She did not fit society’s view of a woman. Short haired and usually wearing masculine attire, she claimed to have studied medicine in Zurich, had studied music in Leipzig and been a war correspondent. Initially she was welcomed. With Dr Edith Ara Huntley, she ran the Lahmann Health Home in Miramar. It was a place where women could go for a break. It had opened in 1912 with great fanfare, high society guests abounded and Prime Minister William Massey performed the ribbon cutting. She had even asked police superintendent John Ellison to give her permission to wear men’s clothing and had submitted to being examined. But in just five years, with war paranoia looming large, feelings had turned and Sir John Salmond, the author of the war regulations, became more and more suspicious of her especially given how many women - even married ones - seemed to be under her spell. In 1914 she had been accused of being a German spy but maintained she was Danish. So in 1917 Salmond thought she was an imposter and sent police to arrest her, interning her on the island as an enemy alien until her sex could be ascertained. Indeed she allowed herself to be examined and was considered female. Hjelmar spent six weeks on the cold isolated island before being able to leave supposedly having suffered a nervous breakdown. She was welcomed back by Edith. Even now it is unclear how to fit Hjelmar into a category. Was she lesbian? Was Edith her lover? Or was her gender identity more complicated? Papers reported she left New Zealand on November 14, 1919 , initially heading for Australia before she ended up living in San Francisco. Even there she was arrested for masquerading as a man but ultimately was given a permit to wear men’s clothing. She died there in 1930. Edith herself died just a few days after Hjelmar left. She is buried in Karori Cemetery.  The steamship SS Ventnor left Wellington on a spring day in 1902 headed for China.
The big ship was filled with people - 499 of them were already dead. Following the wave of Chinese immigrants coming to New Zealand hoping to work hard and find their fortune in the gold fields - mainly in Otago, came efforts to repatriate the bodies of those who had died on foreign soil. A first shipment with over 200 bodies had already been successful. The Ventnor had been chartered by the Cheong Sing Tong benevolent society, looking to return the bodies to their homeland. The rest of her cargo was listed as "5,347 tons of coal for the 144 sacks and 22 bales of fungus, one bale of tow and one bale of flax". On board were 13 crew and nine Chinese coffin attendants, part of the ritual for returning the bodies. But by 12.30am on October 27, 1902, the Ventnor had become stuck on a reef off Taranaki. While the ship got free, water was pouring into her hold. Wellington had no shipyard that could take her and the Captain, Henry Ferry, opted to try for Auckland. When her pumps failed to contain the water she began to sink off the Hokianga Heads and the order was given to abandon the ship. Three lifeboats made it to safety while one - with the Captain board, capsized. The bodies - in metal-lined coffins - sank with the ship. Months later some of the coffins - about 33 - began to be washed ashore. But not the metal lined ones. A number of remains, in normal coffins, had been taken on board in Wellington. A number were buried by local Northland Māori tribes creating a bond between two cultures world apart, but with a similar philosophy about human remains. However, where exactly they are, is now lost from memory. Among those bodies on the Ventnor was Choie (sometimes called Charles) Sew Hoy who was the president of the society helping repatriate the remains. A successful merchant, he had helped charter the ship and with the exhumations of hundreds of the dead. He had died shortly before the ship sailed. The exhumations themselves had caused a great deal of fuss. The European belief of not disturbing the dead clashed with the Chinese need to take their people home. The remains of the ship were only found and identified less than 10 years ago. It is one of the deepest wrecks in New Zealand maritime history and now a heritage site. |
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