Page:Reminiscences of Earliest Canterbury 1915.pdf/156

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massacre, in which Mr. Wakefield and party were murdered, he offered William Deans any position in Wellington he chose to select. He declined, because the brothers were so much attached to each other that they would not separate. In the ’forties they imported a number of cattle, a few sheep, and some horses from Sydney. The settlers by the first four ships had much to thank the Deans Brothers for. The Riccarton Bush then comprised some sixty acres, extending across what is now the Riccarton Road. The settlers had permission to remove from it what firewood they required free of cost up to a limit which marked what now remains of the bush, owing its preservation to the fostering care of the Deans Brothers, and constituting a monument to their work. Mr. William Deans was drowned going to Wellington on 23rd July, 1851, at the age of thirty-four years, and Mr. John Deans died on 23rd June, 1854. They both passed away at an early age, and were much lamented by the early settlers.

John Gebbie, Mrs. Gebbie, David, John, Mary (now Mrs. John Murray), Marion (now Mrs. John Williams), Andy, William, 1840-50. Mr. John Gebbie and family came to Can-