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experiencing ‘Coromandel Life’ for almost a century
Born-bred-and-stayed on the Coromandel,
Bill and Eva, both in their nineties, just
celebrated their 74th anniversary in July.
Eva grew up in Tairua where parents, Charles
and Mary Beach, owned and operated the
old general store and Beachland campground
(located on land now owned by Tairua Fishing
Club and Tairua Residential Care.)
“I attended the original Tairua school which
was later moved and now forms part of the
Tairua Country Club.” Leaving school at 12, Eva
then worked for her family in the Beach Store.*
Bill was 17 when he came to Tairua from his
home in Wharepoa to live with his uncle, Lige
Green, farm manager for the Cory-Wrights.
He was amazed to see the surf – his earliest
memory on arrival. He’d never seen the
ocean before.
“My uncle had been a butcher before he came
to Tairua”, says Bill. “I learnt a lot while working
with him: butchery, running the piggery,
shearing, carpentry, fencing, horsemanship,
and general farm work”. Skills that served him
throughout his lifetime.
Together they supplied meat to camps that
sent pack horses down once a week. They also
made local deliveries that included the Beach
home which is how Bill met Eva. I teased Eva:
was it love at first sight? “Well”, Eva laughs,
“Tairua was a very small town then – only 15
houses – so he didn’t have much of a choice!”
Bill remembers how plentiful crayfish were
back then and how they’d even use them as
bait to catch huge snapper (shaking his head
now at the absurdity of this waste). He tells
of how mate Billy Dick’s dad “would flip over
backwards off a favourite flat rock fishing spot,
and come up with a crayfish in each hand”.
Bill worked for the Cory-Wrights about four
years. Because of dedication to the job, he
was given a wage increase even before his first
pay. Bill played on both the local cricket and
rugby teams organised by Harold Cory-Wright
who provided the playing fields on his property.
“Could be a reason he hired me,” he jokes.**
Eva adds, “And my father was actually the
rugby team selector at the time,”
MARRIED LIFE, THE WAR & FARMING
Eva and Bill were married in Thames in 1941,
shortly before Bill was called up to serve in
the army, based first at Pukekohe then at
Warkworth. As food supplies dwindled in NZ,
those with connections to the land were eligible
to leave the service and return to farming. Bill
was sponsored back to run the Beach family
farm in Tairua (located on the hill south of the
Tairua School) as Eva’s brothers, Alan and Pat,
had both been called up to serve; sadly, their
father Charles had died early that year from his
old war injuries. Bill returned to his new wife
and helped keep the Beach family farm going,
hand-milking 22 cows.
“We also worked on Dave Hamilton’s Hikuai farm
where Robert, our first child, was born,” says
Eva. Bill continued his army training in the Home
Guard reporting twice a month at Hikuai Hall.
In 1943 Bill and Eva moved to Bill’s father’s
farm in Turua. “Many of the workers had gone
off to war,” says Bill, “and the place was left
with all belongings dusty but intact.” Fescue
paddocks welcomed the young farmers,
and their next five children were born there –
BILL and EVA DARRAH
Peninsula pioneers
We have published feature articles about these two, but as individuals; they shared stories from the
early days of Tairua – Bill and his rugby, Eva’s memories of the school. It has been a delight to learn
even more about their lives recently, witnesses to so much history and change on the Coromandel.
I met up with this enduring couple at daughter Jan Collier’s home in Tairua, back where their life journey
together began. They were here to attend the local Anzac Day ceremonies, and Eva proudly wore her
father’s (Charles Beach) WWI service medals on her coat (see photo). The war cost him dearly: he wore
an arm brace from a battle injury, and the longterm effects from trench gassing led to his early death.
-Tovi Daly
* Read Eva’s memories of Tairua school years: ** Read Bill’s memories of Tairua’s early rugby team:
50 COROMANDEL LIFE 2015 SPRING/HOLIDAY
Right: Employed as a farm hand for the Cory-Wright family, Bill Darrah
initially worked on the flats of Tairua with the sheep – mustering the
hills, checking on cattle and shooting boars that killed the lambs in the
Sailor’s Grave area. Bill rode almost as far as Boat Harbour Road, near
the northern boundary of the Cory-Wright farm.
...continued page 47
Eva at ‘Snook’s swimming hole’ and the swing bridge across Tairua
River on the Puketui Valley Road. Remains of the bridge can still be
seen. Read a harrowing account of a pack train’s bridge crossing: