A river to cross
Albert Town was the first. It began as a ferry crossing, operated by the local pastoralists. When the goldminers began their rush to the Arrow and Skippers diggings, George Hassing placed a new boat on the river to cope with the demand.
In 1861 David Robertson built an accommodation house on the north bank of the Clutha River (Mata-Au) just below its confluence with the Hāwea River. Later, in 1862 Henry Norman, formerly manager at Roy’s Station, took over the accommodation house and the ferry service, naming them the Albert Hotel and the Albert Crossing after Prince Albert, Queen Victoria’s recently deceased husband. He also opened a small store.
The tiny settlement soon became known as Albert Town, and the name remained despite it being given the official title of Newcastle (after the Duke of Newcastle) when it was surveyed in 1863 by John Connell. The survey covered the south side of the river as well, where Robert Kidd had a small hotel and when sections were sold in 1865, Norman bought several and shifted his hotel and store over to the site of the present town. Like Pembroke (now Wānaka) the street names on the original survey are named after coastal locations in Ireland from Dublin to Waterford. They are Wicklow Terrace, Kingstown, Rosslare, Kish, Nook, Kinnibeg, Arklow and Wexford Streets.
Albert Town was the centre of the Hāwea/Wānaka region for almost a decade largely because of its role in communications. Until 1873 it was the postal terminus, and the arrival of the mail coach would see the town fill up with men from the outlying districts. It was the site of the first school which opened in 1868.
The floods late in September 1878 destroyed all evidence of Newcastle on the north bank, and the only reminder of the name is Newcastle Road in Hāwea Flat. Guests at Norman’s hotel had to flee as about a metre of muddy water swirled through their rooms. Houses, trees, animals and punts, were carried away. Lake Wānaka rose 4.26 metres above normal. Across the Clutha River at Rocky Point (between Luggate and Queensberry) a new bridge had been built, and the flood came on the eve of its opening. With an impish delight, the river changed its course and left the bridge high and dry.
By 1878, Albert Town’s position as a commercial centre of the region was being challenged by Pembroke. In the 1880s the town could boast a blacksmith, John Hardie and later a taxidermist. But its role as a river crossing kept it important, the punts remaining in operation until 1930 when the Clutha was finally bridged, just above the town.
The Albert Town punt, about to cross with a car
Sources: Ken Thomlinson: Aspiring Settlers John H Angus