Clendon House

Besides missionaries, traders flocked to northern New Zealand from the 1820s. James Clendon, a British trader, first visited the Hokianga in 1829. He did not finally settle there until 1862 after many years moving around the North following trading opportunities. Later in the 1860s he built what is now known as Clendon House at Rawene. He was also a local magistrate. His wife Jane was left with large debts when Captain Clendon died but managed to retain the house by persuading his creditors to allow her to gradually pay off his debts, and brought up her eight children there. As the pou outside the house show, she was of Maori descent and the captain wears an elegant hat.

Jane Clendon lived in the house until 1919 and the house is of interest, apart from its age, for the story it tells of the Clendon family’s long history in Northland. Clendon House has a garden. A 20th Century descendant, James Clendon Tau Henare became a war hero, Northland leader, and was knighted.