The South Island's oldest church... and the woman who calls it her second home

Born a century and a day after St John’s opened, Caroline Gibbs’ life is inextricably linked with the historic church, writes

On Friday evenings when her children were small, Caroline Gibbs would leave her husband in charge and head to St John’s. With no piano at home, she relished the chance to play the organ in the empty church, working through her favourite hymns and choosing the order for the upcoming Sunday service.

In those days, she had to feel her way through the dark interior to the main switch. People would ask her if she was spooked by the dark building. ‘‘But I wasn’t, it is my second home,’’ Gibbs says.

Perched on the brow of the hill in Wakefield’s Edward St, St John’s Anglican Church is considered New Zealand’s oldest parish church in continuous use, and the oldest church in the South Island.

On October 9 – a few days before Gibbs’ 75th birthday – the congregation will turn out to celebrate St John’s 175th anniversary.

The small, pretty church was built in 1846, its £111 cost footed by the Anglican Church. Sawmill magnate Edward Baigent – whose wife Mary Ann had founded Wakefield School three years earlier – donated five pounds worth of timber and oversaw construction.

Baigent’s invoice contained a note that ‘‘Mrs Reay drew a design for the church which was approved’’.

Today, the short sentence holds significance: while it took years for her contribution to be recognised, Baigent’s note has cemented the reverend’s wife Marianne Reay’s place in history as New Zealand’s first female architect.

‘‘Women did not get credit for things in those days, did they?’’ Gibbs says.

A hundred years and a day after Reverend Charles Reay conducted the first service on October 11, 1846, Gibbs was born. She attended her first service at 6 weeks old and was baptised at the font a few weeks later. Over the decades, Gibbs has attended countless services at St John’s. She was confirmed and married in the church, and baptised her sons there. She has held numerous positions – most recently, people’s warden – has occasionally rung the bell (a job her father used to do), and has played the organ for services since she was 17 years old.

And they have shared their significant birthdays: at the church’s 150th anniversary celebration, Gibbs was presented with a cake to mark her 50th year.

For Gibbs, the building’s kauri panels, leadlight windows and worn pews are as familiar as her own living room. As a child, she remembers ‘‘losing herself’’ in the stained-glass windows depicting St John.

The delicately rendered windows were paid for by Elizabeth and Sarah Bullard, ‘‘two spinster sisters’’ who lived in Arrow St, Gibbs says.

Although they donated the funds in 1947, it took five years to get approval from the diocese.

‘‘They said it was too much money to spend on an old church,’’ Gibbs says. Gibbs remembers another anecdote about the Bullard sisters, a story related to her by her grandmother. ‘‘They had a big old square car but they could not reverse, so they had a garage with doors at each end, so they could go right through.’’

Another story Gibbs likes to tell visitors is that of Reverend Francis Tripp, who stayed in the parish between 1863 and 1868.

During that time, he performed 17 marriages but registered only four.

‘‘When the bishop found out, Tripp got the push and they had to have an act of parliament to legalise the marriages,’’ Gibbs says. ‘‘As you can imagine it was not the done thing back then to not be married.’’

The disgraced reverend ‘‘dashed off to Australia’’, leaving his horse behind. Records show Tripp died at 44 in Queensland, where it seems he was better received: the Cooktown Courier reporting after his death that the reverend was ‘‘followed to the grave by nearly all the most influential residents of the town’’.

Not all the church’s stories are written by a human hand: on the chancel ceiling you can make out muddy paw prints, made by a cat picking its way across the timber when it sat in Baigent’s sawmill.

The prints, faded now, never fail to amuse visitors, Gibbs says.

A few years ago, a vicar suggested they wipe the ceiling clean. ‘‘We nearly lynched him,’’ Gibbs says. ‘‘It is peculiar to us and we felt it was important to leave.’’

In the steeply sloping churchyard overlooking Edward St, Gibbs points out her parents’ graves and the plot that will one day mark her final resting place. She is pleased her mother’s plot looks down on the school, where she taught for 21 years. ‘‘It is the best view in Wakefield.’’

Gibbs has always lived in or around the town. ‘‘My roots are down so deep, I would not want to leave now.’’

Each Sunday at 9am, about 20 people attend services at the old church. For the loyal congregation, it is a way of keeping heritage alive alongside their faith.

‘‘People are proud of the church. It is the oldest church in New Zealand that has regular use and we would like to keep it that way,’’ Gibbs says. ‘‘Even people who don’t have anything to do with the church, there is a sense of ownership: it is there looking over Wakefield.’’

Gibbs chuckles at a question about whether any ghosts have been spotted at the historic site.

‘‘I am not aware of any. But when I go, there will be because it will probably be me, I have been here so long. But it will be a friendly one.’’

On Saturday October 9, St John’s will celebrate its 175th anniversary with a re-enactment walk, led by Nelson Bishop Steve Maina. The congregation will leave the Spring Grove Drill Hall about 11am and will walk along the cycle trail to Edward St. On arrival, walkers will be greeted by Reverend Harvey Ruru, and there will be exhibitions, music and a hangi during the afternoon.