Handsome Commemoration

An entrepreneurial Sergeant Major who died in back blocks Taranaki is commemorated with this handsomely inscribed pocket watch in the Puke Ariki Heritage Collection.

The watch was presented to Sergeant Major Thomas Oldfield some time in the 1870s by the non-commissioned officers and constables of Pukearuhe Station. Soon after leaving the force he turned his hand to running a New Plymouth drapery business before speculating in some ill-fated ventures exploiting Taranaki's iron sands. He even briefly owned and operated the smelting works at the mouth of the Te Hēnui stream. After this venture foundered Oldfield turned his hand to surveying until he was felled by a heart attack while mapping a block at the headwaters of the Waitōtara River in 1902.

His watch was rediscovered in a Wellington antique shop in the 1970s and was occasionally used as a dress up prop at parties before being donated to Puke Ariki in 2008.