Pennington Road (Brixton)

Pennington Road in Brixton is named after Joseph Pennington, whose surname comes from an Old English word referring to a farm rented for a penny.

Born in Lincolnshire in 1832, Joseph Pennington enlisted in the British Army as a teenager following the death of his mother. He served with the Grenadier Guards before joining the 57^th Regiment, the so-called Die Hards. After fighting in the Crimean War (where he claimed to have met Florence Nightingale) and India, he was sent to New Zealand, arriving in New Plymouth on the ship Star Queen in January 1861. Whilst housed with other members of his regiment in the soldiers’ barracks on Marsland Hill, Joseph met red-haired Hannah Rundle, who had immigrated with her parents and six siblings on the Amelia Thompson in 1842. The couple were married just months later, on 13 June 1861.

After seeing action in several campaigns during the New Zealand Wars, Joseph took his discharge in Auckland in 1867 rather than return to England. He appears to have run the Prince Arthur Hotel for a time, but by 1880 he and his family were back in Taranaki and Joseph was a member of the Waitara Town Board. He also worked as an auctioneer, selling land and cattle. The Penningtons moved to Opunake around 1886 then to Inglewood around 1890. Joseph continued to work as a land agent but was also appointed Inglewood Town Clerk and a Justice of the Peace. The local Magistrate’s Court was held in a building he owned known as Pennington Hall.

Joseph and Hannah had four sons and four daughters, two of whom died in childhood. The surviving Penningtons were all very involved in community life – son Frederick owned a butchery and later a boarding house, and daughter Ada ran a private school. Joseph was a founding member of the Inglewood Bowling Club and Masonic Lodge, and Pennington Park in Waitara is named after his grandson Harry, who gifted the land.

Joseph Pennington died at his home in Inglewood on Thursday 20 June 1912 at the age of 80 and is buried in Inglewood Cemetery.

This story was originally published in the Taranaki Daily News.