Washbourn Creek Place Name Report

The report considered by the New Zealand Geographic Board Ngā Pou Taunaha o Aotearoa (NZGB) at its meeting on 27 March 2009.

• Washbourn Creek (spelling correction)

Parapara Inlet – Golden Bay, Nelson

General Background

The submitter is seeking to have the spelling corrected from Washbourne Creek to Washbourn Creek. The submitter provides supporting evidence that this feature was named after William Everley Washbourn (1819-1888), a British settler, who with his sons, and using the iron ore from the area, established and operated a paint manufacturing plant at Parapara, near Collingwood in the 1870s and 1880s.

The submitter has provided a significant number of reference sources to help verify the spelling of Washbourn, and the significant connection that the family had in the area. The Reed Dictionary of New Zealand Place Names (2002) includes an entry for Washbourn Creek in Tasman, and notes it as being named after William Washbourn, who arrived in 1857 bringing all his possessions in on two bullocks.

The name Washbourne Creek has not been gazetted as official through the NZGB Act, however, it appears twice in the New Zealand Place Names Database (Archived) as recorded names:

Washbourne Creek	Washbourne Creek
District: Canterbury Description: STREAM: Natural watercourse Lat: -43.3253 Long: 171.0792 NZMG Easting: 2354240.2 NZMG Northing: 5763077.8 NZMS 260 sheet: J35	District: Nelson Description: STREAM: Natural watercourse Lat: -40.7465 Long: 172.6741 NZMG Easting: 2482470.9 NZMG Northing: 6051250.6 NZMS 260 sheet: M25

Changing Washbourne Creek to Washbourn Creek should not cause confusion as both the current and proposed name are pronounced the same. Washbourne Creek in the Southern Alps is far enough away geographically so as not to cause confusion.

There are a number of streets and roads throughout New Zealand with the name of Washbourn or Washbourne(s). Washbourn Road in Onekaka is nearby, but should not cause confusion as Washbourn
Creek is appended by the geographic feature type.

Map

For a larger scale version of this map please refer to the pdf version of the Washbourn Creek place name report (pdf 1.98MB).

NZGB - Investigation Report - Clarke River - 2009-03-27, for Meeting of 27 March 2009, LINZ file reference: GES-N15-07-07/896/01.