I have come across a centaury celebration booklet published by Wesley College. It lists past students of the college. Back when the college was still located in Three Kings, Auckland in the year 1896, we have a new entrant by the name of TANIWE, Wirimu (STANAWAY, William).

Exert from Wesley College Roll.

With that name he must be one of JJ’s descendants, but which one?

I have narrowed it down to one of two contenders;

1. William Alfred Henry Stanaway 1875 – 1900 (Son of William Stanaway)
2. James William Stanaway 1880 – 1921 (Son of Henry Stanaway)

From their DOB’s William Henry would have been about 21 years old and therefore perhaps on the too old side of things. He may have been sent to the College in order to change his ways – there is a gap in our records at this time (1895-1898).

James William would have been 16 years old and perhaps more likely to have been sent to the boarding school for a period. We have no records of his early years. His father was known to use Taniwe in lieu of Stanaway.

I would like to hear from anyone who can confirm the TANIWE, Wirimu (STANAWAY, William), mentioned in the Wesley College records.

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Thanks to some detectives we have uncovered some more information.

It appears that William started at the school in 1896 and studied at the school for at least 3 years.

We have a report from the Auckland Star, dated 10 December 1897, which published the results for that year, in which it has William in the Lower division (we assume the junior part of the school) recording a score that year of 365 points, having studied catechism, arithmetic, composition, transcription, geography and reading.

The following year the New Zealand Herald reports on 19 December 1898, William again at the school, this time in the Second Class (We assume the intermediate part of the school) recording that year he studied in 8 subjects and scored 65 points.