Pastoral Beginnings and Pioneer Lineage
Henry Godfrey established the property in the 1840s, squatting on Wairau land before obtaining a formal license in 1850 and a Crown Grant in 1852.1 He named the run Woodbourne after his family home in Oxford, England.2 Following his 1852 marriage to Eliza Jane Harley, one of only eight Pākehā women living in the Wairau at the time, the couple established early farm infrastructure.3 Eliza's memoirs record the domestic realities of pioneer life, including baking bread, processing cornflour, and making butter, cheese, and haggis.4 Initial construction comprised a six-room cob cottage, a four-stall cob stable with smoking quarters for farm hands, a stone-lined well, and a ditch-and-bank containment system topped with hawthorn hedges, later supplemented by Marlborough's first iron standard and steel wire fencing.5
In the mid-1850s, Godfrey constructed Marlborough's first water-powered flourmill on Mill Stream, featuring a breast waterwheel that supplied flour directly to local settlers and the 1860s Wakamarina goldfields.6 When stream levels dropped, Godfrey operated the mill with a steam engine, representing the first use of steam power in the district.7 To accommodate his expanding family, Godfrey commissioned architect Mr Sloane in 1860 to design a two-storey timber homestead.8 Built in 1862 by Nelson carpenters using on-site fired bricks and imported English slate tiles, the residence featured seven fireplaces and roughly dressed timber interiors.9 Tragic circumstances struck in August 1868 when a diphtheria epidemic claimed Henry Godfrey at age forty-two alongside three of his children.10 Eliza managed the farm and mill accounts before leasing the land to the Redwood and Fairhall families in 1874.11
Over its history, ownership has passed through three families: the Godfreys (1840s–1907), the Fairhalls (1907–1946), and the Walsh family (1946–present).12
The Dawn of Aviation and Trans-Tasman Flight
Technological developments continued into the early twentieth century. In 1900, a 110-metre deep artesian well was sunk beside the homestead and operated via an interior Douglas hand pump.13 In 1928, Irish immigrant Dick Dermody built a concrete horse trough surmounted by water tanks near the original well site.14 Aviation history at Woodbourne commenced during the 1920s when the Marlborough Aero Club, New Zealand's first flying club, began utilising farm paddocks as an airfield.15 In October 1928, Australian aviator Sir Charles Kingsford Smith selected the site for his historic return journey to Australia aboard the Southern Cross following the first non-stop trans-Tasman flight from Sydney to Christchurch.16
To create an adequate takeoff strip for the heavily laden trimotor, farm workers removed boundary fences across more than 200 acres.17 Kingsford Smith departed Woodbourne and reached Sydney in 22 hours and 51 minutes, establishing the first direct aerial crossing from New Zealand to Australia.18 Woodbourne was chosen over Christchurch to avoid the hazards of the Southern Alps, saving approximately two hours of flying time.19 Between 1920 and 1936, the Nelson-Marlborough Mounted Rifles held regular military encampments in the tree plantation known as 'the forest'.20 Commercial aviation expanded in 1935 with the erection of a passenger terminal serving Union Airways and Cook Strait Airways.21
World War II Expansion and RNZAF Fairhall Base
With the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939, the New Zealand Government proclaimed part of the property for defence purposes, creating RNZAF Base Woodbourne and its satellite aerodrome, RNZAF Fairhall.22,23 Between August 1942 and June 1943, Fighter Squadrons 14, 15, 16, 17, and 18 operated from the farm, training airmen for operational deployments in the Pacific while defending the Wellington and Marlborough regions against potential Japanese invasion.24,25 The 1862 timber homestead served as the station Officers' Mess, where airmen carved their names into the living room door and hung sixteen Japanese flag symbols from an upper window to mark overseas aerial victories.26
Military engineers constructed temporary facilities across the property, utilizing the mature tree plantations for natural camouflage.27 Infrastructure included fifteen parabolic timber-framed Nissen hangars for P-40 Kittyhawk fighters, a concrete food safe, a dining mess, and defensive foxhole trenches.28,29 Following the war, all temporary hangars were slated for removal, but Mahon Walsh successfully negotiated to retain one Nissen hangar adjacent to the cob stables.30 Clad in iron over its original plywood and malfoid shell, the structure served as an implement shed and remains one of only four surviving in situ Nissen hangars in New Zealand.31
Agricultural Evolution and Viticulture Legacy
Mahon Walsh acquired the historic core of the farm in 1946, expanding agricultural operations into lucerne seed production.32 In October 1959, Woodbourne hosted Marlborough's first vintage farm machinery show as part of the regional centennial celebrations.33 Photographed and documented by historian Norman Brayshaw, this exhibition provided the impetus for the founding of Brayshaw Heritage Park in Blenheim.34 In 1962, a memorial marker incorporating a millstone and cast iron cog machinery from Godfrey's 1850s flourmill was erected at the New Renwick Road entrance.35
John and Lynne Walsh continued the family's custodial stewardship, pioneering deer farming on the property in 1977 before planting their first grapevines in 1989 during Marlborough's expansion into viticulture.36 Listed as a Category 1 Historic Place by Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga, Woodbourne Homestead and Historic Farm preserves rare archaeological remnants, including the 1850s mill dam wall, cob stable ruins, artesian well, and Nissen hangar, alongside working agricultural fields and defense facilities.37,38