The Elms Mission House

To visit The Elms is to catch a glimpse of life in New Zealand in the early days of European settlement. The fine, late-Georgian Mission House was started in 1838 as the home of Rev A N Brown of the Church Missionary Society, and was occupied continuously until 1991 by descendents of Archdeacon Brown's second wife. The library, constructed in 1839 the oldest free-standing library in the country, still has most of the original books. Items of furniture brought from England in 1829 include an oval table around which British officers dined on the eve of the battle of Gate Pa.