Nugent Street

The Nugents were a prominent Anglo-Norman family. The Nugents had accompanied William the Conqueror from Normandy to England and had fought at the Battle of Hastings.  

In 1172 Sir Gilbert de Nogent went to Ireland with Sir Hugh de Lacy.   Through a clever marriage to de Lacy's daughter, he was granted the Barony of Delvin in County Westmeath, and distributed this large tract of land among his brothers.

The Nugent celebrated by our Bell Block street was born Charles Lavallin Nugent, in 1815 at Portaferry in Ireland. Portaferry, whose name comes from the Irish ‘Port a' Pheire’, meaning "landing place of the ferry", is a small town in County Down.

Charles Nugent served in “Heke’s War” of 1845-6, being involved in the attack on Ruapekapeka pā.

At St Paul's Church, Auckland, in 1848 he married Charlotte, the daughter of Major-General George Dean Pitt, whose family arrived in Auckland on the Minerva in 1847. Pitt was Lieutenant-Governor of the former New Zealand Province of New Ulster.

Charles and Charlotte had seven children.

A land deed on parchment, dated 1856, refers to allotments near the intersection of Symonds Street and Karangahape Road, Auckland leased from Charles Lavallin Nugent.

Major Nugent served for some years as Native Secretary, and completed the first overland crossing from Wellington to Auckland.

In 1855 the Duke of Portland brought troops of the 58th Regiment from Auckland, accompanied by some 200 tons of “warlike stores”. Under the command of Major Nugent, these were the first troops to arrive in New Plymouth.

Major General Charles Lavallin Nugent died on 3 November 1884 at Southsea, Hampshire, England, aged 68. 

His eldest son George, attached to the Royal Engineers, was blown up in 1842 while setting a bomb outside a fort in Afghanistan.

This story was originally published in the Taranaki Daily News.