Heirloom for sale in bid to save life

ON THE MAP: Wayne Regnault with his family's 19th-century print of a surveyor's plan for Greytown and surrounding areas. PHOTO/ANDREW BONALLACK

A treasured Greytown heirloom will go under the hammer to save the life of a family member with a crippling disease.

Nikki Regnault, who has multiple sclerosis, needs to have stem cell treatment in Asia to try and halt the advance of a disease she has been fighting for 19 years.

The Greytown community have rallied with auction items for the Greytown Lions and Lioness Annual Quiz night this Friday, which will include a rare 19th-century print of a surveyor's map of Greytown, passed down to the Regnaults over four generations.

The lithograph print, entitled Guide Plan of Greytown Surrounding Country (Wellington-Wairarapa), is dated January 1896 and was prepared by Greytown surveyor Thomas McKay Drummond.

The Cyclopedia of New Zealand, 1897, describes how Drummond created an "exceedingly useful plan of Greytown and surrounding districts".

Drummond (1846-1934) settled in Greytown in 1887 and was described as being in "fairly lucrative private practice" in Wairarapa, married with a small family.

The map is a detailed "who's who" of landowners' names from Featherston to Carterton, such as Knowles, Maunsell, Waterson, Pharazyn and Ticehurst - the family the Regnaults are related to. The National Library also holds a copy. Wayne Regnault, Nikki's husband, said the map had come via the Ticehurst side of the family, his great-grandfather on his mother's side.

Mr Regnault said the idea was that the map would keep passing down the family but "if it goes towards saving a family member's life, that's a greater purpose".

"That's the reality for Nikki, with MS. It's not kind. We've got to pull out all the stops to get there and we definitely need help."

He said they had never had the map valued, because they had never been of a mind to sell it. "We've kept the map to ourselves. It hangs in our lower lounge, a nice, quiet place. We go to when we want a bit of peace.

"So it's most definitely a wrench [to part with it], it doesn't sit easy."

He said they were hopeful Nikki was going to "get through life" but the disease has "moved into a different phase".

"She's an amazing fighter, she puts a great picture on, but there's lots behind the scenes. We have to go to Singapore."

Wakefield Antiques owner Mike Perry will host the auction, at the South Wairarapa Working Men's Club this Friday at 7.30pm.

Included in the 27-item auction are a dinner for two at a restaurant in Wellington; four corporate tickets to the Warriors; two nights away in the Marlborough Sounds; and a three-night Castlepoint holiday. The cost of treatment would be about $200,000 over three months.

- Quiz entry forms can be collected from the Greytown Primary School library or South Wairarapa Computers on Hastwell St as well as at http://www.lionsclubs.org.nz/Clubs/202M/Zone-4/Greytown