The photos on this page cannot be claimed. They belong to the Spiller family and are just put up here because they are of interest.
Digital copies of these photos are available @ $10.00 per photo, per copy. Please use the contact form to request a copy.
This is a photo Russell took of the telegram sent from the Naval Admiralty instructing the commencement of war with Germany – 3rd of September 1939.
This next set of photos were taken by Russell’s older brother, Lal, after the Napier Earthquake in 1931. To the best of our knowledge these photos have remained unpublished until here and now.
Nurses Home, Napier Hospital
Municipal Theatre
St Pauls new church – unfinished
Looking up from Battery Road, Ahuriri end.
Tech College. Cnr Station St and Munroe.
Hastings Street – new Post Office on left.
Possibly the Masonic
Inner harbour emptying out
Pettigrews Corner now, Simla Tce above.
Midland Private Hotel, Thackeray Street. Steam Laundry on right.
Nelson Park
Nelson Park, East side.
Tent City! Nelson Park covered in Bell Tents.
Park Island, Old Mens Home.
Possibly Park Island
HB Club and Dr Moores cracked Hospital.
Possibly Park Island Old Mens Home
Hastings Street. The X on the photo is where Lal Spiller (Russell’s brother) and his Mother were standing when the quake hit. ANother minute or so and they would’ve been in the car, under the rubble. This photo was taken some time after the quake and fire, by a sailor from one of the Navy rescue ship crews. It is also the place where Lal (Lionel) discovered a girl killed by falling buildings. A friend who he knew well and who was to have been married the following Easter.
Hastings Street. Similar scene, but this time, Lal was the photographer and the sailors were in the picture. Tennyson Street on right. Napier’s saviours off sloop H.M.S. Diomede and Veronica. The Cruiser Dunedin arrived the next day.
Tom Parker’s demolition. Tom was the only man with Earthquake Insurance.
Tom Parker’s taylors shop.
[ more to come ]