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Kōrero: Law of the foreshore and seabed

Grant of seabed ownership document, 1845

The English common law assumption that the Crown owned the coastal waters and foreshore was implicit in this grant of seabed. It was given by Governor Robert FitzRoy to two members of the Legislative Council, Frederick Whitaker and Theophilus Heale. The grant allowed miners to follow a copper seam from land on Kawau Island into the sea.

Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi

United Kingdom National Archives

Reference: CO209/60, folio 269

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Me pēnei te tohu i te whārang

Mark Hickford, Law of the foreshore and seabed – The English legal tradition, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/mi/zoomify/8524/grant-of-seabed-ownership-document-1845 (accessed 4 June 2026).

He kōrero nā Mark Hickford, i tāngia i te 2 March 2009, updated 1 January 2015.