Our earliest ancestry arrivals to New Zealand were on the fourth ship to Wellington from Scotland, which was called 'Bengal Merchant', it was chartered by the New Zealand Company.   They left Glasgow on 30th October 1839, weighing anchor on the Clyde on the 31st under the auspices of the Company.  For Scotland it was a historical event, so they celebrated in style, Lord Provost of Glasgow went on board and made a speech, and the band was playing. The settlers arrived on the 20th February 1840 from Scotland, 14 days after the Treaty of Waitangi. Samuel Burnet and his wife Arbuthnot (Bertha) Clatchie and their three children, as well as her brother George McLatchie arrived in Wellington off Somes Island on the Pito-one (now known as Petone) side.  The Scots had their first mass on the beach of Pito-one.  There were a number of  floods, and an earthquake which caused a lot of the families to move into Wellington, some moved to Australia and some moved back home to England disgusted.  There were six families that stayed on, the Burnet's were one of them, eventually they all moved inland to the Wairarapa, and beyond, whereas the Burnet's made their way to Taita, and settled there.  Samuel set up a mill and provided Wellington with their first wharf.  Sometime after moving to New Zealand the Burnet's added an extra "T" to their name.

Our earliest birth was John Webster Sr, no actual date but his son John Jr was born in 1688 in England, which would mean that the earliest death would be after 1688.  It also means that when John Sr got married it would have been the earliest marriage.

The earliest birth in New Zealand were Samuel & Bertha Burnet's daughter Elizabeth on 14 September 1840 in Petone, Wellington, which means that Bertha was pregnant while at sea on the way to New Zealand.  
 
The earliest death in New Zealand was in 1842 where Edmund Herne Cording Sr and his granddaughter Elizabeth Cook died within the 5 months after their arrival from England.  Edmund died of inflammation on 31 October, he was 53.  Elizabeth died of dropsy around that time, she was 2 1/2 years old.  They had immigrated from England on 18 December 1841, arriving in Petone on the 'Clifford' on 11 May 1842.

The first wedding in New Zealand was Samuel & Bertha Burnett's daughter Mary Burnet.  In 1848 when she was 17 she married Peter Trotter.  They settled as a married couple in Makara, Wellington, and raised a family there.