By Sorrel Hoskin

Frederic Carrington's journal is very good at keeping secrets - it's held one for 160 years without telling.

It's kept people guessing about what's hidden among the 163 pages carefully held together with a linen strap.  A blob of red wax with the Carrington family seal stops prying fingers from entering. Written across the front in pencil are the words 'private correspondence only'.

Sealed Tight: what's hidden in the sealed section of Frederic Carrington's journal?

The main journal contains letters written by Carrington when he was chief surveyor of the Plymouth Company, to Colonel Wakefield, the principal of the company in the early 1840s. Although there's been plenty of supposition no-one knows what's in the sealed section at the back.

Some believe it is personal family letters Carrington did not want his employers to see when he was required to hand over his documents on leaving the Plymouth Company in 1843. Others believe it contains letters critical of Colonel Wakefield, damning the company he worked for.

The journal was gifted to the Taranaki Museum by Olave Deacon in 1922 with the proviso that the sealed section should not be opened.

In 1966 former Mayor E.O.E Hill created an outcry when he asked the museum to make the sealed section public.

After great debate and speculation over what the journal could be hiding it was decided by the museum and the Carrington family to keep it sealed.

Rumour had it that the seal was to be broken 100 years after Carrington's death - but that did not happen in 2001.

Today the journal is kept in the archives at Puke Ariki.