In 1800, there were 2000 Maori on the peninsula, Knight estimated. The first whalers and sealers probably reached the harbour in about 1810, and for Maori it was mostly downhill from there. Influenza killed many in the 1820s, and measles claimed another contingent in 1835. Dubouzet, an officer of the Astrolabe, wrote scornfully of Otakou in 1840 as consisting of about 30 wretched huts containing idle, intoxicated men and dirty, unpleasant women. Many women had been prostituted to sailors by their husbands or fathers in exchange for blankets and drink. By 1878, the Maori population had fallen to 116.