European settlement began with the arrival of an advance party of the New Zealand Company on the ship ''Tory'' on 20 September 1839, followed by 150 settlers on the ''Aurora'' on 22 January 1840. Thus the Wellington settlement preceded the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi (on 6 February 1840). The 1840 settlers constructed their first homes at Petone (which they called Britannia for a time) on the flat area at the mouth of the Hutt River. Within months that area proved swampy and flood-prone, and most of the newcomers transplanted their settlement across Wellington Harbour to Thorndon in the present-day site of Wellington city.