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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 10, Issue 1 (April 1, 1935)

Huria Matenga, the Brave Swimmer

page 22

Huria Matenga, the Brave Swimmer.

The second subject in this sketch of courageous women is Huria (Julia) Matenga, the young chieftainess of Whakapuaka, on the Nelson coast, whose bravery and humanity at the wreck of the Delaware in 1863 earned her the admiration and praise of both races. She came to be called “New Zealand's Grace Darling.” She was foremost in saving a distressed crew at the risk of her life, in a stormy sea, and her deed of bravery even excelled that of the plucky English girl who rowed off to a wreck with her father, braving the gale to save the perishing.

Julia Matenga, whose Maori name is the native form of both Marsden and Martin, was the wife of a young half-caste chief named Hemi Matenga (James Martin), who had been named after Sir William Martin, one-time Chief Justice of the Colony. They were each about twenty-eight years of age, a handsome couple, tall and stalwart, and they were both strong swimmers. I have never seen a more admirable specimen of the athletic pakeha-Maori blend than Hemi Matenga, erect and straight-backed and powerful even in his seventies. His beautiful wife was the granddaughter of a renowned warrior, Te Puoho, of the Ngati-Toa, the great Rauparaha's tribe (His amazing march from the Nelson country down the West Coast and into Otago and Southland is narrated in the book “Tales of the Maori Bush”). Hemi and Huria lived on their farm at Whakapuaka, near where the cable-station was afterwards established.