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The Cyclopedia of New Zealand [Taranaki, Hawke's Bay & Wellington Provincial Districts]

The Trouble With The Maoris

The Trouble With The Maoris.

To understand precisely how the trouble with the natives arose it is necessary to refer to the conditions under which land was first taken up by the Taranaki settlers. The prospectus originally issued by the Plymouth Company stated: “The New Plymouth settlement is intended to consist of two classes of land: (a) the town land, comprising 2,200 sections of a quarter of an acre each; (b) the suburban lands, comprising at least 1,150 sections of fifty acres each. All sales in England will be confined, until further notice, to actual colonists, on the following terms: (1) With a view to distribute as generally as may be practicable the advantages to be derived from the possession of preliminary lands, no application from an individual colonist will be entertained for more than eight allotments of land, each allotment containing one section of town land, and one section of rural land. (2) Two hundred and fifty allotments are set apart as above mentioned at the price of £75 for each allotment, and applications for the same are to be made in writing to the secretary, which, if accompanied by a deposit of £10 in respect to each allotment, will entitle the applicant to receive separate land orders for each town and rural section, with such priorities and rights of selection as are hereinafter mentioned, in exchange for the residue of the purchase money. (3) The numbers signifying the priority of choice for the town sections have been selected on a fair average from the thousand numbers of choice, which have fallen to the Company in the general ballot above referred to. The purchasers will also be entitled to select the rural sections from any land in the Plymouth settlement, surveyed and declared open for choice as rural sections at the time, and according to the order of presenting the land order in the colony, subject only to the regulations of the land office for preserving fairness and regularity of choice.”

It was over the selection of the “rural lands” last mentioned in the prospectus, that the first direct quarrel with the natives arose. By June, 1842, the country districts were sufficiently well surveyed to allow of a choice of selection by the settlers; but when all was ready for the completion of the work, Captain King, the local Protector of Aborigines, protested against the selection taking place, as no lots had been reserved for the Maoris, in accordance with the original terms of purchase from them. But Mr. Wicksteed refused to receive Captain King's protest, or to permit him to select for the Maoris, because the directors of the New Zealand Company had instructed their agent to do so for fear that persons, in selecting for the natives, might interfere with the privileges the Europeans had given them of choosing sections in contiguity with those of their relatives and friends. It was also thought more advisable that the natives should have their land in a block by themselves, for trouble might arise about fencing, and so forth, if the natives and Europeans were mixed indiscriminately on the same block. The idea of getting the two races to live together as neighbours was suggested with a desire to benefit the Maoris; but such a proposition did not seem to answer, as the settlers found the natives an annoyance to have alongside them, for they permitted their pigs to trespass, their curs to worry the sheep, and their neglected page 20 land to produce crops of weeds instead of being farmed properly.

The first actual collision with the natives occurred in July, 1842, and the incident is so important that it may well be told in Mr. Wicksteed's words. Writing to Colonel Wakefield, he says: “You are aware that a considerable number of natives have lately been liberated from the Waikatos, who, some years ago, overran the Taranaki district, and carried off a large number of its inhabitants as their slaves. The manumitted natives are now returning to this district, and not having been parties in the sale of the land to the Company, now complain that they have neither potato ground, nor utu in money or recompense. In point of fact, however, the native reserves are sufficient for a population twenty fold larger than that likely under any circumstances to belong to Taranaki; and I cannot discover among the malcontents a single person who, according to the custom of the natives, has, or had, the right to sell the land. On the contrary, many of those who did sell the land distinctly warned me not to enter into any bargain or treaty with those returned. Not being encouraged by me to expect any utu, some of these natives had recourse to violence, and entered a section on the Mangaoraka, belonging to a peaceful settler named Pearce, burned his cottage, and destroyed some raupo he had for thatching. They then proceeded to the next section where the Messrs Bayly had put up their tents, and were commencing farming operations. They were very furious, brandishing their tomahawks, and attempting to tear down the tent; but the Baylys, very resolute and strong men, resisted, and a short scuffle or wrestling match ensued between one of the brothers and a native, who acted as champion for the assailants. Twice Bayly threw the Maori, but was thrown himself the third time; whereupon the natives crowded round him, and one apparently was going to cleave his skull with a tomahawk, when a bystander levelled his fowling-piece at the native, who then gave way. There were about thirty natives and six white men. A parley ensued, and they agreed to refer the case to me. Accordingly the mob of natives came to my house two days after, and there I told them my determination to put the white settlers on their land, and to call upon the police magistrate to send any native who broke the peace into prison; at the same time assuring them that any chief who had any real title to the land should
Waihi Cemetery: The Graves Of Armed Constabulary and Military Settlers Killed By Titokowaru, Are In The Foreground.

Waihi Cemetery: The Graves Of Armed Constabulary and Military Settlers Killed By Titokowaru, Are In The Foreground.

receive such compensation as Mr. Spain, on his arrival, might award. They very well knew they had no such chief amongst them, and being also certain that I should protect the settlers, they promised to give the Baylys no further annoyance; and they are now very good friends with the settlers, working for them, sleeping in the same tents, and apparently quite satisfied with the excellent land reserved for them in or near that part of the country.”

But the chief opposition to the selection of native lands came from the Waitara, where Mr. Carrington had originally intended to fix the site of the chief town. Here Messrs Goodall and Brown, who were agents for absentee proprietors, had taken up large sections of land; and the natives drove them off, and declared their intention to keep the British settlers to the south of the river. Mr. Wicksteed decided that vigorous action must be taken to compel respect for his authority, and the following is his own account of the sequel: “The day after the riot I called upon Captain Cooke. a magistrate, to swear in a body of special constables, and that gentleman administered the oath in the presence, and with the sanction of Captain King, the chief police magistrate. I put twelve muskets and fifty ball cartridges into the boat, and, accompanied by Mr. Cooke, who nominally commanded the party, proceeded to Waitara, and there we swore in the surveying men, making our force twenty-eight in all. As I fully expected, this demonstration had the desired effect. A long talk with the natives ended in their entire submission, and a promise of better behaviour in the future. Mr. Cooke told the ringleader that on the next occasion of his breaking the peace, he would himself go to the pa and arrest him, and send him for trial to Port Nicholson. We crossed the river, formally took possession of the land, fired a volley by way of asserting our right to act as we had done, and then, but not before, I gave away a few blankets and some tobacco. The principal natives at the Waitara, as well as here, express their satisfaction at the proceedings. Among the settlers there page 21 is but one opinion, and that is in favour of what has been done, and I have received thanks on every side. At present all is quiet, and I think will continue so. I wish it to be particularly observed that I had the express authority and countenance of the magistrate throughout; and I took, what the events proved to be, the best means of preventing an otherwise inevitable collision with the natives.”

But there were men in the country who understood the natives better than Mr. Wicksteed; and Mr. F. A. Carrington's version of the episode, and the judgment that he passed upon it, place the affair in a very different light. The Chief Surveyor's account of the Waitara affair, as quoted in Seffern's “History of Taranaki” reads thus: “Some time after the drawing, for choice of the rural sections, it was discovered that an oversight had been committed in not ascertaining what the first order of choice should be for the natives. I consequently saw and told Captain King not to trouble himself about the matter, as I would find out from the natives what sections they would like to have at the Waitara and elsewhere, and make a note to that effect on the map. This I did, and on the 13th of June, 1842, seven days before the selection of rural lands took place, some of the settlers called upon me to say that they had heard I was going to reserve certain sections of land at Waitara and elsewhere for the natives. I told them I was going to do so. They objected to my so doing, and finding that I would not yield to their opinion, they saw the Company's agent on the subject, and he sided with them. Subsequently Captain King and myself talked the matter over, and we resolved to do all in our power to rescue for the aborigines the sections of land which they had requested me to choose for them, and which I promised them they should have, and upon some of which sections there were native clearings, gardens, and several whares.

“On the day of the selection, the 20th of June, 1842, I laid upon my office table a plan showing the sections of rural land offered, and on a few of them, which the natives wished to have, on the banks of the Waitara, and at the junction of the Waiongonga and Mangaoraka rivers, I had marked in pencil on the plan the word ‘native.’ On some of the settlers seeing this, a warm discussion arose, and Captain King—who was, for the time, Protector of Aborigines—and the Company's agent (Mr. Wicksteed) went outside my office and held a conversation. Captain King afterwards told me that he had either read or given a protest to the Company's agent. I remember perfectly telling the peoply in my office on that day, in the most emphatic language, and at
Kendall Cascade, Mount Egmont.

Kendall Cascade, Mount Egmont.

the same time striking my hand forcibly on my office table, that if they allowed the natives to have the sections they had requested me to reserve for them, they (the settlers) could in that case obtain all the other sections in peace and quiet; but, if they excluded the aborigines from the said sections, they would never get the land. The Company's agent disregarded my words and Captain King's endeavours, and the settlers were allowed to select, not only the reserves I had made for the aborigines, but also all the desirable sections on both sides of the river Waitara. As I had predicted, difficulties arose. Messrs Goodall and Brown endeavoured to occupy a section they had chosen on the north bank of the Waitara, upon which were several acres of clearings and gardens made by the natives. Failing to get occupation, Messrs Goodall and Brown applied to the Company's agent to put them in possession, and, on the 20th of July, 1842, he, with twenty armed men, went from New Plymouth to Waitara in a boat, and, on arrival there (as I was shortly afterwards informed, for I would not go), fired a volley or two, and in the name of the Queen and the New Zealand Company, took possession of the land—the very land I had promised I would retain for the natives. From this breach of faith has arisen all our native war troubles in New Zealand.”

It is well to give prominence to this incident, because at the time it produced a deep impression, though in different ways, upon both natives and Europeans. The Wellington “Spectator,” of the 13th of August, 1842, speaks approvingly of the action of Mr. Wicksteed, and is accordingly strongly condemned by Mr. Carrington, who scathingly criticises its statements. “In the New Zealand Gazette and Wellington Spectator of the 13th of August, may be seen,” he says, “the untruthful statement and unscrupulous recommendation that induced the Chief Magistrate of Nelson to adopt the course which has led to such fearful consequences in this colony; untruthful, because it stated that the demonstration made with arms at Waitara, “had the desired effect, and ended in the entire submission of the natives,” whereas the effect was quite the reverse, and ended in bitter and determined opposition from the natives at Waitara and elsewhere, and frustrated settlement; unscrupulous, because it recommended a course which was known to be perilous, and likely to lead to contention and bloodshed. The Chief Magistrate of Nelson adopted the course suggested in the Wellington paper. Natives opposed the occupation of the land at Wairau. He, in consequence of their opposition, went with forty or fifty armed men to make a demonstration. The sequel is but too page 22 well known — the massacre of twenty-nine of our fellow colonists without atonement, without redress. Hence the difficulties with the natives in Cook Strait, the Hutt, and other parts of the island. In like manner, Heke, in the north, seeing our apparent inability to punish perpetrators of the Wairau, the Hutt, and Cook's Strait affairs, became emboldened, and resolved, with his tribe, on getting cheaper tobacco, and a more liberal supply of goods and blankets free from taxation, which they hoped to have accomplished when they cut down the British flagstaff at the Bay of Islands, thereby generating for many subsequent years a desultory and demoralising warfare between the races. To me, and to all who have knowledge of Indian character, it will, I think, be clear that Heke and his people would never have attempted the bold and rebellious acts they did, and we should never have had war in the north of New Zealand and elsewhere, had they not witnessed our impotency in the Wairau, the Hutt, and Cook's Strait affairs, and which, as I have already shown, sprang from the wrong doings (and wrftings) perpetrated upon the natives at Waitara.”

It was in this way that a series of unforeseen events initiated, between whites and Maoris, the conflict which was destined to have such disastrous and sanguinary consequences