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Port Molyneux : the story of Maori and pakeha in South Otago : a centennial history : commemorating the landing of George Willsher and his companions at Willsher Bay, June 28, 1840 : with a programme for the unveiling of the centennial cairn, erected by the Clutha County Council, June 28, 1940

The Accident At Timaru

The Accident At Timaru.

In his “Jubilee History of South Canterbury” Johannes Christian Andersen gives some details of Tuhawaiki's death:-

“The name of Tuhawaiki is perpetuated in Bloody Jack's Point, south of Timaru… He was drowned at the point which bears his name… At a date soon after the signing of the deed by which the Maoris conveyed Otakou to the New Zealand Company—say, about the middle of 1844. He was coming north in a whaleboat by night, and a boy on board wanting a drink of water, he steered for the shore at a place called Mutu–mutu, where there was a spring of fresh water… He had slightly misjudged his position in the dark, and found when close inshore that he was almost on the reef. Having the steer oar, he swung the boat clear, but was himself knocked overboard. The boat reached the shore, but Tuhawaiki was drowned, and in the words of the Maori narrator, ‘his body was not found for weeks and days, and was then half eaten by fish.’ He was a well tattooed young man, at the time only about thirty years of age…”

This makes Tuhawaiki a “young man” at his death; other records say he was “a middle–aged chief.” To a young man of twenty, perhaps thirty years of age may seem middle–aged; to one of sixty, a man of fifty years may appear middle–aged. It is most likely that Tuhawaiki was about forty years of age when he died. It is impossible to fix the date of his birth. It is difficult to fix the date of his death.