Otago was the most advanced district in land-title survey methods and techniques. J. T. Thomson, Chief Surveyor of Otago, was appointed the first Surveyor-General for the colony following the abolition of provincial government in 1876. He and his team of Chief Surveyors tackled the problem of improving the state of surveys with ability and energy. A system of meridional circuits controlled by triangulation networks was laid down. By the end of the nineteenth century the whole of the country had been covered by a triangulation system that has served, until recently, most of New Zealand's survey and mapping needs. This accomplishment sealed the Crown's guarantee of the measurements and areas for land parcels.

The Surveyor-General immediately established a Surveyors' Board, which was responsible for the qualification of land surveyors and the review of the qualifications of all surveyors then employed in Government and private practice. A land-surveying profession was thus established, responsible to the Crown for the accuracy and indefeasibility of land-title boundaries. Thus the Crown's guarantee of the accuracy of land title surveys was safeguarded. Uniform regulations for the control of land-title surveys carried out under the Land Act, the Public Works Act, the Maori Land Act, the Mining Act, and the Land Transfer Act, and for the provision of survey records and cadastral maps, were gazetted. Ever since, the offices of the Registrar-General of Lands and the Surveyor-General have been closely linked in their administration of the land-title registration system. In districts, the Chief Surveyor is responsible to the District Land Registrar for the approval of all surveys of land subdivisions carried out under the Land Transfer Act. Such approval is necessary before the District Land Registrar may issue title to the land. The merits of the work of these early surveyors is proved by the fact that there has been no fundamental change in the land-title survey system since its inception in 1876. A professional institute was set up in 1881, comprising both Government and private surveyors. It has helped its members to keep abreast with the latest technical developments and has maintained a high standard in the profession.

The New Zealand Company had bought from the Maoris large tracts of land in the Wellington and Taranaki districts and in the South Island. Settlements were established in the Wellington district in 1840, in the Manawatu and Taranaki districts in 1841, in the Nelson and Marlborough districts in 1842, in the Otago district in 1848, and in the Canterbury district in 1850. Settlement had been preceded by explorations by a band of surveyors who designed and surveyed the towns and rural allotments to accommodate the increasing flow of selected immigrants. With the setting up of the provinces under the Constitution Act of 1852, the office of Surveyor-General was abolished, because it was impossible to maintain any effective central control of surveys, especially as there was hardly any overland communication between the scattered settlements. Under a Provincial Superintendent, a Lands and Survey Office was responsible for all land administration within each provincial district. A Chief Surveyor had autonomous control and direction of all surveys within his district. Unfortunately, in the nine provincial districts ultimately set up, the standards of land-title surveying and the techniques and methods used in the office and in the field varied greatly. Rapid settlement and its demand for surveys led to inferior work being done by men who were not adequately qualified. In the Auckland and Taranaki districts the Maori Wars of the 1860s (brought about by land disputes) disrupted land settlement, and survey work fell behind.

After conferences between provincial and Government officials, and after receiving a report on the state of the surveys of the colony by Major Palmer of the Ordnance Survey of Great Britain, the Government of New Zealand accepted the following general recommendations: the surveys of New Zealand be placed under the central control and direction of a Surveyor-General; a system of triangulation be provided to control the accuracy of surveys; and no person be permitted to carry out land-title surveys unless he had obtained a licence after passing an examination set by the Surveyor-General.

It was fortunate that some of the provincial survey officers were outstanding surveyors who had had experience and training with the survey of India and the Ordnance Survey of Great Britain. In four of the provincial districts these men had already established limited triangulation and standard traverse systems for survey control and an orderly method of reference for cadastral surveys within their districts. By the early 1860s most districts had adopted the theodolite for the observation of bearings and angular measurements, and by 1872 the continuous steel band had been universally adopted for distance measurements. Land-title boundary marks were related to permanent survey monuments established by triangulation of standard traverses, and the accuracy for land-title surveys was 1 in 8,000 in urban areas and 1 in 4,000 in rural areas.

Under this treaty the Maori tribes surrendered the sovereignty of New Zealand to the Crown, but retained the ownership of the land, excluding that which was subject to land claims. When a Government was established under Governor Hobson, one of the four officials who accompanied him was Felton Mathew, first Surveyor-General. It was his responsibility to recommend to the Governor sites suitable for towns and settlement, to lay out roads for access to settlement lands, to define the boundaries of such land, to provide a system of land records, and to establish a land-title registry. This was a heavy task for one man and a few assistants, especially as the sailing ship was the only mode of travel between the far-flung settlements. But Felton Mathew had foresight. He laid out the site of the Auckland City, providing for Albert Park, and showing on his first map of the city (1842) the identical location of the foreshore access road across the Orakei Basin, which was not developed until 100 years later.

Meanwhile the New Zealand Company had established its first settlement in Wellington. The most important administrative unit was the Survey Office, first under the direction of a Surveyor-General, later called the Chief Surveyor. The Company recruited some outstanding surveyors from the Ordnance Survey of Great Britain. Many of them had had experience in the survey of India, where a triangulation system had been laid down as a basis for land-title survey. In the Wellington district it was almost impossible for the surveyors to keep ahead of the settlers' demands for town and rural land. In the steep and broken forest-covered terrain, the job of finding suitable land meant exploring territory as distant as the Wairarapa and Manawatu districts. These were often epic journeys.

The story of the development of New Zealand may almost be found in the history of the surveying and mapping of its territory. The land surveyor was the forerunner of settlement, the explorer of the hinterlands, the roadmaker, and the designer of its towns and cities. In the pioneering era the work of the surveyor was difficult in the extreme. New Zealand has some 3,000 miles of indented and irregular coastline enclosing a total area of 103,000 sq. miles. The terrain is dissected by mountain ranges and turbulent rivers and streams, and the dense rain forests and the lack of communications presented unique logistic and technical problems for the land surveyor. It is to his credit that the standards, methods, and techniques in land surveying adopted in those pioneering days have been the basis for the development of a most efficient survey and mapping organisation.

Tasman in 1642 and Captain Cook between 1769 and 1772 charted the coasts of New Zealand. Cook's chart, supplemented by knowledge of the hinterland gained from the Maoris, was the only source of geographical information available to the missionaries, traders, and whalers before 1840. Sporadic and scattered settlements were established along the coast on land purchased directly from the Maoris for trade goods and muskets. These deeds of purchase, the boundaries of which were loosely defined, became the basis of subsequent land claims investigated by the colonial Government in 1840 following the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi.

“If the blood of our people only had been spilled, and the land remained, then this trouble would have been over long ago.” Ngapora Tamati, 1872.

The Maoris interpreted the wars of the sixties as a struggle for land. The beginning of the war in 1860 over the Waitara dispute, its resumption in 1863 over Waitotara, the invasion of the Waikato and the announcement of Government plans for the confiscation of the “rebels” land all helped to confirm their suspicions. Though volunteers from outside tribes often joined in, giving the Maori forces the semblance of a national front, the wars were mainly a series of pitched battles in which each tribe made a final, desperate stand on its tribal domain: Atiawa at Waitara, Waikato at Rangiriri, Ngati Maniapoto at Orakau, and Ngai-te-Rangi at Gate pa. In such circumstances defeat and perhaps death were honourable. No Maori patriot hesitated to fight to the last for tribal land. But for the survivors the future was clouded with bitterness: they had to endure confiscation, the permanent loss of their valued land. Many tried to avert the final catastrophe by prolonging the campaigns. Some accepted the delusion of Hauhauism – “a new and precious thing by which we shall keep our land” – and when this failed others, like Te Whiti's supporters in Taranaki, reoccupied confiscated land and passively resisted the European occupation. But the European victory was final. Time and numbers were on their side and the confiscated lands were gradually settled by European farmers.

Land Confiscations

Altogether 3,215,172 acres of Maori land were confiscated in the Waikato, Taranaki, and the Bay of Plenty. Of this area 1,341,362 acres were subsequently purchased or returned, mainly to “friendly” or “loyalist” Maoris. In confiscating the land, little heed was paid to the degree of “guilt” of the “rebels”, and it was noticeable that the best of the confiscated land was retained by the Government for European settlement. Some tribes like Ngati Maniapoto lost no land, though equally involved in the conflict with Waikato who lost almost all their land. Ngati Haua, who fought at Rangiriri, lost very little; and Ngai-te-Rangi, the defenders of Gate pa, had most of their land returned. This unequal treatment had its sequel in differing tribal attitudes after the wars. Ngati Haua and Ngai-te-Rangi surrendered and cooperated with the Government, only to sell most of their land recklessly within a few years. Waikato were irreconcilable but Ngati Maniapoto eventually agreed to the opening of the King Country (q.v., despite the intransigent opposition of Tawhiao and the Waikato Kingites.

After the wars the struggle for land entered a new and, in some respects, more dangerous phase. Under the Native Lands Acts of 1862 and 1865 the Crown's right of pre-emption was abolished, a Maori Land Court was established to individualise Maori land titles and European settlers were permitted to purchase land directly from the individuals named in the Court's orders. This was part of a wider policy designed to fulfil the promise of the Treaty of Waitangi to grant Maoris the rights and privileges of European citizens, including representation in Parliament. But it was the land legislation which had the most disastrous results for the Maoris who became involved. The legislation could not be introduced in the unsettled districts, and in any case King Party supporters would have nothing to do with land transactions; consequently it was the “friendlies” like Ngati Kahungunu of Hawke's Bay and the surrendered Ngati Haua, both possessing valuable pastoral land, who were first involved in land dealings. The upshot was that most of the land passed into the hands of European squatters, often in return for the debts incurred in taking the land before the Court. In Hawke's Bay a “Repudiation” movement arose in the seventies as the Ngati Kahungunu attempted to contest the transactions in the Supreme Court. This was unsuccessful; it was decided in the Courts and by a subsequent Commission that the transactions were sound in law. The Ngati Haua tribe was sadly divided by the transactions in land, one section dealing with Europeans the other adhering to King Party proclamations against doing so. In 1873, as a direct result of a land dispute, T. Sullivan, who was employed by a European purchaser, was murdered by the Kingite section of Ngati Haua. Land transactions were coming dangerously close to provoking a renewal of the war, and moreover the Maoris involved were paying a bitter price for their loyalty.

There were other dangers. Land transactions and the proceedings of the Maori Land Court gave rise to social and economic disturbances. Agricultural production declined as Maoris lived off the proceeds of land sales; tribes were divided as individuals defied chiefs to sell land and, prompted by interested Europeans, carried their disputes into the new arena of the Maori Land Court; and a wave of drunkenness and demoralisation swept over the districts concerned. Significantly, Maori population declined most rapidly in land-selling districts. The peace of the Pakeha was becoming more dangerous than his war.

The King Country

Where tribes could refrain from dealing with land, they escaped the social consequences. The supporters of King Tawhiao, by withdrawing behind the confiscation line and preventing European penetration, escaped for 20 years. Despite the bitterness over the confiscation this was no mere “sullen isolation” of “degenerate exclusiveness”. The agricultural production which had made the Waikato the granary of the North Island in the fifties was revived in the upper Waipa Valley. A considerable border trade emerged from 1868 and continued unabated until the opening of the King Country in 1885. The King Party traded grain, tobacco, hops, cattle, and pigs for European steel mills, agricultural implements, and clothing. Old forms of communal organisation and activity persisted though modified by the use of European implements and crops, and trade. A pacifist, predominantly Christian, religious cult, the Tariao (Morning Star) faith, emerged with Maori preachers taking over tasks previously performed by missionaries. As this tended to deify the personage of Tawhiao, it added social and political cement to the movement. The King Country became a kind of Mecca for hundreds of outside visitors who made an annual pilgrimage to attend King Party meetings. Here they took part in the traditional hakari, haka, and korero. The debates were mainly about land and usually ended with demands for the return of the Waikato and proclamations urging the tribes to refrain from selling land. The King Party was pursuing the pre-war policy of coexistence, territorially separate and politically independent, but cooperating with Europeans as far as this was possible without sacrificing land. The wars had in fact decided that Europeans were to be supreme but the King Party could continue in independence for some years because in 1869 Donald McLean had introduced a policy of pacification, instead of more war and confiscation. Although McLean and then Sir George Grey conducted a series of formal negotiations with the King Party in the seventies, in an effort to open the King Country to the Main Trunk railway and European settlement, failure was inevitable because the King Party would accept nothing less than the return of all the confiscated land as its quid pro quo. Nevertheless the slow but more certain activities of land-purchase agents and the Maori Land Court were gradually breaking down the unity of the King tribes. By the turn of the eighties some of the tribes fringing the King Country were beginning to deal with land independently and soon afterwards John Bryce, the Native Minister, was able to break the Waikato-Ngati Maniapoto alliance by persuading the latter to place their land before the Court. In 1885 Stout symbolically opened the King Country by turning the first sod of this section of the Main Trunk railway. A display of force by 200 militia was sufficient to prevent Tawhiao and the Waikatos from making more than a verbal protest.

Taranaki and the Urewera

In Taranaki a similar movement had been developing under the leadership of Te Whiti, who rallied the dispirited sections of the Taranaki tribes to his Parihaka settlement. Te Whiti was a biblical prophet but, unlike his atavistic Hauhau predecessors, a pacifist. His prophecies and the success of his followers in disrupting Government attempts to survey the confiscated Waimate Plains, provided a last ray of hope that the European occupation of the confiscated land could be avoided. This too proved a delusion. In 1881 Bryce sent 1,500 militia to Parihaka, arrested Te Whiti and his lieutenant, Tohu, and dispersed their followers.

With Te Whiti's resistance broken and the King Country open, there remained only one more large area under Maori control: the Urewera Country, home of Te Kooti's Ringatu followers. Inaccessible and bush clad, it held out little attraction for European settlers, but it was opened to surveyors in the mid-nineties. By the turn of the century communications had penetrated well into the interior of the North Island and behind these came the European settlers. Land transactions, particularly in the King Country, led to the same sort of social disturbances that had helped to further depopulation among the “friendly” tribes a decade earlier, although these were less severe in the King Country, because the Government prohibited private purchase of land and the sale of liquor.

The New Leadership

The failure of the King Party and Te Whiti to save the land meant that all hope of an independent Maori existence was doomed. The implications of the European victory in the wars had, by the turn of the century, become a matter of fact. It was difficult for the old wartime leaders to look forward from the grievances of war to an uncertain future in a predominantly European society, although Te Whiti made an effort to do so after his return from imprisonment. Maori leadership passed to a new generation, unconnected with the bitterness of war and confiscation. In the nineties a Young Maori Party emerged from a group of talented schoolboys of Te Aute College who subsequently went on to practice law and medicine among their own people and then turned to politics. They were the first to make effective use of the rights and privileges promised to Maoris by the Treaty of Waitangi and the legislation of the sixties. And before long they were able to persuade a predominantly European Parliament that positive Government aid was necessary if the Maori people as a whole were to make proper use of their rights and privileges. Ngata was responsible for the first real attack on the numerous tenurial knots which had developed from 40 years of legislation designed to individualise Maori land tenure, and for introducing a scheme to consolidate ownership. He made strenuous efforts to encourage Maori farming and eventually succeeded in obtaining Government assistance for land development. He persuaded the Urewera and the Waikato Kingites to adopt his land-development schemes, thus providing new hope for the tribes defeated in the wars. Pomare and Buck, both graduates in medicine, persuaded Maoris to adopt European remedies to combat European diseases. Their efforts coincided with and helped to further a slow but steady increase in Maori population.

The young leaders succeeded in promoting European ideas because they could do so within a Maori context: they were familiar with their own language and culture, men of both worlds who were just as effective on the marae as they were in Parliament. In later life both Ngata and Buck turned to studying and encouraging Maori and Polynesian arts and crafts. It was largely through the efforts of these men that the Maori rehabilitation of the twentieth century was both cultural and economic. This was also assisted by a more generous generation of Europeans who not only provided the financial means but also, as in the 1928 Royal Commission on Confiscated Lands, showed a willingness to admit to the errors of the past and make some effort to compensate for them.

by Maurice Peter Keith Sorrenson, M.A.(N.Z.), D.PHIL. (OXON.), Senior Lecturer in History, University of Auckland.

• New Zealand in the Making – a study of economic and social development, , Condliffe, J. B. (1959)
• Politics in a Small Democracy, (1961), Chapman, R. M. (ed.), “The Maori King Movement, 1856–1885”, Sorrenson, M. P. K.
• Jnl. of the Polynesian Society, Sep 1956, “Land Purchase Methods and their Effect on Maori Population, 1865–1901”.

1. Prelude: The Fighting Forties

New Zealand colonists had a foretaste of Maori fighting in the turbulent eighteen forties. The rash attempt of the European Magistrates to arrest Te Rauparaha and Te Rangihaeata for resisting the occupation of the Wairau precipitated the massacre of Captain Arthur Wakefield and his 21 companions (1843). Governor FitzRoy made himself very unpopular by blaming the colonists and refusing to punish the Maoris, but he averted a war that might have been calamitous in the feeble condition of the colony. Appeasement, however, damaged Government prestige, and provoked further disturbances. At the Bay of Islands, Hone Heke grew jealous of Te Rauparaha's reputation for killing Pakehas, and defied British authority, first by bullying the settlers, and then, incited by seditious Americans, by chopping down the flagstaff that bore the emblem of their enslavement, the Union Jack. He was joined by Kawiti whose young men clamoured for battle and booty. Fortunately, most of the northern Maoris remained neutral, and important chiefs like Nene, Patuone, and Rewa loyally fielded war parties against the rebels.

The war that followed (1845–6) consisted mostly of reverses suffered by the small British forces engaged, partially offset by successes of their native allies. The destruction of Kororareka (March 1845) and the heavy losses sustained in attacking Puketutu and Ohaeawai pas (May-July 1845) revealed the fighting qualities of the Maoris and the folly of British tactics. Governor Grey, who arrived opportunely in November 1845, quickly decided that the troops, though effective in the open when it came to bayonet work, should never be employed in hilly bush country unless supported by native contingents, under whose cover sappers could cut roads and gunners haul guns, permitting bombardment of the invested position before assault. These tactics were used against Ruapekapeka pa (January 1846). The approach and siege were well conducted, but the usual costly assault was avoided when the besiegers surprised the pa on a Sunday morning, which the defenders had naively imagined was dedicated to rest and prayer. The “victory” did something to restore lost British prestige, and Grey made a generous and lasting peace with the northern tribes.

The southern disturbances took longer to quell. Te Rangihaeata from his pa at Pahautanui, near Porirua, threatened both the coastal road north from Wellington and the Hutt Valley settlements; further north, the 200 settlers at Wanganui were at loggerheads with some of the local chiefs. Grey had only some 500 troops available, whom he dared not commit to the bush to pursue marauders, and he feared using loyal Maoris in case he encouraged tribal feuds. Till reinforced, he tried to play a waiting game, building roads and blockhouses, and winning friends by diplomacy. But murderous raids on isolated homesteads and skirmishes against military outposts (April-June 1846) forced the pace, and in July, after failing to come to grips with the main Maori forces, he seized the principal chief, Te Rauparaha, at Porirua and held him hostage for the good behaviour of the Ngati Toa tribe. The rebellion collapsed. Te Rangihaeata retreated to Manawatu, and half a dozen unlucky Maori captives were tried for murder and rebellion and punished as scapegoats for the rest. The justice of these proceedings was questionable, but they ended the insurrection with less bloodshed than pitched battles.

There was sporadic fighting at Wanganui (June-July 1847), following the Gilfillan murders, but peace was restored in February 1848, and the repurchase of the Wanganui Block removed the source of friction. Grey had vindicated his boast that murder and theft by Maoris would be punished and rebellion suppressed. He also persuaded them that the Government would treat them fairly and generously. On these terms peace prevailed till 1854, and Pakehas and Maoris had a breathing space in which to adjust their mutual relations.

2. The First Taranaki War, 1860–61

The situation deteriorated rapidly in the late fifties, till the fatal course pursued by Governor Gore Browne and his Ministers over the Waitara purchase led to the Taranaki War of 1860–61. The immediate issues were twofold – the right of the Maoris to refuse to sell their lands, and the sovereign authority of the Governor to maintain law and order in native districts. Unfortunately, the Governor, under colonial pressure, did not act impartially. Wiremu Kingi's protests against Teira's false sale were taken for sedition, and his rights were over-ridden without investigation. Kingi had committed no overt act of hostility when Lieutenant-Colonel Murray proclaimed martial law (February 1860). He and his people were driven by troops off the land they had occupied for the last 12 years, and were virtually forced into rebellion in self-defence. Waitara, in Maori eyes, became proof of Pakeha injustice, and Te Ati-Awa had the sympathy of all Maoridom and active support from other Taranaki, Waikato, and Wanganui tribes.

New Plymouth was garrisoned by 1,200 regular troops (chiefly the 65th and parts of the 12th and 40th Regiments) plus gunners and sappers, a naval corps, and some 500 or 600 colonial militia and volunteers. Reinforcements (including the 14th and 57th Regiments) brought the total to over 3,000. The Maoris never had half as many fighters in the field at any one time, but the nature of the country, broken by ridges and gullies, intersected by streams and swamps, and covered with fern near the coast and bush a few miles inland, gave the rebels many advantages. The outsettlers had to abandon their farms and stand to arms behind the town stockades; the women and children were evacuated to Nelson. Meanwhile, the Maoris ran amuck, burning houses and pillaging stock, and property worth over £200,000 was lost.

Military operations were again marked by inept command and faulty tactics. An early instance occurred when a mixed detachment of regulars and volunteers clashed with the Ngati Ruanuis near the Waireka Stream (28 March). Lieutenant-Colonel Murray withdrew the regulars and left the colonists to finish the fight, because Colonel Gold had ordered the troops to be back in barracks before dark. Fortunately Captain Cracroft with 60 seamen and marines made a diversionary attack, and the colonials withdrew with the loss of two killed and 12 wounded. Maori losses were about 50 killed. “The moral of all this,” wrote Henry Sewell, “is that the proper force to deal with the natives is the bluejackets and the settlers. Regular military tactics will not do for bush fighting.”

Gold blundered again when, after some trivial successes in capturing undefended pas and burning Maori food stores, he sent Major Nelson and 350 men to attack the strong pa of Puketakauere near Waitara River (27 June). Nelson, underrating his opponents, approached the pa without proper reconnaissance. It was winter time and wet, and the troops floundered in swamps and ditches under heavy fire from concealed entrenchments forward of the pa. Gold failed to send help, and the attackers were driven off by a tomahawk charge, leaving 31 dead and many wounded behind them. “Culpable imbecility or worse”, Sewell called it.

The elderly Major–General Pratt assumed command in August, the garrison was reinforced, and systematic operations were commenced to clear the coastal area between the Waitara and Waireka Rivers. Pratt's methods were slow but sure. He detested bush fighting and rash assaults on prepared defences, and adopted the patient siege tactics of the drill book. His “mile-a-month” technique excited the ridicule of the colonists – one report said, “The war at Taranaki maintains its peaceful course”. But the capture of Orongomai pa (October) showed that the Maoris disliked heavy shelling and grew uneasy as the sap approached their palisades; in fact, they made a hurried exit just before the sappers' mines blew up their stockades.

As the British grew cautious, the Maoris grew rash. A Ngati Maniapoto force had fought at Puketakauere and their exploits and plunder excited the envy of all the Waikato tribes. Another “Pakeha-shooting” expedition was dispatched under Rewi Maniapoto and Wetini, who, as soon as they arrived in Taranaki, rushed to the front of the battle and occupied the old ill-fortified pa site of Mahoetahi, about 7 miles from New Plymouth (6 November). Pratt threw a force of 600 men against them. The mistakes of the previous June were avoided; troops and volunteers skirmished their way competently through the swampy approaches. They then reformed near the earthworks, charged, and drove the defenders off the mound and back over the Waitara, inflicting about a hundred casualties for a British loss of four killed and 17 wounded.

This reverse only stimulated the Waikatos' thirst for revenge, and Auckland was more heavily garrisoned in case of attack. The Maoris, however, for the time being limited their actions to the Taranaki. Their main stronghold, manned by a thousand fighters, was a series of entrenched and palisaded positions at Kairau, Huirangi, and Te Arei, near the historic pa of Pukerangiora. Against these positions Pratt continued to advance his saps and trenches yard by yard, building redoubts and blockhouses as he went. Kairau fell after the heavy bombardment on 31 December, and then began the famous “long sap” towards Te Arei. On 23 January 1861, a picked Maori force tried to surprise the Huirangi No. 3 redoubt before dawn, but the attackers were held back in the ditches below the parapets, taken in the rear by troops from the adjoining redoubt, and slaughtered with bayonets, rifle fire, hand grenades, and short-fused shells dropped amongst them by hand. They lost about 50 killed and 40 wounded, while British casualties were five killed and 11 wounded.

Maori efforts to check the inexorable progress of the sap by filling it up at nights and assaulting the diggers by day slowed it but did not halt it. Wiremu Tamihana came down to Taranaki as peacemaker (12–14 March) but Pratt would not accept his mediation. Te Arei, however, was becoming untenable, and Hapurona hoisted the white flag (19 March). It was arranged that the Atiawa should submit to the Queen's sovereignty on promise that the Waitara question would be investigated, and the Waikatos were to return home and restore their plunder.

Fighting ceased but stalemate ensued. Kingi retired with Rewi to the King Country, the Waikatos would neither acknowledge the Queen nor surrender their plunder, nor did the Ngati Ruanuis yield. Gore Browne and General Sir Duncan Cameron, the newly arrived commander, considered invading the Waikato, but had to realise that they lacked sufficient troops for the task and that the lives of all the South Auckland settlers would be imperilled. Thus matters stood when Sir George Grey returned to New Zealand in September 1861.

3. Peace Proposals and Preparations for War, 1861–63

Grey's instructions were to make peace if he could, but if not, to wage war resolutely and end once and for all the pretence of Maori independence. The Premier, William Fox, approved the substance of Grey's plans for creating district and village runangas (assemblies), in which the chiefs, aided by European Magistrates, would enjoy a form of local self-government. But benevolence was balanced by calculation. The runanga scheme also envisaged road construction, individualisation of native land titles, and European settlement in native districts. Grey was reverting to his old idea of racial amalgamation, which most Maoris were now disposed to reject and which the colonists viewed without enthusiasm except on their own terms.

Moreover, Grey had to prepare for the possibility of war. The belligerent attitude of some elements amongst the Maoris and the fears (and hopes) of the colonists made this imperative. But his defence measures made his professions of peace suspect. “He maminga pea,” said Wiremu Tamihana – “Perhaps it's all humbug”. The advance of the Great South Road through the Bombay Hills, the positioning of troops at Te Ia and Queen's redoubt, and Grey's announcement that he would extend the road into the King Country and put bullet-proof steamers on the Waikato alarmed even well-disposed Maoris.

Rewi Maniapoto thought there was no “perhaps” about it. Te Paea, Potatau II's sister, said Rewi was “porangi” (madly incensed) and was doing his best to incite rows in order to start a war. He nearly came to blows with Naera to stop the building of the Raglan road; he caused a fracas at Kohekohe when the Government began building a courthouse there (March); and he expelled Gorst from Te Awamutu (April). He also manoeuvred to make the unsettled Waitara question a casus belli. Tamihana implored Grey to be patient, “to give him years”, and undertook to restrain Rewi. Whether or not he could have done so is doubtful. Grey was prepared neither to wait nor to surrender his function as keeper of the Queen's peace to Tamihana.

As soon as Auckland's defences were secure, Grey went to Taranaki and reoccupied Omata and Tataraimaka. Then he turned to Waitara, concluded that the purchase had been unjust, and, in order to remove a possible cause of war, proposed to return the land to its former owners. But Alfred Domett had replaced Fox as Premier, and while Ministers demurred, Rewi urged the Taranaki Maoris to violence. “Me patu te Pakeha” (“Kill the Europeans”), he wrote (15 April 1863), and dispatched a Ngati Maniapoto war party to forward that object. On 4 May Maoris of the Taranaki and Ngati Ruanui tribes, hoping to ambush the Governor himself, murdered eight officers and men at Oakura, a few miles out of New Plymouth. As the Kingite emissary Erueti said, “This is the work of all the Maoris for Waitara, and further trouble is at hand”.

4. The Maori Wars, 1863–72

Fighting recommenced in Taranaki on 4 June, when a sharp clash occurred at Katikara. But as British strategy hinged on the defence of Auckland, a strong garrison was left at New Plymouth and the main forces were concentrated in the north. All Maoris living in South Auckland were required to take oaths of allegiance and lay down arms, or else get out of the British zone. Cameron's troops crossed the Mangatawhiri, and on 17 July had their first brush with the Maoris at Koheroa. To justify this offensive, it was asserted that the Waikatos were on the point of attacking Auckland, but in fact the colonial Government was again, as in 1860, taking the initiative to extend its authority over Maoris hitherto outside the effective reach of the law.

Reinforcements brought the British strength up to 10 infantry regiments plus auxiliaries; the colonial militia was called out for local defence, and volunteer units of Forest Rangers were formed for more extended operations. Steps were also taken to recruit, chiefly from the Otago goldfields and Australia, some 3,000 military settlers, who were to occupy the conquered areas and guarantee future security. Land confiscation was already contemplated to punish the rebels and to defray part at least of the cost of the war. The General Assembly which met in Auckland in October endorsed this policy. F. A. Whitaker replaced Domett as Premier, and passed the harsh Suppression of Rebellion Act authorising martial law against suspects, the Settlements Act providing for confiscation, and the £3,000,000 Loan Act for war and other expenses.

Meanwhile, Colonel Carey's flying columns, aided by companies of Forest Rangers under Captain W. Jackson and Captain F. von Tempsky, cleared the Hunua Ranges of Maori guerillas, but not before the latter had made some enterprising attacks on the blockhouses along the Great South Road and on the villages of Pukekohe, Pokeno, Tuakau, and Mauku. Aided by two armoured gunboats, the Pioneer and the Avon, on the Waikato River, General Cameron at length turned the rebel defences at Meremere (31 October) and stormed the entrenched position at Rangiriri (21 November), capturing 183 prisoners, but losing 37 killed and 93 wounded. Ngaruawahia, the King's capital, was abandoned without further fighting and the Waikatos retired to Maungatautari.

In January 1864 Cameron resumed his advance up the Waipa, bypassed Paterangi where the Maoris offered battle, took Rangiaowhia by surprise, and occupied Te Awamutu and Kihikihi. Then occurred the famous battle of Orakau (31 March–2 April). Rewi Maniapoto and 300 followers, surrounded by 2,000 troops, defied their foes for three days and would neither surrender nor accept a safe conduct for their women and children. Only about a hundred of them, including Rewi, escaped to Hangatiki.

Orakau virtually ended the Waikato campaign, but the war was spreading like fire in the fern. Troops had been sent to Tauranga in January to block the flow of food supplies and reinforcements to the rebels. Their presence provoked skirmishes and ambushes, culminating in a costly British assault on Pukehinahina, Gate pa, when 46 officers and men were killed and 122 wounded. This reverse was avenged at Te Ranga (21 June), where Rewi Tuia and over a hundred of his Ngaiterangi warriors were killed, and the tribe submitted. In the Taranaki, sporadic fighting had gone on without much profit to either side – crop-burning raids by British flying columns, a series of skirmishes at Kaitoke (March), and a pitched battle at Sentry Hill (30 April). Of more sinister significance, Te Ua inaugurated the cult of Hauhauism. His devotees ambushed a small party of the 65th Regiment at Te Ahuahu (6 April), killed and mutilated the victims, and carried Captain Lloyd's head round the country as a prophetic emblem to incite the war fever. A Hauhau expedition against Wanganui was defeated by loyal Maoris in an extraordinary pitched battle at Moutoa Island (14 May).

Efforts to make peace at this time failed because Grey and his Ministers, Whitaker, Fox, and Thomas Russell were at loggerheads over the custody of the prisoners, the amount of land to be confiscated, and the terms of submission. Cardwell, the Secretary of State, authorised the Governor and General to settle these questions without the concurrence of Cabinet, whereat Whitaker complained that responsible government had become a farce, and resigned (November 1864). He was succeeded by F. A. Weld who, rather than tolerate British dictation of native policy, accepted the token alternative of colonial self-reliance, i.e., the withdrawal of British troops. But self-reliance meant heavy taxation, which the General Assembly was not prepared to sanction. The £3,000,000 loan had failed and the General Government had no money to pay for colonial troops, even if the manpower had been available.

In these inauspicious circumstances, it was proposed to launch a campaign against the Ngati Ruanuis and their confederates in the Taranaki-Wanganui area. General Cameron objected to this move, which he said was “bringing war into [a] hitherto quiet settlement” merely to gratify the colonists' lust for land, and did his best to defeat their purpose by go-slow tactics which earned for him the title of “the lame seagull”. His well-equipped force of 3,000 regulars, outnumbering the enemy by 10 to one, advanced 50 miles in 80 days, then stopped, leaving the principal enemy position, Weraroa pa, uncaptured. Colonial forces and their native allies achieved minor successes at Hiruharama or Jerusalem (March), Pipiriki (3 April), and Kakaramea (13 May). Exasperated at Cameron's obstructiveness, Grey, with his Ministers' full approval, came to Weraroa himself, and after failing to negotiate its surrender, took it with a small colonial and native force while the regulars stood by idle (21 July) – an episode which the Imperial Commander-in-Chief indignantly declared had “no parallel in our Colonial or General History”.

Weld's “self-reliant” policy collapsed when the General Assembly quibbled about voting additional taxes (October 1865), and E. W. Stafford took office, promising to reduce taxation and relying on the Governor to retain enough British troops to defend the country. An impossible situation arose. Cardwell had ordered five regiments home, and was demanding payment for the other five if they were retained. Stafford would neither pay for them nor raise a sufficient colonial force to replace them, leaving Grey in a quandary. Peace proclamations were issued, but they did not stop the war. The Hauhaus murdered the Rev. C. S. Volkner in barbarous fashion at Opotiki (2 March 1865); the crew of the schooner Kate were massacred at Whakatane (July); the Hawke's Bay and East Cape tribes rebelled; and the murder of Broughton and Kereti (September) showed that Weraroa had not pacified the West Coast. A mixed colonial and native force under Major W. Brassey fought a successful bush campaign in the Opotiki region against the Whakatohea and Urewera insurgents, and an Arawa contingent led by Major W. G. Mair campaigned in the Rangitaiki Swamp and captured Te Teko pa. At Hawke's Bay Major J. Fraser and Lieutenant R. Biggs campaigned against the Ngati Porou rebels in the Waiapu Valley and forced their submission (October 1865), whilst similar operations at Poverty Bay captured Waerenga-a-Hika pa near Gisborne, and drove the rebels back to Waikaremoana (January 1866). In the Taranaki-Wanganui sector, General Chute, who replaced Cameron in 1865, vindicated the prowess of British troops by a brisk campaign round Mount Egmont, covering 260 miles in 42 days and capturing seven pas and 20 villages (some of which belonged to friendly Maoris) and killing 50 rebels with little loss.

These successes, it was thought, might have enabled Grey to comply belatedly with Cardwell's demands for the return of the troops. Five regiments were in fact sent back between October 1865 and April 1866, but the remainder Grey thought were indispensable. Hauhauism had become a sort of Maori Fenianism, unpredictable and almost irrepressible. Ngati Ruanui and Tangahoe rebels were still active in the Patea area, despite Major T. McDonnell's bush raids on Pokaikai and Pungarehu (June, October 1866). On the opposite coast a Ngati Hineuru force tried to seize Napier but was intercepted by an improvised colonial force led by Colonel G. Whitmore, which killed over 30 and captured 88 prisoners. The latter, including Te Kooti, were deported to the Chatham Islands. Rumour had it that the Urewera, Taupo, and Waikato tribes were planning a joint rising. Fighting broke out again at Opotiki and Tauranga, and the Waikatos attacked the loyal Arawas at Koutu pa near Rotorua (March 1867).

In these circumstances, Grey had good grounds for holding on to his troops, and he interposed every possible obstacle in the way of Chute when he attempted to disengage them and get them embarked. His insubordination eventually brought a peremptory instruction from Lord Carnarvon (December 1866) suspending him from his functions as Commander-in-Chief and authorising Chute to direct troop movements irrespective of the Governor's sanction. Shortly afterwards, Grey was curtly dismissed and was replaced by Governor Sir G. F. Bowen (February 1868). Most of the troops left New Zealand in 1867–68; one regiment (the 18th) remained till January 1870.

Still, peace did not ensue. Titokowaru, a Hauhau chief of Patea, fell foul of authority over some stolen horses, took up arms and defeated Colonel McDonnell's ill-disciplined forces at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu (7 September 1868), when von Tempsky and 19 others were killed. Whitmore attacked Titokowaru unsuccessfully at Moturoa (7 November), but later drove him back into the forests of the upper Waitara, where he lapsed into sullen quietude.

Te Kooti proved a more formidable and skilful opponent. Embittered by allegedly wrongful imprisonment, he escaped with over 300 fellow captives from the Chathams, landed south of Poverty Bay, and raised rebellion anew. He won his first encounter with the colonial forces at Paparatu (20 July 1868), skilfully evaded Whitmore's efforts to capture him, and gained a large following in the Wairoa and Urewera districts. On 10 November he made a murderous attack on the outskirts of Gisborne and massacred some 70 inhabitants. Pursued by Major Ropata and defeated at Makaretu (November-December) and Ngatapa (January 1869), he retired into the Urewera whence he launched more of his savage raids on the Whakatane and Mohaka settlements. Colonel Whitmore directed an elaborate three-pronged attack which drove him out of his forest fastnesses, and McDonnell thrice defeated him in the Taupo district, but Te Kooti, though several times wounded, miraculously avoided capture. A final expedition searched for him in the Urewera in May 1872, but he had taken refuge in the King Country, and there matters were allowed to rest.

Sheer exhaustion brought the fighting to a standstill. Alarms and excitements recurred in the next 10 years or so, and in particular a quarrel with Te Whiti in the Waimate Plains in 1879 nearly precipitated further hostilities. The situation was at last eased in 1881, when King Tawhiao made formal peace.

by James Rutherford, M.A.(DURHAM), PH.D.(MICH.) (1906–63), Historian, Auckland.

• C.O. and W.O. series in Public Records Office, London
• N.Z. Archives, Wellington;Miscellaneous MSS in Turnbull Library, Wellington
• Grey MSS Collection, Auckland
• England and the Maori Wars, Harrop, A. J. (1938)
• The New Zealand Wars, Cowan, J., 2 vols. (1922, 1955)
• Sir George Grey. A Study in Colonial Government, Rutherford, J. (1961).

It has become increasingly difficult for an historian to know what he means when he speaks of “cause”, in view of the subtle and contradictory analyses of historical explanation by modern philosophers. The Maori Wars would offer an admirable battleground for the several theorists. The student who accepted Hume's principle of regularity which asserts (to the discomfort of most historians, who believe that they deal only with the concrete case) that it is only possible to postulate “cause” where there is multiplicity of instances, would note that the British were involved in a number of similar native wars in the nineteenth century. Following the positivist theory of the “covering law”, as framed by C. G. Hempel, he might hypothesise some law such as: “If large numbers of nineteenth century British settlers intrude among a war-like primitive people, fighting will (probably) occur”. But such a statement could scarcely be made, without the “probable”, in a law-like form. Or if the student thought of historical explanation as resting on common-sense judgments about human nature, as suggested by W. H. Walsh, his account of the origins of the Maori Wars would assume some such generalisation as: “Men are likely to fight when their livelihood and social order are threatened by a rival community”; or “Racial fear and hatred are likely to produce aggression”. Collingwood's idealist army might take the field too. But the present historian must be dogmatic, because he must be brief; must largely ignore the logical status of his explanation, in order to summarise a few generalisations that appear to rest on good evidence.

The Maori Wars against the British were a product of imperialism, or more specifically, of colonisation. The two more immediate causes were racial antagonism and socio-economic competition, though these may be separated only for the purpose of analysis and exposition, the latter being the material and rational aspect, the former the irrational aspect, of a single complex rivalry. Perhaps the subject may best be approached through the obvious fact that colonisation involved a direct competition for possession of the limited areas of easily cultivable land in the North Island, where most of the Maoris and Europeans lived. For the Maoris this was not an issue purely nor even primarily economic. The land of each tribe was its homeland. To increasing numbers of Maoris, the sale of land to the European Government amounted to selling their country. The land was the scene of the tribal traditions and the ancient legends on which their youth had been nurtured, their self-regard formed. And it seemed inextricably involved with the Maoris' future as a distinctive people. The loss of the land was paralleled by the decline in their population; it seemed doubtful whether, without it, they could anticipate any future worth thinking of. Though the settlers were not New Zealand patriots, to them, too, the land was more than an economic question, for the future of their communities depended upon acquiring it.

The Land Question

From the commencement of organised colonisation, in 1840, many Maori tribes opposed the sale of land. At every New Zealand Company settlement there was a threat of fighting, or actual bloodshed, as in the so-called Wairau “massacre” (q.v.), over disputed land purchases. That their conflicting interests over land were not the only cause of war between Maoris and British may be seen from Hone Heke's and Kawiti's rebellion at the Bay of Islands, 1844–46, which resulted largely from the sheer love of fighting of turbulent young men who were throwing off the influence of their elders. Though some of their grievances related to land questions, they seem to have been more worried about the cessation of land sales than about the danger of landlessness. The situation in the north differed considerably from that in the New Zealand Company settlements, where the rapidly increasing number of settlers seemed a menace. Many settlers were leaving the north, and the Maoris, who had become accustomed to European forms of wealth, and who had never feared the settlers, resented the poverty which followed British annexation. But it is significant that, even in this situation, the Maoris were agitated by rumours, deriving from reports of a debate in the British Parliament, that the Government intended to confiscate their lands.

A Maori anti-land-selling movement appeared in the 1840s and spread rapidly in the fifties, notably in Taranaki and the Waikato. A number of attempts were made in the early fifties to form leagues of tribes pledged to sell no more land, attempts unsuccessful because there was always a minority tempted by the thought of Government money. This movement coincided with a boom in agricultural prices, 1851–56, which brought prosperity to both races, and encouraged an increased rate of European migration. It was a direct threat to the interests of the settlers, who demanded more land when the Maoris were willing to sell less. The Government Land Purchase Department was led into underhand or “secret” purchases of land, news of which exacerbated Maori resentment. Maori sentiment against land sales was one of the main stimuli which in 1858 induced the Waikato, Taupo, and some other tribes to elect a King, Te Wherowhero, an old chief who now took the title of Potatau I. In the next two years he gained the adherence of the three Taranaki tribes. These Maoris acknowledged Potatau as their “King” and placed their lands under his protection, trusting that his mana would prevent their sale. Thus there was now indeed a Maori “land league”. But the King movement was more than that; it also represented a crystallisation of Maori national feeling.

Maori Nationalism

Evidence of the existence of mutual antagonism may be found from the early years of contact between Maoris and Europeans. The attitude of many educated and Christian settlers towards the Maoris was influenced by the evangelical doctrine of the unity of man, but it is plain that the majority imported with them assumptions of superiority over non-Europeans which were strengthened by misunderstandings arising from intercourse with the Maoris and changed to fear and antagonism by Maori resistance to settlement. That the Maoris felt a growing hostility to the settlers is equally clear from their letters and recorded sayings. J. E. Gorst in The Maori King (1864) gave vivid expression to the brute force of this feeling, when he wrote, “Men who are habitually told that they emit a disagreeable smell, are not likely to feel a strong affection toward the race that smells them”.

The Maoris in pre-European times had little (if any) sense of unity, and no word for themselves as a people. The word “maori” meant “normal”. They thought of themselves as members of tribes as distinct as European nations. A sense of nationality arose after the Europeans came, and led to the kotahitanga or “unity” movement, which joined with the anti-land-selling movement in inspiring the election of the Maori King. Maori nationalism was a product of contact with foreigners, but not, as in many parts of the world, of foreign rule, for the European Government had not seriously attempted to bring the bulk of the Maoris under European law and its penalties, other than by suppressing armed rebellion. Enlightened contemporary observers, like the Chief Justice, Sir William Martin, considered that the King movement was an attempt to introduce a political order to replace decaying tribal authority, which certainly was one motive of Wiremu Tamihana, its most distinguished leader. But his conclusion, that if the Government had governed the Maoris they would not have sought to create their own organisation, would not be accepted by many modern students, who are likely to judge, in the light of the history of nationalism since 1860, that more European interference with the native society would have stimulated, rather than prevented, Maori nationalism.

The King Movement

The loose federation of King tribes had little real political coherence and no effective institutions for cooperative action, but as the focus and symbol of Maori national feeling and resistance to land sales Potatau I was stronger than the Government was willing to believe. Official policy was to ignore him, in the expectation that his support would rapidly disintegrate. This did not occur, and the settlers soon came to regard him as a barrier to their purposes, an affront to their Queen, and a challenge to their Government. The Maori nationalists and the settlers, whose Ministers had since 1856 governed their domestic business, other than Maori affairs, under the system of responsible government, now had incompatible views of the future of the country, and had potentially conflicting political organisations. Two nations or one, the progress of colonisation or the conservation of Maori tribal society on its territories, were the alternatives presented by the coexistence of colonial ministry and Maori King. The situation had become very dangerous, and it was widely felt on both sides that war was imminent. The Maoris learned from the 1858 census that in numbers they were already inferior to the settlers. If they were to resist colonisation, the lesson was clear that they must do so soon. In Taranaki, where the Europeans had little land, there had been since 1854 a feud between the Maori land sellers and land holders in which the settlers longed to join. And while racial relations deteriorated, the Government had since 1856 been effectively paralysed by the rivalry of Governor and his officers on the one hand, the Ministers and the House on the other, to govern Maori affairs. Scarcely any attempt had been made to control the situation.

There is no need, in the case of the New Zealand wars of the sixties, to distinguish underlying causes and immediate occasion, for the latter directly arose from and exemplified the former. Nor is there space to relate details of the Waitara purchase: it must be sufficient to say that fighting began over an attempt by the Government to buy land, urgently needed by the settlers, against the wishes of the local chief, Wiremu Kingi, and the majority of his tribe. Kingi was not at that time a supporter of Potatau (though he joined his party when war began) but he opposed further land sales and the authorities believed that he was acting as the agent of a “land league” to prevent the rightful owners of the land from selling. For different reasons they were antagonistic to him, and determined to acquire the land, which the local settlers, who were openly hostile to Kingi, had long urged. Later investigations showed that what the authorities regarded as his “pretensions” were clear rights to a paramount voice in the disposal of the land.

The first campaign of 1860–61 in Taranaki was succeeded in 1863 by another which arose in part from the same situation. The Maoris held European land at Tataraimaka as security for the land at Waitara, which was occupied by troops. Sir George Grey reoccupied Tataraimaka before instigating an investigation of the title to the Waitara Block which convinced him that the Government had been in the wrong. Before he had induced the Ministers to agree to return the Waitara Block to its Maori owners, hostile Maoris had ambushed a party of troops near Tataraimaka. Having inflicted a severe defeat on the Taranaki “rebels”, Grey launched an invasion of the Waikato to put down the King party, which was the strongest centre of Maori disaffection. A long wearying war, which the Maoris appropriately called the “white man's quarrel”, had commenced.

• The Maori King, Gorst, J. E. (1864; 2nd ed. 1959)
• Sir George Grey, A Study in Colonial Government, Rutherford, J. (1961)
• The Origins of the Maori Wars, Sinclair, K. (1957; 2nd ed. 1961).

by Keith Sinclair, M.A., PH.D., Professor of History, University of Auckland.

When Te Rauparaha left Kawhia his kinsmen of Ngati Raukawa remained on their lands at Maungatautari, but their frequent collisions with Ngati Maniapoto and their other neighbours eventually led to their moving southwards to the west Taupo district. There they joined forces with the Ngati Tuwharetoa tribe and became embroiled in a remarkable series of battles which centred round Te Roto a Tara, a pa situated in the lake of that name (now drained) near the present site of Te Aute College in Hawke's Bay.

In 1820 Ngati Tuwharetoa, under their chief Te Heuheu Tukino II, assaulted this pa, but without success. In a raid into the surrounding area Te Heuheu's brother was killed. This death was avenged by an attack on Te Aratipi pa on the bank of the Maraetotara Stream.

In 1822 Te Heuheu enlisted the aid of Ngati Raukawa and, strange to relate, their old enemies Ngati Maniapoto, Waikato, and Ngati Maru, to make a further attack on Te Roto a Tara. The pa was defended by the chief Pareihe and the Ngati Whatuiapiti branch of Ngati Kahungunu. The attackers cut down trees in the surrounding bush and built a causeway from the lake shore to the island. Pareihe countered this by building a tower overlooking the end of the causeway and did considerable damage to the invaders. Later he led a determined sally from the pa and drove back the enemy with many casualties. As it seemed inevitable, however, that the siege would eventually succeed, Pareihe quietly led his people out of the pa during the night and escaped, leaving it to the enemy. The odds against him were so strong that Pareihe went to Nukutaurua on the Mahia Peninsula and settled there with many of his people.

In the following year Te Wera, one of Hongi Hika's greatest leaders, arrived at Mahia with a local chief, Te Whareumu, who had been captured in a previous raid by Ngapuhi on the East Coast. His purpose was to restore Te Whareumu to his people and make peace with them. He was persuaded by the Ngati Kahungunu people to settle at Mahia and help them against their enemies.

In 1824 Pareihe went back to see what was happening in Heretaunga (the Hastings district) and, while in the vicinity of Waipawa, he sighted a war party comprising forces of Ngati Raukawa, Ngati Tuwharetoa, and tribes from inland Patea. He attacked them at Whitiotu on the Waipawa River and routed them.

In spite of this success Pareihe did not yet feel strong enough to reoccupy his lands and he returned to Mahia. Some of his people refused to go, however, and remained at Te Pakake, a small pa on a sandy islet near the present Ahuriri Station at Napier. There they were attacked by another mixed force of Waikato, Ngati Maniapoto, Ngati Raukawa, and Ngati Maru. This was a powerful force of over 1,000 men, with 400 muskets. The weakly-held pa soon fell and most of its inmates were slain, although some important chiefs were taken back to Waikato as prisoners. Among those captured were the chiefs Tiakitai and Te Karawa. Te Wherowhero, the Waikato leader, took pity on these men and decided to return them to their tribe. He accordingly sent a message to Ngati Kahungunu at Mahia to send a party to Waikato where peace would be made and the captives returned. After some hesitation the invitation was accepted and peace was duly made.

But the saga of Te Roto a Tara was not yet ended. Late in 1826 a mixed war party of Ngati te Kohera of West Taupo, Ngati Raukawa, and others decided to make a determined effort to complete the conquest of the Heretaunga district. Led by Te Momo, they set out for Hawke's Bay after having been refused assistance by Te Wherowhero and Te Heuheu. They took over the Kahotea pa on the shore of Te Roto a Tara Lake and settled down there. News of this fresh incursion reached Pareihe at Mahia and, with the aid of the Ngapuhi Chief Te Wera, a war party of 2,000 men was assembled. They proceeded to Te Roto a Tara and made a successful assault on Kahotea. Te Momo was absent at the time of the attack, but was hunted and killed. This fight took place early in 1827. Te Wera returned to Mahia with some of the Ngati Kahungunu, but others remained in the Heretaunga district.

The remnants of Te Momo's force gradually built up their strength and reoccupied Te Roto a Tara pa. From there they made raids on Ngati Kahungunu as far as Napier. Pareihe was not the man to put up with this and once again he took a war party up the Tukituki River. The canoes were hauled overland to the lake from a point up stream from Patangata, and Pareihe settled down to a siege which lasted for two months. When the pa was without food Pareihe ferried a party across to the island at night. They hid in the raupo until dawn and then scaled the palisades. The pa was captured and almost all of its defenders were killed. This ended the attempt of Ngati Raukawa to settle in Hawke's Bay. A large section of the tribe had joined Te Rauparaha at Otaki about a year earlier and those who escaped from Te Roto a Tara joined them there.

This account of tribal warfare is confined to the exploits of a few tribes and makes no pretence of completeness. To achieve this would require many volumes. All that has been attempted is to illustrate by selected examples the nature of the intertribal clashes of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. There are a number of tribal histories available which give much greater detail and much wider coverage. Some of these are listed below.

by Jock Malcolm McEwen, LL.B., Secretary, Department of Maori Affairs, Wellington.

• Maori Wars of the Nineteenth Century, Smith, S. P. (1910)
• King Potatau, Jones, P. te H. (1960)
• Tuwharetoa, Grace, J. te H. (1959)
• Tainui, Kelly, Leslie G. (1949)
• Tuhoe, Best, E. (1925)
• Takitimu, Mitchell, J. H. (1944)
• The Stirring Times of Te Waharoa, Wilson, J. A. (1907)
• The South Island Maoris, Stack, J. W. (1893)
• The Life and Times of Te Rauparaha, Travers, W. T. L. (1906).

Soon afterwards Te Rauparaha was joined by Ngati Raukawa and also by a Ngati Tama party. With a large force at his disposal he began to accumulate firearms for an attack on the South Island. Te Pehi even journeyed to England to get more guns. In the meantime Ngati Raukawa were occupying the Horowhenua district. The defeated Muaupoko made a last effort to retrieve their lands and assembled at Lake Papaitonga, near Ohau, but Te Rauparaha and Te Rangihaeata attacked and defeated them once more.

In 1828 Te Rauparaha was ready for his first attack on the South Island tribes. On this occasion he was accompanied by his Taranaki allies of Ngati Tama and Te Atiawa. While Te Rauparaha was defeating the Ngati Apa on D'Urville Island (Rangitoto), the Taranaki party raided settlements in Queen Charlotte Sound. Te Rauparaha then crossed to Pelorus Sound, where he slew many of the local people. The Taranaki left Queen Charlotte Sound and proceeded to attack the Ngati Apa in Blind Bay and Massacre Bay, while Te Rauparaha and his Ngati Toa went down the east coast by canoe to Kaikoura. There he defeated the local branch of the Ngai Tahu tribe, who mistakenly believed the canoes to be those of a party of visitors they had been expecting. The unarmed people were completely taken by surprise, some 1,400 being killed or taken prisoner. Among the prisoners was Rerewaka, a chief who had some time previously insulted Te Rauparaha. He was taken back to Kapiti where he was put to death with great cruelty.

In 1829 Te Rauparaha again crossed to the South Island, this time to avenge an insult paid Te Rangihaeata by Kekerengu, a Ngati Ira chief who had taken refuge with the Ngai Tahu at Kaikoura. The Ngati Toa landed at Wairau and went overland to Kaikoura. The Ngai Tahu had, however, heard of their coming and fled southwards. They were overtaken at Omihi, where they were attacked and defeated with great slaughter.

The Ngati Toa then proceeded to the great Ngai Tahu fortress of Kaiapohia (Kaiapoi), where they pretended to be trading guns for greenstone. The Ngai Tahu, however, had their suspicions aroused and, when Te Pehi and some other notable chiefs were inside the pa, they were set upon and killed. Te Rauparaha, having lost a number of his principal chiefs, withdrew and returned to Kapiti to prepare his revenge.

Soon afterwards the Elizabeth (q.v.), commanded by one Stewart, called at Kapiti and, in return for a load of flax, Te Rauparaha and some of his men were taken to Akaroa for the purpose of capturing Tamaiharanui, a leading chief of Ngai Tahu who had been present at Kaiapoi when Te Pehi was killed. Tamaiharanui, with his wife and daughter, was lured on board by Stewart and was carried back to Kapiti, where he was put to death by Tiaia, Te Pehi's widow.

Subsequently Te Rauparaha, with Ngati Toa, Ngati Raukawa, and Te Atiawa, went to Kaiapoi to complete their revenge. They found the Ngai Tahu force somewhat depleted, as many of their warriors were accompanying the Otago chief, Taiaroa, back to his home following a visit. After the pa was invested, some Ngai Tahu messengers slipped through the surrounding swamp and succeeded in overtaking Taiaroa's party, who returned to Kaiapoi and made their way into the pa. As the siege went on Te Rauparaha became impatient and he ordered his men to dig saps to enable them to approach the palisades. The inmates of the pa sought to hamper this work by piling brushwood outside the palisade and setting fire to it. To their dismay the wind changed and the defences were soon enveloped in smoke and flames. The attackers dashed through the ruins of the palisades and defeated the Ngai Tahu with tremendous slaughter. Following the capture of Kaiapoi, Te Rauparaha ravaged Canterbury as far south as Rakaia and also attacked settlements on Banks Peninsula, where Onawe pa was destroyed and many of the Ngai Tahu were killed.

Having conquered Ngai Tahu, Te Rauparaha was asked by Ngati Raukawa to assist them to avenge a defeat they had suffered from the Wanganui people. With nearly a thousand warriors they attacked Putiki pa on the south bank of the Wanganui River. After a siege of two months the pa fell and ample revenge was obtained.

In subsequent years Te Rauparaha was engaged in several battles which took place between Ngati Raukawa and their erstwhile allies, Te Atiawa, who lived at Waikanae. The last of these was the fight known as Te Kuititanga, which took place at Waikanae in 1839. Te Rauparaha arrived from Kapiti to find his Ngati Raukawa friends getting the worst of it and he deemed it discreet to make a hurried return to Kapiti, his escape being helped by a vigorous rally by Ngati Raukawa. Te Rauparaha's subsequent career concerns the early European era of New Zealand history and will not be dealt with here.

The Maori leader responsible for the greatest slaughter in the early nineteenth century was undoubtedly Te Rauparaha, a chief of the Ngati Toa tribe of the Kawhia district. This was a small tribe, closely related to the Waikato and Ngati Maniapoto tribes who surrounded the Kawhia domains of Ngati Toa. Te Rauparaha was the stormy petrel of the Tainui tribes, constantly quarrelling with his neighbours.

After many years of intertribal fighting, the district north of Kawhia and around Aotea Harbour had become almost depopulated. This vacuum was an invitation to Ngati Mahanga, a Waikato sub-tribe of Whaingaroa (Raglan), to move southwards. They did so, killing a few scattered members of the Ngati Toa and Ngati Koata tribes in the process. Te Rauparaha reacted quickly to this invasion and descended upon Whaingaroa with a fleet of war canoes. He attacked Ngati Mahanga and inflicted a decisive defeat upon them. This led to retaliatory attacks by Waikato on Ngati Toa and Ngati Koata. Gradually Te Rauparaha became embroiled with the whole might of Waikato and Ngati Maniapoto, and for some years war parties moved up and down the Kawhia coast. At times Te Rauparaha's forces were defeated; at other times he inflicted sharp defeats on his more powerful neighbours. In between, there were periods of uneasy peace.

In 1818 a party of Ngati Whatua, under the chiefs Tuwhare and Murupaenga, came to Kawhia, and Te Rauparaha persuaded them to join him on an attack on some of his enemies in Taranaki. While they were in Taranaki Te Puoho, of the Ngati Tama tribe of the Urenui district, asked for their help in attacking the Taranaki tribe's stronghold of Tataraimaka, situated on the coast about 11 miles south-west of New Plymouth. Te Rauparaha and his allies, with a few muskets, were able to take the pa with great slaughter. After a successful attack on another Taranaki pa, Mounukahawai, and an unsuccessful assault on the people of the Tapui-nikau pa, the war parties returned to their respective homes.

In the following year a large northern war party of Ngapuhi and Ngati Whatua stayed at Kawhia on an expedition to the south. Their leaders were Tuwhare, Patuone, Nene, Tawhai, and others. Te Rauparaha and his Ngati Toa were prevailed upon to join the northern people and in due course they set out by way of North Taranaki. The Ngati Tama, Ngati Mutunga, and Te Atiawa tribes of that district, being related to Ngati Toa, gave a free passage to the expedition. With somewhat indifferent success they attacked several pas of the Ngati Maru tribe of inland Taranaki and then moved on without incident until they arrived at Wanganui. Here they were met by the Wanganui people at Purua pa on the eastern bank of the river, a little above the present city. The firearms of the invaders were too much for the local people and the pa was taken.

Moving south the war party attacked a small pa of the Rangitane tribe on Lake Hotuiti in the Mana-watu district and slew the chief. After a halt at Otaki they continued to Pukerua Bay, where the Muaupoko fortress, Waimapihi, was captured. The next engagement was with the Ngati Ira of the Wellington area. The Parangahau pa was taken after a tremendous resistance by Ngati Ira, which even evoked the admiration of their enemies.

From Wellington the northern party crossed the Rimutaka Range and assaulted the Tauhere-nikau pa near Featherston. The siege was successful and many of the defenders were killed. After pursuing fugitives as far as Porangahau and Cape Palliser, the combined force returned to Wellington and made their way home. Tuwhare's party of Ngati Whatua left the main body to attack some of the river tribes. Tuwhare himself was killed during this fighting.

In 1820 or early 1821 the Waikato tribes decided to rid themselves of their troublesome Ngati Toa neighbours. With their allies, Ngati Maniapoto, the Waikato tribes made a well-planned attack on Kawhia and Taharoa with three forces totalling over 3,000 men, the advance being made simultaneously from the north, the east, and the south. Waikato were led by Te Wherowhero and the Maniapoto by Tukorehu.

As the enemy closed in upon him Te Rauparaha withdrew his men from the strongholds of Te Maika and Te Totara on the south shore of Kawhia Harbour. He concentrated his forces at Te Kawau and Te Roto at the western end of Lake Taharoa. Here Te Rauparaha fell ill and, after handing over the command to his nephew, Te Rangihaeata, he retired to Te Arawi, a pa between Honipaka point and the entrance to Kawhia Harbour. The main battle took place at Te Kakara, between Lake Taharoa and the coast. Te Rauparaha, on the verge of collapse, rejoined his army to exhort them to defend their lands and then went out on the lake in a canoe to watch the fight.

After a desperate struggle Te Wherowhero's combined forces split the Ngati Toa army in two. One half retreated southwards to the friendly Ngati Tama south of Mokau. The remainder moved back into Te Kawau and Te Roto fortresses. These, with inadequate garrisons, soon fell, and the only Ngati Toa force left intact was a small band with Te Rauparaha at Te Arawi, a pa situated on a headland connected to the shore by a razor-backed ridge. As the pa could not be taken by storm the Waikato army laid siege to it. After the siege had lasted for several weeks the Ngati Maniapoto, under the Chief Te Rangituatea, took their turn in standing guard. While the Waikato men were away seeking food Te Rangituatea held a parley with Te Rauparaha, to whom he was related, and arranged for his escape by canoe, while some of the garrison were permitted to move south overland.

Owing to his illness Te Rauparaha did not go far, but took refuge with some of his relations in a cave at Tirua point, while Te Rangihaeata, Te Pehi Kupe, Tungia, and others moved south to Taranaki with the main body of the tribe.

Eventually Te Rangituatea surreptitiously arranged for Te Rauparaha and his party to escape to Mokau. They were seen by Ngati Maniapoto after they had crossed the river but Te Rauparaha had a large number of fires lit to convey the impression of a large force and they were able to move south again without further molestation, finally joining their tribe, which was living with Ngati Tama.

Some time later (in 1822) Te Rauparaha and his Ngati Toa were living at Okoki pa in the Ngati Mutunga territory in the Urenui district. A Ngati Maniapoto war party under Tukorehu, while on an expedition, were besieged in Pukerangiora pa, on the south bank of the Waitara River, by the tribes of North Taranaki. Te Rauparaha heard that his old enemy, Te Wherowhero, was bringing his Waikato army to relieve Tukorehu. He thereupon laid plans to even up the score with Te Wherowhero. When the Waikato army was approaching Okoki, Te Rauparaha sent out a decoy party to lure Waikato thither. Although Te Wherowhero tried to restrain his men, they pursued the decoy party into a well-laid ambush and the Waikato were soon put to rout. In the pursuit which followed, Te Wherowhero was overtaken by Te Rauparaha and some of his Taranaki allies. One of the latter was about to shoot Te Wherowhero when Te Rauparaha kicked his musket aside and allowed the Waikato chief to engage his attackers in single combat. After he had withstood attack after attack from various Taranaki warriors, Te Wherowhero was saved by his army, which had rallied and returned to look for him.

The Waikato disengaged from Te Rauparaha's combined force and moved off to the relief of Pukerangiora pa. Te Rauparaha in the meantime gathered his tribe together and moved southwards, many of the North Taranaki people going with him.

Early in 1823 the Ngati Toa moved into the Horowhenua district and proceeded to drive the Muaupoko tribe out of their lands. After capturing the pa built on artificial islands in Lake Horowhenua, the invaders proceeded to Paekakariki, where they successfully assaulted another pa occupied by the Muaupoko. This prompted an attack by the mixed Ngati Ira and Ngati Kahungunu people of Wellington and Wairarapa, who drove Te Rauparaha back to Waikanae with considerable loss.

This reverse caused Te Rauparaha to abandon his efforts to occupy the mainland for the moment and to cross over to Kapiti Island. He proposed to make his base there until he could call on the assistance of his Ngati Raukawa relations from Maungatautari. Kapiti was actually captured from the Ngati Apa tribe by Te Rauparaha's uncle, Te Pehi Kupe, while Te Rauparaha made a feint withdrawal to the Manawatu.

After the move by Ngati Toa to Kapiti, Te Rauparaha heard that the Rangitane tribe had erected a large pa at Hotuiti on the north bank of the Manawatu. He and Te Rangihaeata immediately proceeded to Hotuiti with a war party and captured the pa by treachery, killing many of the Rangitane and also three Ngati Apa chiefs from the Rangitikei.

The Ngati Toa withdrew to Waikanae and, while there, they were attacked by Te Hakeke of Ngati Apa with a considerable force from his own tribe and from Rangitane and Muaupoko. Upwards of 60 of the Ngati Toa were killed, including the four daughters of Te Pehi Kupe. When reinforcements of Ngati Toa arrived from Kapiti, the attackers withdrew.

In 1824 the combined tribes of Rangitikei, Manawatu, and Horowhenua, including a large contingent of Rangitane from the South Island, assembled a huge flotilla of war canoes with the intention of overwhelming Ngati Toa on Kapiti Island. Te Rauparaha's warriors heavily defeated them at Waiorua and dealt with them so severely that Kapiti was never again attacked.