Story: New Zealand Wars

Henry Rawson’s painting of the Ōmata stockade was completed several years after the stockade was the catalyst for one of the first battles of the Taranaki Wars. The stockade was a few kilometres south-west of New Plymouth and protected local settler families. In March 1860, Ngāti Ruanui moved towards New Plymouth and built a pā, Kaipopo, overlooking the stockade. Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Gold sent a force to relieve the stockade and attack the new pā, which was eventually captured, probably after its abandonment by Māori.