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Story: Anti-racism and Treaty of Waitangi activism

Octavius Hadfield

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Octavius Hadfield

Reverend Octavius Hadfield was a missionary who, from 1839, worked for 50 years with mainly Māori communities in the lower North and upper South islands. He was regarded as a 'philo-Māori' (lover of Māori) by Europeans because of his opposition to settler land grabbing and the Taranaki wars. This portrait of him appears in a stained-glass window in St Luke's Church, Waikanae, the community where he spent much of his life.

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Te Ara – The Encyclopedia of New Zealand

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Robert Consedine, Anti-racism and Treaty of Waitangi activism – Early attitudes and anti-racism, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/26663/octavius-hadfield (accessed 4 June 2026).

Story by Robert Consedine, published 2 May 2011.