MAORI WAR EPISODE.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 55, Issue 85, 21 January 1935, Page 3

MAORI WAR EPISODE.

GATE! PA ENGAGEMENT. CEREMONY AT CHATHAM. (Special to the "Guardian.") WELLINGTON, January 18. During the years' of the Maori -Wars a stout .part was played by officers and men of two British Naval corvettes, the Esk and the Eclipse. That New Zealanders have not altogether forgotten the excellent service rendered in those early days was shown when Sir James Grose, general manager of the National Rank of New Zealand and president of the New Zealand Navy' League, visited the newly commissioned destroyer H.M.S. Esk at Chatham Dockyard, and presented a bronze plaque commemorative of the warship's namesake and predecessor. Heavy rain drenched the dockyard when Sir James Grose, accompanied by Rear-Admiral G. 0. Stephenson, general secretary of the British Navy League, made an informal inspection of the destroyer, and presented the plaque to Captain R. P. Selby, commanding the Esk. "With this go and will remain our fervent good wishes," said Sir James. "It is perhaps not too much to call it symbolic of the bravery of pakeha, and Maori in their war, of the unity between them to-day, and of the goodwill of the Navy League to the Navy." The bronze plaque, mounted on mottled kauri, bore an inscription of similar purport. The twenty-one gun corvette, after which the new destroyer has been named, was a vessel of 1169 tons, under tlie command of Captain John Hamilton. Some of her officers and men, part of the Naval Reserves, reinforced the land forces, and participated in the hard fighting at the Gate Pa near Tauranga, where after desperate hand-to-hand fighting the Maoris repulsed the attacking forces with heavy losses to both sides.

On that day, April 29, 1864, many of the officers of the attacking side were shot down in the initial charge; in the melee that ensued the Europeans were hampered by restricted space and «\ maze of entrenchments, while at that type of warfare the Maori was at his best. Although the Reserves, under Captain Hamilton, fought heroically to save the day, their effort failed] the commander was shot down from the top of the outer parapet, whence he was calling his men to advance, and the Maoris were left in possession of the pa. They abandoned it, however, during the following night. It was in that engagement that a Maori woman brought water to a wounded European, who was calling for it, under fire. To-day those two corvettes, so intimately associated .with the Dominion's history, have passed on their names to 'a new H.M.S. Esk and a new H.M.S. Eclipse. To each of these iwo destroyers the Navy League is presenting a 'commemorative plaque.