OLD MANGERE.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 134, 8 June 1929, Page 1 (Supplement)

OLD MANGERE.

STORY OF THE MAORI "FENCIBLES," A NATIVE MILITIA SETTLEMENT. (By J.C.) Across the inner Manukau shallows, where the always vividly green fields of Mangere are overlooked by the. storyhaunted little mountain on which the Waiohua of old made their last stand, there is a venerable church of lava stone built in the solid yet picturesque style of New Zealand architecture 80 years ago. Around the early-days place of worship there are some historic associations, dating back to the settlement there of the famous Te Wherowhero and his Ngati-Mahuta clan of the Waikato as a protective warrier wing for the fledgeling town of Auckland. The mountains and the stone church, and that cabbage tree-dotted burying ground behind the church —those, are the most charming things of Mangere. The ancient pa-hill has its poetic memories. One "waiata" of lamentations for the dead, Matire Toha's grief-song for her huts-, band, Hori Kerei Kati Takiwaru (brother of Te Wherowhero), who died here, contains these linee:—

"Puhia e te hau Ki runga o Mangere; Ka ngaro ra ia I te rehu tai." "Sweep on, 0 winds, Across the peak of Mangere; My loved one's gone for ever, Lost in the ocean spray." The chief for whom that funeral chant was composed was one of the leaders 01 the band of Waikatos who took up their quarters here in the year 1849 as a kind of auxiliary territorial force to serve with the British military pensioner companies in the event of war 'threatening the town. The official story of that tactical move by the sagacious Governor, .Sir George Grey, is contained in a volume of Government papers relating to the colony, published in 1850. Some of the facts about "Mangere taone" I heard long ago from the two old' chiefs of the tribe, Patara te Tuhi (the much-tattooed and a favourite Maori model of portrait painters) and his brother, Honana , Maioha, who lived on their rich farm lands at Ararata, near the inner seashore of the peninsula. The two brothers were young men in the Mangere company in the days of .Grey's first governorship. Later on they had leading parts in the exciting drama of setting up Te Wherowhero as the Maori King under the name of Potatau Ingiki ("Potatau the Inca"). A curious title, that Inca, derived from translations oi the substance of Prescott's history of Mexico. After the close of New Zealand's first three little wars —the campaigns at the Bay of Islands, Wellington and Wanganui—the Government took measures for the defence of Auckland against possible attacks by establishing the Imperial time-expired soldiers' settlements at Onehunga, Panmure and Howick. These veteran soldiers, styled the Royal New Zealand Fencibles, were under the command of Major Kenny, whose headquarters were at Onehunga. Immediately after they had been given their sections and cottages, Sir George ' Grey ; induced his friend, *Te Wherowhero, and 80 families of his tribe to occupy a block of Government land at Mangere as an outer guard for the capital. Ngati-Mahuta's Drill Conditions.

On April 16, 1849, an agreement was signed by 121 Maoris of the Ngati-, Mahuta and by C. W.-Ligar, surveyorgeneral, on behalf of the Government, covering the conditions on which the tribe was settled at Mangere. The principal conditions were: The Maoris (who were armed at their own expense) agreed to attend regularly "for military purposes" on twelve days in each year, if required to do so, without receiving any payment for so doing; to serve in aid of the Government, when called upon so to do, on any number of days in the year; for each day they were so called out, in excess of the twelve days mentioned, they were to receive a payment of 1/6. The periods for which they were _ to be called out would be fixed by the Governor, but they would only be summoned "for the purpose of military exercise, or of the defence of the colony"; and when so

called out they would In all respects be regarded as forming a part of Her I Majesty's regular forces.

In a report to Governor Grey, written in May, 1849, the Surveyor-General described the settlement of these Maori Militia. He had given the tribe possession of the site of the village at Mangere, containing 80 one-acre lots, and the same number of five-acre lots for cultivation adjoining (480 acres in all).

"It was an interesting sight," wrote Ligar, "to witness these natives taking over into the first village set apart for them and designed in accordance with the European custom. They were delighted to find that in every particular it resembled those which have lately been laid out for the New "Zealand Fencibles. Their first care was to examine every part , with the object of ascertaining and reserving the best site for a church and a place for the clergyman's residence. In.the choice of these places they displayed more taste and judgment than could have been expected. . . They request that thier native teacher, who, in the absence of their minister, reads prayers, may be exempted from the military duties they themselves have promised to perform." Into Rebellion. Like the pakeha Pensioners, the Maoris were allowed, at the end of seven years' service, to obtain the freehold of the land they occupied. But the "attachment to British interests" did not stand the test of time. Sixteen year?, iatur practically all Ngati-Mahuta were mi >' t.he war path, making use of Llien .u hi in training, superimposed oi r .\uor nav« «ildiering talent, u> u Governor's pakeha troops. Confiscation of some of the land naturally followed, but there were some, such as Honana Maioha, who remained at Mangere through the war (Honana's brother, Patara, joined the other Kingites in the Waikato), and later there were certain restorations

The Surveyor-General mentioned the names of the various chiefs who settled there with their, people. The list was headed by Kati Takiwaru, Tainati Ngapbra and Warena Kahawai. Ngapora was a cousin of Potatau Te Wherowhero; he was a church of England lay reader and took the leading part in the building of the stone church, which was the first communal duty. The Waikato war, when it came, 16 years later, was a great grief to the good old chief. He loved the peaceful life but loyally went into the war on the side of his fellow tribesmen, and he took refuge with them in 1864 in the Ngati-Maniapoto country, south of the Puniu River. He changed his name to Manuhiri, signifying visitor, guest, or stranger, in allusion to the Waikato's long sojourn in the territory of another tribe. There is a portrait of him by Lindauer, painted at Whatiwhatihoe, on the Waipa, in the 'eighties, in the Lindauer Maori room, Auckland Municipal Art Gallery.

When Mr. James Mackay, the Government native agent, and special commissioner for the Waikato in the scaretroubled 'seventies, was attacked in his tent at Tokangamutu (now'Tβ Kuiti) one night in 1873, old Manuhiri at once ranged himself on the lone pakeha's side. The Maori who attacked Mackay and tried to kill him was a man named Ruru (a quite appropriate name for a night-roving marauder, for it means the owl). Manuhiri took Mackay's assailant by the ear and led him through the village, saying, "Who is this low fellow? Let' him be killed!" Rewi Maniopoto, too, strongly condemned the attack on Mackay.

"Queen's Town" or "La?y Town."

To return to Mangere, the old bluebook before me contains the story of a protest entered against the name of the settlement of 'Forty-nine, The SurveyorGeneral reported- to the Governor that the chiefs of Ngati-Mahuta wished the official name of the place to be changed.; "I selected, the native designation of the peninsula on which it is situated," Ligar wrote, "as the most proper; but as the meaning of it is lazy, or laziness, they are apprehensive that it may be used reproachfully against them. After several native names had been proposed by them and rejected they unanimously agreed that it should have a European name, and' that the name should be 'Queen's Town,' in honour, as they said, of our most gracious Sovereign. I do not apprehend that there will be any difficulty in making the alteration requested." But "Queen's Town" seems to have died a very early death, if it was evei adopted. Later generations of Maori and pakeha residents do not seem to have been so sensitive about the uncomplimentary name of their beautiful seaside home.