WHITMORE'S RAID on RUATAHUNA

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 1, Issue 6, 3 May 1939, Page 3

WHITMORE'S RAID on RUATAHUNA

BATTLES IN THfE BUSH < FIRST UREWERA CAMPAIGN SEVENTY YEARS AGO THIS WEEK j r k Drenched with the mountain mist, swathed in dense bush, Ruatahuna 1 in the hea.rt' of the Urewera country for centuries was the main village ol the Tuhoe tribe, and 70 years ago it was the headquarters of the rebel 'le Kooti. The great carved house erect, ed for him still stands nearby at Mataatua village, and there, too, the traveller may see the lonely j graves of those Bay of Plenty mens " -wtiQ fell in the war in 1869 when, Whitmore and St John for the first time penetrated the savage Urewera uplands, and showed the turbulent Hauhaus something of the power of c pakeha. — Seventyears ago to-day, on May 3, 1869, Colonel Whitmore's men built Fort Galatea which they established as an advanced base for the j operation against Ruatahuna. Whit_ more's column had boated and swag-< ged its supplies up the Rangitaiki from Matata, building a chain of redoubts along the route. The operation, which was in, retaliation for Te Kooti's raids on Mohaka and W hakatane a few weeks earlier, ~-a s planned as a converging drive by columns from Waikaremoana, Whakatane, and Galatea. Little Success The first column never reached Ruatahuna, and though the latter two fought their way up to their goal it is doubtful whether the result of the expedition justified its •cost, for the imposingly large columns killed few of the enemy, and the native troops employed were not suited to the bush fighting. Tuhoe were not as impressed by the raid as they were a year or two later when their fastness was swept by smaller parties of the savage Ngatiporou and rough Armed Constabulry men. Towards the end of April the Wha katane force had gathered. On the 22nd April No. 1 Division of the Armed Constabulary marched to Opouriao where an advanced camp was formed, while No. 2 Division encamped at Whakatane to await supplies which arrived on May Ist. On May 2nd the column assembled at Opouriao where five days rations and 60 extra rounds of ammunition were issued to each man for the Warch"to which started on May 4th a day after Whitmore fiad built Fort Galatea. The force consisted of 235 A.G. men, ten Guides, 144 Maoris under Major Mair 3nd Te Puku.atua, a ad 35 native carriers. It must have been a picturesque sight as it toiled up the mountain gorges with its young, be-whiskered Armed Constabulary, the Maoris in blankets or flax kilts, the Guides similarly dressed, or in. service blue with their trousers cut

off at the knee and their feet bare, * and the native porters heavily be- 1 swagged. c A March Begins f These were the men that on May •1 marched away from Opouriao. c They tramped up the lluatoki gorge, ] and so up the Whakatane River, , wading it many times" and camping , that night at Tuna-nui. On May i the Europeans eo.ptinued up the riveV, camping that night far up the Waikare stream where they awaited the arrival of the Maori contingent which had been outmarched. On May 6th the column crossed a high range between the Wa;k£ire stream and the Whakatane River and there they surprised a native village near a kainga known as O-haua-le-rangi. The hamlet was rushed by the ten Guides under Lieutenant D. White, of Opotiki, and seven Ngapuhi. Six men, two women and a child were shot down as w r ere digging potatoes, the child receiving its death wound when the man who was earning it to safety was j killed. Lieutenant White was slight.. I ly wounded, but he continued to lead his men. ( The column camped that night in the captured hamlet and next morning tlie march continued up river with the Guides scouting iu front. As the advance guard was crossing the river at the mouth MaltakL rua stream, at a place called Pari, j pari, .they were heavily fired on by a party of Hauhau hiden in the bush. Lieutenant White fell mOitahy wounded, and a Maori Constable was seriously wounded. No. 1 A.C. was sent up the right bank of the river to cross and clear out the ambush, but the enemy were satisfied with the damage they had done and they fell back on a steep hill, whcie they occupied rifle pits and kept up a brisk fire on the troops in the valley bplow who were engaged in bury. . ing Lieutenant White. Two of the native contingent were hit, one mortally. The column then nd vane ;d up the hill, though Major Man- had much difficulty in getting his natives to go forward. When the troops did L advance they found the elusive foe had slipped away again. > Pa Taken ) i After dinner among the rifle pits i; the troops advanced again. 'Ihe enemy were found in possession ot 1 Nga-hukeke pa, a weak newly-built 5 place. Tuhoe never built many fortii lied places, nor did they seem to care • for fighting ;in., them. From Nga.. [ hukeke thc' MaoriS opened a harni. : less fire on .the column St John sent out parties to flank the fort and rush it, but again, before the * troops coukl get into position. They I Hauhau foe had slipped away. They l only lost one man, a sort of semii idiot who, when he saw the nathe contingent, mistook them for own friends and quietly walked over , to them. "He did not walk back i again but died of lead po'soning ; about this time," says, Elsdon Best.

The troops camped at the pa that night. Colonel St. John, in his book 'Pakeha Rambles through Maori Lands' speaks of a peculiar incide-.it which occurred as dusk fell. It shows how unreliable the native troops could be when anything happened which played on their superstitious fears. "Just about dusk" says St.. John. "I heard a great hullabaloo, and rush cd out of the whare, thinking there might be some fresh Hauhau move and found our native allies gro\ elling on the ground and singing out lustily.. Near the lop of the wooded range on the right a large ball fire Avas slowly wending its way down the vale. It was quite round, seemed to be some six feet in, diameter, emit ted a dull light, and was unaccompanied by the slightest noise; presently it turned round a corner and was lost to-sight. The natives would have it that this was the atua s fam. iliar demon) of Te Kooti, and that it prophesied disaster to us." Another Encounter After this alarm the native troops must have spent an uneasy night. In the morning the force pulled down the palisades of the pa, and when they had cleaned their arms, and a ration of bacon and fresh ammunition had been served out, ohey marched off again. B3 r noon they were in touch with Tuhoe again. This time the enemy held the P a of O-rangi-kawa and were also in the bush in force. Fighting commenced at once. One party of the A.G. men was sent to deal with the men in the bush and Colonel St. John with another force managed to get within ten yards of the pa 011 the other side where it was decided to commence a sap. However, before the tools Girived the garrison had, decamped. Stubborn Officer It had been quite a brisk skirmish and it had lasted for four hours. Several men had been killed, among them Captain Travel's Avho commanded the force' which was sent against the Hauhau ambush. Travers was standing on a fence at the time. He had a bright silver badge on the front of his uniform cap. ''You'd better take off that badge, old man; I it's too good a target for the Maoris ; said a brother officer, but Travers l refused to take the advice. It would - be unsokliei ly, he said, and lie also refused to take shelter like the old hands. A few minutes later he fell with a bullet through the brain. 1 Where was Whitmcre ; It was late afternoon when tlv? 1 troops with fixed bayonets rushed the " redoubt. There tliev threw off their heavy packs and tended tneir six : wounded and buried the four who " had been killed. The chill of the late " autumn evening was advancing, and * the sun was dying as the tired men k sat in the pa listening to the yell* e of the hidden Hauhaus and the bcllow of the war trumpet. Their posL ' tion was not over-satisfactory. They " were in the heart of the enemy country, in, a position tnat be attacked that night by ;! vastly superior 1 force of Maoris, and the men wer<: * almost out of ammunition of which " a tremendous amount had been useU ' in the two days' heavy skirmishing. Some of the men had fired awnv all " their issue while others yd a single cartridge left. True, it was the dsy fixed for the junction with Whit, mores men,, but where wag vVhitmore? How Wh'tmorc had fared will be told in our next issue.