TAUPO.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume 13, Issue 1085, 21 September 1869, Page 2

TAUPO.

OF COL. M'DONNELL, (JBOM A COttfIESPONDBNX.) LiEUT.-CoLONKr. Me l>on»ell -armed fi" 010 Wanganui on Monday, Sept. 6, at 9 p»ni«ji having walked turuug'h the bush, accompanied by ten natives, to Pateaj :; 6vei a very rough country, impassable for horses. The natives, some years ago, succeeded in bringing one horse out of ten through the bush. On arriving in Napier/ he %aS; given command of the expedition to Taupo against Te Kooti, who was reported to be in force at Poatu, the village on Rotoaira Lake. McDonnell left again on the 7th, arriving at Kuri Papanga, Kgaruroro gorgS, at 3 p.m. on the Btb, the road from Herrick and Williams' station being very hilly and intercepted by deep gullies. On the 9t% after climbing Kuri Papanga,—- which is much 1 steeper, and twice the length, of the Moeangiangi hill on the Wairoa road— -and a,lso theTairuarua range, He went on totke Rangitikei river, the road to which is good, passing over an undulating, grassy country; the Kaimanawa ranges lying on the right, and extending almost to Lake Taupo, their tops being covered with snow, and their sides thickly wooded. Crossing the Rangitikei, the party arrived on Birch's station at 5 p.m., and heard that Renata with 60 natives and the Patea people hadleft the same morning!: Arrived at Wirihana's p.ah on the 10th, at 4 p.m., the road being vely bad and boggy. Found the whole native force there, Wiriharia having killed six bullocks and. fifty fat sheep for them, , On the 11th, at 7 a.m., Lieut-Colonel McDonnell left Wirihana's pah, with the whole force for Poatu, the route passing under Ruapahu and Tongariro, with! a magnificent view of Mount Egmonr in the distance. We rode for some miles, along the banl^s of the Wangihu river, whose waters are the color of milk, and not drinkable, having a very astringent, acrid taste, and being strongly impregnated with sulphur. This river empties itself into the sea on the West Coast, but its waters become clear, before arriving there. Crossed the source of the Waikato river, which rises from beneath a large stone in the Ruapahu desert, the Wangihu river also rising in the Fame locality,r — ;its sulphureous, mineral waters, and, the clear, pure Waikato almost rising from the same source. The force camped on the evening of the 11th under a belt of bush at a place called Kaihau, about 15 miles from Rotoaira.

On the morning of the 12th, the force marched for Poatu. The ro^d was bad, crossing the spurs of Tongariro, which are intersected by deep gullies with boggy sides. About five miles from Poatu, Lieut.-Colonel McDonnell sent on an advanced guard, the remainder of the force following in single file, as an old native told me, "To make their number look larger." 1 Four men were sent to visit a Frenchman, (the Tokano miller,) who was located in the bush under the Kaimanawa ranges. This man had received a message from Te Kooti, to say that, he being a Wi Wi (i.e. a Frenchman), the Hauhaus would not kill him ,* but they took his Maori wife 1 and children away, returning them on his paying £10, — this the Frenchman actually paid, and then bolted to the bush, where we found him ! We fully expected to have a skirmish at Poatu, and it was approached very cautiously ; but we found it deserted, Te Kooti and his followers having apparently left it the day before. We found Kingi Tauteka's pah destroyed, and a large wharepuni burnt. Half a bullock was found hanging up in the bush. The Hauhaus had occupied an earthwork on the side of the river. We pitched our camp at noon. Lieut-Colonel McDonnell went next day with 27 men to reconnoitre Tokano : the party was fired at from a wooded hill about a mile from the village, and returned to camp at 4.30 p.m. Hare Tauteka was of opinion that the firing was by Henare Tomoanu's people, who had mistaken our party for Hauhaus ; for as Henare had left Runanga on the 6th, we fully expected he would be at Tokano : others thought that the firing proceeded from Te Kooti's men. On Monday night we heard a volley fired, which put the whole force on the gui vive, expecting an attack. Scouts came in, and reported that they had seen marks of the feet of shod horses on Taupo beach, near Tokano. From this we made sure that the firing heard the night before was at Henace's scouts or advanced guard, who had been to reconnoitre Tokano.

On Tuesday, the 14th inst, a reinforcement of 27 men, Wirihana's Wanganui people, arrived. Scouts were sent to a hill above our camp, whence a good view of Tokano could be obtained. The scouts reported that they observed Hauhaus on horseback, both men and women, some on the road in the direction of Moerangi, and others on foot, evidently "skedaddling." Lieut. -Colonel McDonnell could not conceive why Henare Tomoana did not come up, as the orders were that Henare was to meet him at Taupo (Tokano). Our force not being strong enough, and not sufficiently well-provided with ammunition to cope with Te Kooti by itself, and not being able to communicate with Tauranga (Taupo Lake), the enemy being in force on the road there, Lieut.-Colonel McDonnell sent despatches down to Napier, asking the agent; of the General Government to send on Lieut.-Col. Herrick's men, and also the Arawas from Tapuaeharuru, with all despatch. Captain Tuke, who had accompanied the force, was the bearer of these despatches ; he, with a half-caste trooper named Perro, performing the journey in three days, and reaching Napier late on Friday. :

On their arriving in Napier, the whole mystery was solved : the shod horses whose tracks had been seen by the scouts upon Taupo beach having been those captured by Te Kooti's people from Henare Tpmoana. Lieut. -Colonel McDonnell would have been joined by the whole force on the. 16th insfc. I know that it is his intention to follow up the enemy, as far as his orders will permit; he will, it seems probable, destroy the Iwi Kohoru, or " Murdering Tribe," provided they are not harbored by the King's people. , ..