TROUBLOUS DAYS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21844, 5 July 1934, Page 8

TROUBLOUS DAYS

BAY OF PLENTY MURDER HAUHAU CRIME OF 1867 PERPETRATORS NEVER CAUGHT The troublous days of early settlement on the East. Coast, in particular the tragic death in 1867 of Mr. Bennett White, have been recalled by the recent golden jubilee celebrations of the marriage in St. Matthew's Church, Auckland, of Mr. and Mrs. George White, now well-known residents of Gisborne. Mr. George White is a son of Mr. Bennett White. The New Zealand Herald of July 5 1867, gives the following account of the tragedy: —"By the arrival of the P.S. Sturt this afternoon we have the sad intelligence of the murder of Mr. Bennett White and the native mailman, Patrick, an Arawa, between Opotiki and Whakatane, by the Hauhaus, on Saturday last (June 29, 1867). Bodies Found on IJeach "We hasten to give the following particulars: —The intelligence was conveyed by Mr. Clark, C.C., and a body of 150 armed men were at once sent down to scour the beach, and succeeded in finding the two bodies, which were frightfully mutilated. The heads were severed from the trunks, the eyes had been gouged out and probably eaten. Bennett White's head was found on the beach at some distance from the body. Another armed party has been sent out to follow the tracks of the murderers. " Our readers will remember that Bennett White was on board Kate when Mr. Fulloon and other persons were murdered, and was spared by the Maoris at that time. He gave evidence at the trial of the murderers, and it is more than probable that his life has been taken as utu for the lives of those who were executed for Mr. Fulloon's murder. " Of what use it can be to order out 150 troops to march them back again we do not know, for as for supposing that they will do more than come upon old camp fires or deserted villages is not in the order of such things. Such a murder as that which has now occurred is probably the act of some small band of fanatics, and will be heard of with abhorrence and disgust by the bulk of the native race. Suggested Investigation " If it is really intended to capture these murderers it will be done, not by marching a company and a-half of troops through the country, but by ascertaining the portion of the tribe, or even the names of the guilty party, if possible, and entrusting their capture or punishment to a party of thorough bushmen, such as the elite of the Forest Rangers, and a few Arawas, to which tribe the murdered mailman belonged, under such men as Majors Jackson and Von Tempsky for leaders. " The backswoodsmen of America would have known how to deal with the miscreants' who keep the East Coast unsafe, and would long since have followed up and routed them out of fastnesses quite as inaccessible as any in New Zealand. That the murder has any political significance we do not believe. It is no more than might have been looked for in. that particular district, and as occurring to Mr. White, who must have been a marked man among the Hauhaus."

For months after the murder the East Coast community was agitated by repercussions of the event. It was finally believed that the murderers of Mr. Bennett White and the Maori mailman were Ureweras, none of whom was ever captured. .