THE MASSACRE AT THE WHITE CLIFFS.

Taranaki Herald, Volume XVIII, Issue 971, 30 March 1870, Page 7 (Supplement)

THE MASSACRE AT THE WHITE CLIFFS.

To the Editor of the Taranaki Herald.

Sir, — With your permission I will advert to the White Cliff massacre of ISG9. As you are aware, a settler with his wile and family, the Rev. Mr. Whiteley and others were cruelly murdered in the February of that year, by the Ngafcimaniapoto Natives.

The murders were discovered, aud the lala Government of Taranaki despatched a search party who recovered the half buried bodies, had them removed to New Plymouth, and publicly buried; so far — saving retribution — all was done that could have been done after tli£ fact, but the publication in your journal of a letter from the Rev. Mr. Whiteley (one of the victims) addressed to H. R. Richmond, Esq., the late Superintendent, dated three months before the catastrophe, leads to serious reflections ou the conduct 'of the late Government, which I will embody in the following remarks : —

With a prophetic voice, the Rev. Mr. Whiteley, on the 30th September, ISGB, in a letter written to the Watchman newspaper, in England, says — " When I visit the out-settlement3 of onr enterprising English families, it is painful to thiuk how very easily might all the effects of their industry be destroyed, themselves murdered, wives and children tomahawked and devoured without anyone even being the wiser uutil all was over;" again, in his lately published letter to H. R. Richmond, Esq., Superintendent of Taranaki, he expresses his anxiety about the safety of the out-settlers of the Province, especially of those who were located on the confiscated lands. He speaks in a spirit of warning, and advises, besides the employment of an aggressive force, the desirability of using all the available local force in the protection of the outsettlers, whom he considered in a state of jeopardy.

But despite these warnings, no notice is taken — the out-settlers on the confiscated lands, neither " forewarned nor forearmed," slumber iv peaceful security. Scared by the Poverty Bay massacres, an appeal from one of them to the Government only meets with the assurance that all was secure, and that even in the event of a native rising, pleuty of opportunity and warning would bo given them to secure the safety of their wives and families ; and thus in the full belief in tho protecting wing of a paternal Government, they sow and they reap, they eat, drink, and are merry, until — without preparation or warning — they are cruelly butchered, as one of the victims had foretold, I submit, Sir, that the settlers on these confiscated lands had a claim on the Government for protection, and the men who allotted them their lands should have interested themselves towards the protection of their lives aud properties ; but euch was not the case. In spite of all the warnings — the " coming events cast no shadows before" — and with signal unpreparedness, these trusting pioneers of civilisation fell victims to the negligence and supineaess of those whose interest and whose duty should have been to have protected them.

Nor is this all ; the apparently repentant Government, who with pomp and circumstance gave decent sepulture to the victims of their blindness, no sooner fall ou one of the representatives of the murdered, than he is sorved with a bill of funeral costs; costs enhanced by display, and which near lying humanity had given Government the credit of defraying.

True it is, that there are, as Hamlet says, "More things twixt heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy."

And that such will be the belief now, is the reason thafc I subscribe to the truth of these statements, and am, Sir, your obedient servant, Cecil Gascoyne.

New Plymouth, March 15, 1870.

The Medical Board under the Pensions Act. — We are informed that Major Stapphas received intimation from the Uuder-Secretary for the Defence Office, thafc " His Excellency the Governor has appointed Geoi'go St. George, Esq., to be a member of the Medical Board under the Pensions Act."