HISTORIC WAIKATO

Waipa Post, Volume 46, Issue 3309, 30 March 1933, Page 5

HISTORIC WAIKATO

EARLY DAYS IN THE TE AIWA-' MUTU DISTRICT.

CHURCH WRITER REVIEWS THE PAST. The New Zealand Tablet is collecting and recording historical data connected with the pioneering days of the Catholic Church, in New Zealand and in the March 22nd issue just to hand there is interesting reference to the Te Awamutu district. Under the caption "Historic Waikato," the Tablet says:— In his book "The Old Frontier— Te Awapiutu, the Story of the Waipa Valley," published in 1922 by the Waipa Post Printing and Publishing Co., Te Awamutu,,Mr James Cowan,' F.R.G.S., writing.of the pre-Waikato war days, thus refers to the Catholic Maori Station at Rangiaowhia, a pa fifteen miles from what is now the important town of Hamilton, subsequently (February 21, 1864) the scene of a fierce battle fought against the British forces. Quoting Mr Haywood Grispe, one of a party of travellers from Auckland and Onehunga in 1813, and later a well-known Mauku settler and volunteer rifleman: "The Catholics had a very nice place .of worship at Rangiaowhia, where regular worship was conducted. There were mission stations all up the Waikato and Waipa Rivers in those days as far as Te Awamutu. Everywhere the Maoris of those days showed travellers the greatest hospitality. . , . Rangiaowhia in those days was a beautiful place, with its comfortable thatched houses, shaded by groves of peach and apple trees, dotted along the crown of a gentle-sloping hill, among fields of wheat," niaize, potatoes and kumara, and its flourmills in the valley. On the most commanding mound was the Catholic church in front of Moani Papita's home."

Continuing, we read: "Dr Ferdinand Vot Hochstetter, the famous Austrian geologist, oil his expedition through the interior of the North Island in 1859, admired the settled aspect of Te Awamutu and the neighbouring country. He made an ascent of Mount Kakepuku, setting out from Te Kopua and from the summit viewed the valley of the Waipa :■ ' The beautiful, richly-cultivated country about Rangiaowhia and Otawaho lay spread out before us like a map. I counted ten small lakes and ponds scattered about the plains. The church steeples of three places were seen rising from among orchards and fields. Verily I could hardly realise that 1 was in the interior of New Zealand. 7

" Now the scene has vastly changed. A far more richly-cultivated country than that which the wandering geologist saw Sri 1859 stretches in all directions, and the railway engine trails the smoke-banner of the pakeha past Kakepuku's foot, bejtween him and his hill-wife, "Kawa. -But some relics of Hockstetter's day remain. The picturelike spires of the English and Catholic churches at Rangiaowhia still rise above the tree-groves heaven, pointing fingers that carry a suggestion of antiquity all too rare in man's work in New Zealand."

In "Old Waikato ©ays," written by Father John Golden, and published in 1922, we read:— "In prewar days there was_ a Catholic mission station at Rangiaowha, where lived Father Garavel, who was greatly beloved by the natives. He afterwards went to Sydney, where he had charge of a parish for many years. In later times," writes Father Golden, himself an old-time missionary in the Waikato, " Father Garavel paid a visit to the Waikato and stayed |a few weeks in the Kvng Country with his old friends beyond the Puniu River, saying he could not resist the impulse that urged him to lay his eyes once more on his dear old native friends. It was a pathetic renewal of tenderest attachment between priest and people. When bidding the Waikato farewell (he died a few months afterwards, on his return to Sydney) the good old priest shed tears and moved others to tears also." '" ''•'•■ i

During the battle fought at Raiu giaowhia (which in Maori means, according to Mr Cowan, beclouded sky) the old Catholic church there at the time was occupied by about a hundred Maori warriors. The building however, was not bullet proof and they were dislodged soon after their presence there was discovered. About 1870, a chain of blackhouses was erected in the disturbed district of the Waikato, the one at Rangiaowln:a being built -close to where the Hairini School now stands. Rangiaowhia is in the parish of Te Awamutu, the church there being dedicated to St. Joseph.