SOLD FOR A MESS OF POTTAGE

Te Ao Hou, June 1959, Page 8

SOLD FOR A MESS OF POTTAGE Government officials had little difficulty purchasing the land needed for European settlers. In October 1840 George Clarke purchased the block fronting the Waitemata needed for the township. This was a triangular block, of about 3,000 acres, extending along the foreshore from Hobson Bay to Cox's Creek and inland to Maungawhau (Mt. Eden). The land was sold by Ngatiwhatua—the deed was actually signed by Apihai te Kawau,

Tinana, Rewiti Tamaki and Horo. Clarke paid the chiefs £66 in cash* This included £8 for burial grounds. Another £60 was paid in 1842. and goods worth £215. The goods were listed in the deed—50 blankets, 20 pairs of trousers, 20 shirts, 10 waistcoats, 10 caps, 4 casks of tobacco, 1 box of pipes, 100 yards of gown pieces, 10 iron pots, 1 bag of sugar, 1 bag of flour and 20 hatchets. The whole block had cost less than 2/- an acre. Yet within six months the Government had made a handsome profit by selling a small portion of it. In April 1841 at the first Crown land sale 44 acres of town lots were sold for £24,275—over £550 per acre. The Europeans who had paid the high prices also made money out of it, some of them immediately, by sub-dividing and reselling parts of their lots. Hobson was jubilant over his success as a landbroker and hastened to obtain more Maori land. In May 1841 the Government purchased the Kohimarama block—about 6,000 acres—from Ngatipaoa. This included all the waterfront land from Kohimarama to the Tamaki estuary. The tribe was paid £100 in cash and goods worth £258. A month later Ngatiwhatua sold another block of land, about 13,000 acres, inland from the Waitemata block and bounded by Maungakiekie (One Tree Hill) in the south-west and the Whau estuary in the north-west. The payment was £225 in cash plus goods valued at £164. Money was also paid on some more distant blocks at the head of the Waitemata, North Shore and Papakura but these transactions were not completed for some years. By the end of 1842 all the land fronting the Waitemata from the Tamaki estuary to the head of the harbour, except the Orakei block, had been purchased. The Maoris still owned a valuable strip of land running from Orakei, through Remuera, to the Manukau and most of the land around this harbour. European settlers were soon agitating for the purchase of this land. They were anxious to purchase it directly from the Maori owners, hoping to avoid paying the minimum of £1 per acre that they had to pay for Crown land. In March 1844 Governor Fitzroy gave in, waived the Crown's right of pre-emption, and allowed Europeans to purchase directly from the Maoris on condition that they paid a Government fee of 10/- per acre. Few were satisfied with the concession and only a little over 2,000 acres were purchased. Agitation was renewed, this time aimed at a reduction of the government fee. Fitzroy was disturbed by Heke's revolt in the north and after a Maori demonstration had been staged at Remuera in May (mainly by the Waikato tribes) was apprehensive that the trouble would spread to the south. He too readily accepted European suggestions that a reduction in the 10/- fee would quieten the Maoris and in October reduced it to 1d. per acre. This was the signal for a burst of purchasing by Europeans who, in the remainder of 1844 and 1845, claimed to have acquired an estate of 100,000 acres from the Maoris. Most of this land was in the neighbourhood of Auckland, some of it along the boundaries of the earlier Government purchases.† Between Henderson and Papakura the area involved was 65,000 acres. The Royal Commission on Surplus Lands (1947) recognised that the Maoris had a claim in equity for compensation on some of this acreage, and this compensation has since been paid. But the purchasers were sorely disappointed when the new Governor, Captain George Grey, arrived at the end of 1845. He immediately restored the Crown's right of pre-emption and later held an enquiry into the European claims. The fraudulent claims were cancelled and the exaggerated ones reduced. Less than 20,000 acres were finally awarded to the claimants. But the surplus of these claims was not returned to the Maoris; instead the Crown retained it, after making some pittance payments to them. By 1850 the Orakei reserve was the only substantial block of land left in Maori hands in the whole of the Tamaki isthmus. The remainder of the land had been sold cheaply and the proceeds squandered. The cheap prices were excused on the grounds that European settlement would increase the value of Maori reserves and that Maoris by cultivating their land and making contact with Europeans would acquire the arts of civilisation. A comfortable view—for the Europeans—but it did not work out in practice. The trouble was that the Ngatiwhatua tribe could not retain their Orakei reserve, even though the chiefs had wanted it kept for the children. From time to time they were tempted to sell portions of the reserve and nearly all of the land dwindled away. Today there is hardly enough left for a marae. The Government started nibbling at Orakei in 1850 when H. T. Clarke bought 700 acres of the Remuera end. Clarke admitted the chiefs had set the land aside “as a nest-egg for their children”. The chiefs then agreed to accept £12,000 for the 700 acres but after “prolonged and wearisome interviews”, Clarke beat them down to £5,000. Certainly this was more than the Government had paid for Maori land in the ‘forties; but it still made exhorbitant profit on re-sale. One-third of the block was sold immediately for £32,000 and, according to Clarke, the whole block realised just on £100,000. Another 470 acres were purchased from the Maori owners in 1855 for £2,000—not a high price, the Southern Cross noted, because the Government had been selling adjoining land (probably Clark's purchase) for £100 an acre. Approximately 700 acres of Maori land were left around Okahu Bay. Could the Maori owners keep this as a nest-egg for their children? For many years it seemed that they could. The Government left them alone. The Europeans who were anxious to obtain the land when direct purchase

was introduced again in 1862 were frustrated when Fenton's Native Land Court judgment of 1868 made the land inalienable. In 1882 an Act of Parliament unconditionally reserved the block for its Maori owners. The Maori hold on Orakei seemed secure. In 1908, however, an act was passed to consolidate Maori land legislation and it was found that this had the effect of repealing the section of the 1882 Act bearing on Orakei. A syndicate of European speculators then tried to buy the land and at the urgent request of the City Council the Government stepped in. Instead of passing legislation to make Orakei inalienable once more the Government started to purchase it. The individual Maori interests were gradually purchased over the next 30 years and virtually all the 700 acres was acquired by the Crown. Much of the land was sold off to Europeans and the portions overlooking the harbour have become Auckland's most fashionable suburb. The transactions on Maori land should not be considered abnormal. Europeans regarded land as a commodity to be bought at the cheapest price and sold at the dearest. It was to be expected that the Government and European settlers would treat Maori land in this fashiion. To speculate with it was good business and a way of making money. And land speculation, plus the expansion of commerce helped European settlers to get established. European merchants offered Maoris an opportunity to trade and European farmers were willing to employ Maori labour. Maoris still had a chance to adapt themselves to European civilisation.