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Te Ao Hou, December 1968, Page 60

either a treacherous, bloodthirsty rebel, second only to that other arch-rebel Hongi Hika in villainy, or as a nuisance and a trouble-maker with a wanton compulsion to cut down flagstaff's and burn out towns. We may well decide after re-reading evidence, that Heke emerges as a tragic figure of certain heroic proportions. He had a burning conviction that British sovereignty was synonymous with European alienation of Maori land. It was no easy road that he chose, to maintain militant defiance in the face of threatened punitive confiscation of his lands, to suffer the systematic destruction of his undefended pas, to fight at the same time a frontal attack against one enemy and a rearguard action against his own tribal kinsman. Accounts of the engagements at Ohaeawai and at Ruapekapeka stir the imagination about the generalship of this man. Our history books were hazy too about details of the sacking of Kororareka. They neglected to tell us that British warships bombarded the deserted town of Kororareka while Maori troops watched impassively from the surrounding hills, that these vital shots did appreciable damage and actually precipitated the sacking of the town, that Heke carefully excluded the missionaries and the settlers' families from attack, that he gave orders for the preservation of the church, and that he sent Signalman Tapper's wife and child down to safety when the blockhouse was taken. The petulance, instability and treachery attributed to Heke by the government might as easily have been applied to Waka Nene by Heke. Kawiti claimed that Waka Nene's loyalty to the government sprang from private differences with Heke and that he constantly exploited the situation to wipe out old scores and grudges. Hostilities in the North subsided into an uneasy peace after the battle at Ruapekapeka and the military detachments could now be utilized in the already explosive situation in Wellington. Whereas British sovereignty vested in the government had been the opposition in the Northern disputes, conflict in Wellington was almost entirely between Wakefield's Land Company settlers and the Maori occupants of the area. British troops were used to protect Company interests and support their claims. Fitzroy's irksome halter of the Company's unrestricted acquisition of Maori land had been removed with the arrival of a new governor, and new horizons of hope had opened up for the settlers. The involved situation of Maori land tenure in the Wellington district resulted largely from Te Rauparaha's movements in the area. The reader should be familiar with the ancestral lands of the tribes involved in the hostilities before trying to follow the land negotiations. The interplay of reference to Ngati Toa, Ngatiawa, Ngati Raukawa etc., may be confusing. There was no unity of action among the tribes, a factor that lessened chances of success and hastened European occupation. Te Rangihaeata was the Hone Heke of the south. Te Rauparaha, more or less quiescent at this period, plays a relatively small part. Devious man that he was, Grey was always suspicious of the guile in anyone else, and it was the astute move of a very astute man when he made the ageing warrior his prisoner. But whether or not it was a wise move depends upon whether the following wave of mistrust that permeated Maori attitudes to any European move can be sheeted home to this particular incident. The most distasteful aftermath of the Wellington conflict was the courts martial of captured Maori prisoners and their punishment by hanging and transportation. That did its part in intensifying Maori opposition and bitterness in Wanganui. Tribal fragmentation in Wanganui was complex, and troubles arose when areas of Maori and European occupation were neither understood nor clearlv defined by either side. Many of the chiefs had taken part in the Wellington disputes and bitterness over the courts martial still rankled. The Christian mission was firmly established among the river tribes and in the midst of hostile preparations on both sides, a Christmas Day service for 2,000 Maoris brought 382 to receive the sacrament. The sporadic guerilla nature of Maori warfare was frustrating to the stockaded British troops. An even greater annoyance was the Maori resourcefulness in ‘living off the land’. Their strategy was to send two or three men out to show themselves and goad the soldiers into firing at them. The decoys then sprang on the unexploded shells, gathered them up and made for

cover. The help to their own meagre stock of ammunition must have been considerable, for the Rev. Taylor records that one such sortie netted them 63 musket balls and 4 lbs of powder. Throughout the book, the author describes missionary influence as a great civilizing force. The missionaries were forthright in their condemnation of unscrupulous land deals. They fought a constant battle to enforce the letter of the Treaty. They moderated in inter-tribal disputes and influenced to no small degree the breaking down of lingering pockets of resistance. But there were those among them who were not above testing Maori action against their own interests in the name of Chrisitian duty. Grey's exhortation to Maori claimants to give up the Hutt land to European settlers found gratifying support when the Rev. Taylor obtusely took for his text a chapter from Timothy, which reminded Christians of their duty to yield to governors. It was unfortunate that the Maori was to get such early initiation into European double standards. He had not yet become familiar with nominal Christianity. On the same Christmas Day when a service brought 382 Maoris from a population of 2,000 to receive communion, a similar service in the township for 400 troops and settlers attracted 20. It could not have escaped Maori notice that Europeans appeared to take to heart the maxim ‘the better the day, the better the deed’. Dates in the author's documentation reveal that from the North to the Hutt Valley, Sunday was the auspicious day for launching a military offensive. It was also the preferred day for stockade building in Wanganui. Maori Christians must have found this difficult to reconcile with keeping holy the sabbath. Two incidents of plundering and destruction which occurred during the period under review are interesting for their treatment of Christian property. One, the sacking of Kororareka by Hone Heke is known to every schoolboy as a fact of New Zealand history. The other may have escaped publication altogether except in this book. A detachment of British soldiers attacked the unoccupied Ngati Rangatahi pa in the Hutt Valley, and after plundering the homes, set fire to the pa. There was a significant difference in the two operations. At Kororareka the only building left standing and unviolated was the church; in the Hutt Valley, the Maori chapel was desecrated and destroyed in the general conflagration. There is so much in this book that draws new significance from a re-appraisal of evidence that the reader finds himself with exciting, new concepts of early New Zealand history. It is a provocative book. Events and personalities that have hitherto intrigued the student of early New Zealand history because they lacked a comprehensible Maori association with reality are shuffled more satisfactorily into perspective. Fitzroy, Busby, Hobson, Te Rauparaha, Hone Heke, Te Rangihaeata, Te Wherowhero, Waka Nene, Te Heuheu, Te Mamaku, Wakefield, Grey, the missionaries, the military commanders, the land arbitrators, all come into the sweep of the author's microscope and gain or lose brilliance in doing so. It dwells longest and most searchingly on Governor Grey, that complex and gifted man, egotist, able governor, superb politician, arch dissimulator, self-professed friend of the Maori, yet to quote from the book, who ‘lied on so many occasions concerning his land purchases that no completely satisfactory account of these yet exists’. It is a considerable volume of almost 400 pages, well documented by clearly numbered foot-notes and possessing an excellent index arrangement at the end. Illustrations and maps are thoughtfully chosen or prepared and add considerably to the interest of the book. It is a scholarly presentation and aptness and clarity of expression contribute greatly to its readability. It would be exciting to read this author's assessment of the decade preceding the period under review and the years that followed when the wave of disillusionment swept the conflict to new heights in Taranaki and the Waikato. This is a valuable and rewarding book for the young Maori to read. Cause and effect of the conflicts have cast long shadows. It is not difficult to date the time, almost 100 years after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, when the Maori was beginning to emerge from his second class citizenship to political parity with his European neighbour. Nor has Nopera's shadow of the land gained in substance or lost any of its sombreness with the passing of more than a century.