The following extract from a further dispatch to Gladstone on the 23rd of July 1846 seems to have been the deciding factor against the chiefs: “I also understand from the chiefs of Otaki, Te Rauparaha's principal place of residence, that that chief had altogether deceived them, and instead of his fulfilling his promises of joining them for the purpose of preventing parties of rebels passing down the coast to murder European settlers, he was in fact conniving at their so doing. I determined, therefore, in pursuance of my previous intention to return to Porirua and to send a party on shore at daylight this morning to seize Te Rauparaha and the principal chiefs who had been concerned in enforcing the tapu.” Unknown to the British, Rangihaeta had visited his uncle only a week before to tell him of strange forebodings. “Last night I dreamed a dream,” he told Te Rauparaha, “a dream of evil to come. It will be well if you come away with me. Leave this place; it is full of danger.” But Te Rauparaha's wife Te Akau was too ill to move and he was therefore unable to heed this advice. Shortly after daybreak on the 23rd of July the armed party of soldiers and bluejackets arrived at the entrance to his whare where he was informed that they had come by the Governor's order to take him on board the man-of-war to be tried for supplying arms, ammunition, and provisions to Te Rangihaeta, then in open rebellion. With amazing agility the old chief, who had been sitting immediately in front of the low doorway, threw himself back, and instantly seized a taiaha with which he made a blow at his wife's head. Mr McKillop of the Calliope jumped forward to ward the blow off with his pistol. McKillop wrongly inferred at the time that Rauparaha thought his wife had betrayed him but according to Heni Te Whiwhi of Otaki (died 1921), the reason for attempting to strike his wife was that he instanty remembered that if it had not been for her he could have been in a safe retreat inland.” Grey had been of the opinion when he captured Te Rauparaha “that a dangerous and extensive conspiracy had been formed, and that he was the directing head of it.” It seems more likely, however, that Te Rauparaha attempted to balance carefully his expressed and quite genuine opposition to Te Rangihaeta's policies with his kinship obligations which demanded that he should help his nephew in some way. There is no evidence that Te Rauparaha supplied him with either warriors or arms, but he did give him food. He probably did not explain this policy to Governor Grey but evidently hoped that sooner or later the trouble would end when Te Rangihaeta could be persauded to come to terms with the British. For ten months he was detained aboard H.M.S. Calliope, after which he was allowed to occupy a house provided for him in the Auckland Government Domain by Te Wherowhero, a former enemy chief. In captivity he was said to have been generally contented, although occasionally overcome with grief. Many Europeans and Maoris managed to lessen his sorrowful burden with kindness. In September 1847 two hundred Hauraki chiefs attended a large gathering in his honour. After traditional greetings had been exchanged, Te Rauparaha, dressed in a dogskin mat and a forage cap with bold band, addressed the gathering. He recited with much dignity his warlike deeds, and how he was captured, after which Taraia, Te Wherowhero and others delivered long ceremonial speeches. “Food was served at two o'clock,” writes A. S. Thompson. “Te Rauparaha, who was ill at ease, ate little, and soon returned to his house; two Maori women followed him in, and sang the heroic deeds of his own princely line in a lament which brought tears to the old man's eyes. ‘And he thought the days that were long gone by When his limbs were strong, and his courage high.’” Te Rauparaha was never brought to trial, and when Grey finally released him at Otaki in January 1848 many irate settlers criticized the Governor for this act of clemency. It is extremely doubtful that any of the Ngati Raukawa chiefs who so readily denounced him at Otaki would have shown the courage to accuse their old leader in his presence. Until his death in November 1849 at Otaki he managed to maintain his former dominant and overbearing authority in all matters affecting the surrounding tribes. He was buried a few yards from the church he had requested Hadfield to build some years previously, and although a tombstone marks the spot, tradition has it that his remains were secretly transported to Kapiti Island.