AN EVENTFUL CEREMONY Primarily it was an occasion chosed by Rapata Wahawaha to re-affirm the loyalty of Ngati Porou and also of some of the neighbouring tribes. Many of them, as I have said, had been in arms against the Crown. Many of them had, in fact, been taken prisoner in the Urewera campaign by Rapata and his Ngati Porou. They were gathered together on this June day of 1872 to unite in re-affirming their loyalty to Queen Victoria and the British Crown. They did so by marching under the flag which had been hoisted on Rapata's flagpole and by taking part in the service of re-dedication conducted by the Rev. Mohi Turei and Rapata himself. Paratene Ngata, father of the late Sir Apirana and adopted son of Wahawaha, records that there was one solitary Maori rebel who refused to take the oath. He ran in a direction away from the flag, chanting as he did so a little haka: Tieke taretare; tieke taretare; Po! Tu ana i waho e. which might freely be translated Thou ragged Jack, thou tattered Jack; Behold! I stand aloof from thy circle. I like to think of that rugged individualist, defying both the distant Queen and the nearer and more grimly terrible Rapata Wahawaha. There is always a place for the noncomformist, the intransigent and the upholder of the old order. But I like even more to think of those thousands of others sinking their ancient enmities and their conflicting ideologies in a new affirmation of a common purpose.

RAPATA AND HIS ARMY Rapata Wahawaha was born about the year 1807. That is to say he was born into a world, and a society, where cannibalism and slavery were part of the accepted social usage. He was himself made captive as a young boy. He learned at first hand the ruthless savagery as well as the bravery and fortitude of his people. He saw the beginnings of pakeha settlement, the sowing of the seed of European customs and European religious beliefs, and he saw the ancient customs and practices of his people become modified or pass completely away in the face of newer and stronger though not always better concepts. He was a small man, this Rapata, but like his tupuna Hikitai he might have claimed “He iti ra; he iti mapihi pounamu” and have further remarked with that progenitor that a small axe could cut down the biggest tree, if the axe were but of greenstone. In fact Rapata possessed something of the characteristics of the prized pounamu. He was hard, he kept his edge in spite of rough usage, he was polished and he was of great intrinsic value to his people. He came first into prominence when the Hauhau forces under Kereopa and Patara came seeking converts in the Waiapu valley. Rapata, Mokena Kohere, Henare Potae and Henare Nihoniho frowned on the new religion and gave orders that their followers were to remain loyal to their own beliefs and to the British Crown. With the aid of a small force of European Volunteers and Militia they attacked the invading Hauhau, subdued their strongholds one by one and put them to flight. Rapata shot some of his own followers out of hand for disobedience to his orders. Some three hundred other Ngati Porou, taken in arms against their own people were given the choice of marching under the Union Jack and taking the oath of allegiance to the Crown or of being shot out of hand. Many of those who took this enforced oath became Rapata's most gallant followers in the campaigns that followed.

A GRIM CAMPAIGN Rapata and Mokena, with their Ngati Porou, were among the combined Maori and European forces which inflicted defeat on the Hauhaus at Waerenga-a-hika. Rapata and his men spear-headed the pursuit and defeat of the Hauhaus at Wairoa in the following months. Ngati Porou furnished the greater part of the garrison which kept uneasy peace in Poverty Bay during the four years which followed the Hauhau defeat. The letters of Major Reginald Newton Biggs, who was resident magistrate at Turanga during that period, give some idea of the cost at which Ngati Porou demonstrated their loyalty. “I have sent Henare Potae a ton of flour and a ton of potatoes and 4 cwt. of sugar,” he wrote to McLean. “I hope the Government won't find fault, but Ngati Porou are starving. They were protecting us, here at Turanga and at Wairoa, at a time when they should have been planting the food of which they are now so badly in need.” Paratene Ngata wrote in his diary: “We were sent for (by Rapata) to take up garrison duty at Turanga. The job was without monetary consideration so we depended on catching horses and hunting stray cattle and pigs. At times we had to leave the garrison because the rations were so meagre, and take odd jobs pit-sawing timber.” It was Rapata and his Ngati Porou who led the storming of parties in the advance on Te Kooti's position at Ngatapa and it was Rapata and his Ngati Porou who bore the main burden of keeping Te Kooti on the move in the Urewera, defeating one by one the supporting parties of Tuhoe and finally driving Te Kooti to sanctuary in the King Country. Under conditions so severe that two European columns, under Colonel's Whitmore and St John, had to be withdrawn Rapata and his tribesmen fought on. Rapata would not allow a fire to be lit lest it pinpoint his position to the enemy. It was a campaign that only the strongest