Copyright is owned by the Author of the thesis. Permission is given for a copy to be downloaded by an individual for the purpose of research and private study only. The thesis may not be reproduced elsewhere without the permission of the Author. POLICIES AND PROPHECIES Aspects of Government Native Policy in Taranaki 1878-1884 A thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History at Massey University Hazel Riseborough 1987 11 ABSTRACT This thesis examines the government's reactions to the pacific resistance offered by the resident Maod ttibes to the survey for sale and settlement of confiscated lands between Hawera and New Plymouth. on the west coast of the Nm1h Island of New Zealand, in the years 1878-1884. Successive governments neglected to honour the promises to make reserves contained in the legislation confiscating the land and, by treating those who protested this neglect as infatuated followers of deluded prophets and refusing to consider their legitimate grievances. helped create in Taranaki a centre of disaffection which they perceived as a threat to the colony. This study looks first at the existing literature on the events in question, and then at the acts and proclamations of confiscation and the promises contained therein. The main body of the thesis. chapters three through seven. is a chronological study of the years from 1878 to 1884. When the government attempted to enforce the confiscation on the Waimate plains by surveying for sale before making any effort to delimit the promised reserves. the resident tribes protested first by removing the surveyors. then by ploughing the disputed lands and finally by fencing across the roads which cut through their cultivations. The government chose to interpret Maori protest as a denial of the confiscation and a challenge to European supremacy. Under intense settler pressure the government responded by arresting almost four hundred ploughmen and fencers and finally two prominent Taranaki chiefs. and passing legislation which enabled them to imptison and hold the protesters without trial for up to two years in South Island goals. The injustice done the Taranaki people stemmed more from a determination on the part of the European to force the Maori to submit to European law and admit to European supremacy. than from a greed for land. The government's aim was to end Maori isolation by settling a close European population on the coast in an effort to destroy Maori separatism and self determination. The stand the Taranaki people took in defence of their rights was finally vindicated, yet the grievances remain. and the events of the 'Pa1ihaka years' are a reminder of the issues which lie behind continuing Maori efforts to have those grievances righted. lll CONTENTS Page Abstract 11 Maps iv Preface V Introduction Vll Chapter One The Parihaka Years Two Muru Raupatu : Confiscation 25 Three The Survey of the Waimate Plains 50 Four Challenge to the Confiscation 75 Five Response to the Challenge 112 Six The Road to Patihaka !59 Seven Aftermath 220 Eight A Question of Mana 268 Bibliography 283 iv MAPS After Page Not1h Island : Confiscated Lands 24 Waimate Plains 49 West Coast : Plan of the Confiscated Tenitory 292 V PREFACE A word of explanation is needed on the terminology employed in this study. Taranaki is used in European documentary sources to refer to a wider provincial dishict rather than a ttibal area. It comptises seven main ttibes tracing their descent from at least three canoes. yet it has the cohesion of a tribal district. a cohesion which stems from a cause, a grievance: land confiscation. One of the tdbes. Te Ati Awa, is always referred to in the documentary sources as Ngatiawa. so this term has been retained. Natives and native affairs are inescapable terms in reference to nineteenth century New Zealand. Not until 194 7 was the word Maori substituted for native in all official usage. The emotive terms rebel and loyal native describe the views of the Europeans who bestowed the terms rather than of those on whom they were bestowed. I have refrained from the use of parentheses which might indicate disapproval of the terms but would serve only to clutter the text. I have also refrained from underlining words or otherwise treating Maori as though it were a foreign language. Those who are not yet familiar vv ith basic Maori terminology would be better served by a teacher of Maori language and culture than by a simplistic and possibly misleading word list. The Appendices to the Journals of the House of Representatives and the New Zealand Parliamentary Debates are a rich source of information on the period under study, and the reports of the Royal Commission appointed under the Confiscated Lands Inquiry and Maori Prisoners· Trials Act. 1879. are especially valuable. Unfortunately many papers such as police files have simply "disappeared". and the important Maod Affairs Depattment files known as the West Coast Papers were destroyed by tire. so a vast body of material has been lost to researchers . What remains is scattered through lands. police. legislative . justice and governors· files in the National Archives and especially in various ministerial papers in the Alexander Turnbul l Library. A certain amount of material never published in New Zealand was printed in the British Parliamentary Papers: the Irish University Press series vi (here abbreviated I UP since the pagination refers to that series and not to the 01i ginal) is a useful source of infotmation not otherwise easily accessible. I wish to thank those many people who have helped in the preparation of this thesis First, Sir Makere Rangiatea Ralph Love. whose approval I sought before I began this study: tena koe e koro : and my supervisors. Dr Ken;' Howe. Professor Colin Davis and Professor N gatata Love of Massey University. I also wish to thank Dr Mat)' Bitte1man . Dr David Wu and the staff of the Insti tute of Cullure and Communication. East-West Center. Honolulu: Professor W.H.Oiiver. editor of the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography: Dr J.M.R. Owens and Te Pakaka Tawhai o Massey University: and Karen Puklowski . cartographer at Massey University. I a indebted to the staffs of the Massey University Librat)'. especially Courtney Carpenter: the Alexander Turnbull Library. the General Assembly Library and the National Archives. Wellington: the Hamilton Library . University of Hawaii at Manoa: the Bernice Bishop Museum Library. Honolulu: the Auckland Institute and Museum Library: the Taranaki Library and Museum. New Plymouth: and the Massey University Computer Centre. especially Dr Peter Kay . 'vvho was unfazecl by my inability to speak computer. I am grateful to the University Grants Committee. the East-West Center and the New Zealand-United States Educational Foundation for the grants which enabled m to undet1ake this study. vii INTRODUCTION The confiscation of land on the west coast of the Not1h Island following the wars of the 1860s created a sense of grievance among the local tribes which continues to affect relations between Maori and European to this day. Maori frustration resulting from the confiscation has been vatiously expressed over the years by fut1her mmed resistance. by pacific resistance to the enforcement of the confiscation. and by the presentation of a series of petitions to parliament. This thesis examines the government's reactions to the pacific resistance offered by the west coast people to the survey for sale and settlement of the lands between Hawera and New Plymouth before any effort had been made to delimit the reserves promised by the acts and proclamations of confiscation. It is a study of policies and personalities at a time of intense feelings and reactions resulting from cultural misunderstanding and racial intolerance. In refusing to consider the legitimate gtievances of the Maoti . the government helped create in Taranaki a centre of disaffection which they perceived as a threat to the colony. The discord that arose between the government and the Ma01i people on the west coast is better explained in tetms of political and financia expediency , clashes of personality. and ideas of racial superiority than by any physical threat posed by the resident ttibes. But Maori protest at the government· s failure to set aside the promised reserves was interpreted as a challenge to the confiscation and was treated as a sign of fanaticism and infatuation. even as a manifestation of the determination of the Maori to establish themselves once more as the dominant race. This thesis does not seek to probe the philosophy behind Maori responses to injustice, but it is clear that successive governments found it expedient to misinterpret reasonable Maoti demands. and they chose to deal with the ensuing situation not by granting reserves. but by passing some quite iniquitous legislation which enabled them to imprison without trial two prominent Taranaki chiefs and several hundred of their fo llowers for a period of up to two years in South Island gaols. Vlll This study argues that the injustice clone the Taranaki people stemmed more from a determination on the pati of the European to fo rce the Maori to submit to European law and admit to European supremacy than fro m a greed for land. The European already possessed the land through confiscation. and the government was determined that Europeans would occupy it. But much more than land was at stake. The government's aim was to end Maoti isolation by settling a close European population in the area in an effoti to destroy Maori separatism and self detetmination. By separating the Maori people from the land they sought to destroy their mana motuhake. In the end a minimal area of land was in contention: the seaward Parihaka block of ten to fifteen thousand acres.