TAURANGA—REMOVAL OF THE WAIKATO MILITIA.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 6, Issue 294, 3 August 1865, Page 1

TAURANGA—REMOVAL OF THE WAIKATO MILITIA.

[From the Xew Zealand Herald, July 18.] The announcement made in the Herald of yesterday morning that the Egmont, on her way up from the South, had called in at Tauranga to embark 350 men of the Ist Waikato Regiment for Auckland, caused considerable excitement. For what purpose, it was asked, was the regiment to be thus dismembered ? Did the Government contemplate the abandonment of Taurauga altogether ? Major Shuttleworth, of the 68th, refused to allow these men to embark on the bare order of the Defence Minister, and without the sanction of the General, and the Egmont proceeded on to Auckland without them. Last night, the sanction of the General having been obtained, the Egmont left for Tauranga, and may be expected back in a few days with the whole of the single men of the Ist Waikato Regiment. On arriving in Auckland they will be struck off pay, and told that land will be provided for them iu the Waikato. Iu plain words, they will be turned upon the streets. Of what, we ask, is this step of the Government the fore-runner? What will bo their next ? Is Tauranga to be abandoned, and all the married men of the regiments and their families to be the next victims of deceit and General Government repudiation? Is the blood poured out like water at the Gate Pa; is the victory at Tauranga to end iu this miserable desertion by the Government of their share of their part iu the mutter —the turning of them to solid and permanent advantage ? Was it for this that General Cameron stood iu the gap when General and Governor and ministers met at Tauranga a year ago, and—when out of the 400,000 acres of land which had been justly forfeited by rebellion, the Governor was only willing that some 2000 acres should be confiscated—he stood firm to the interest of the colony that 100,000 acres should be taken, and carried his point ? Sir Duncan Cameron knew the value of establishing a strong European settlement at Taurauga. He knew that it was the key to the Waikato. Rut a Southern Ministry, anxious to do anything that might blast the future of Auckland, happy if they could only leave her out-settlers exposed to murder and rapine, and thus check her prosperity, have been only too glad to listen to the impediments which William Thompson, instigated by such men as Mr Fitzgerald, have thrown iu th ir path. The settlement of I'auranga is to be abandoned; faith is to be broken with the military settlers, and another blow is to be struck at the safety of Auckland. The act is a robbery on tne men of the Ist Waikato regiment. It is a shameless dereliction of duty ou the part of the Government, which, we trust, they will be called to answer for on the floor of the House. It is a shameful and disgraceful breach of faith perpetrated upon the recruits drawn from Australia, which will go forth to the colonies and the world as another proof of the dishonesty and wickedness of a Ministry which has made the name of the New Zealand Government to stink in the nostrils of all honourable men It is now nearly a year since the men of the Ist Waikato Regiment have been placed upon their

lots. They have spent their pay, their darnings, and savings, in improving these lots; more than a million feet of timber has been landed at Tauranga, all of which has been expended by the militia in the construction of their houses—streets have been laid put, stores have been erected, and contracts have been entered into for months to come for the provisioning of those very men who are now to be disbanded. No wonder that Colonel Harrington should have protested to the General, as we hear he has done, against this ministerial act of weakness, of folly, and of wickedness}

In the action of the Weld Government in respect to Tauranga, we have an epitome of their general policy since they assumed the reins of office. That which the General and troops accomplished by force of arras, the Governor endeavoured to nullify in the interests of himself and the party of Exeter Hall. That of the original intentions which the Governor either could not, or was to wary openly to attempt to suppress, he has succeded in doing, gradually and secretly, by means of the puppets whose strings, unknown to themselves, he craftily pulls, while they imagine themselves free and responsible agents. The Governor never intended to confiscate land at Tauranga any more than he ever intended that th lands confiscated in Waikato should become European teritory, filled up by permanently settlled European population. When he went down to Tauranga last year with the General and two members of the late Ministry, he declared it to be bis intention only to confiscate a couple of thousand acres of land there. The members of the Ministry expostulated, the General, by right of Imperial power conferred upon him in the matter of confiscation, interfered, and the Governor yielded at the moment, Since then every obs acle that eoald be found has been placed in the way of the settlement of Tauranga, and Mr Fitzgerald, while a lesser offender awaits bis trial in Auckland for sedition, has been busy with Thompson, and the Government always anxious to forego the settlement of Tauranga, have had an opportunity afforded them for so doing. It is to Sir George Grey that the colony owes its miserable condition of debt and insecurity. It, is the Weld Ailministration, whose weakness and whose selfinterest has led it to become the passive agents in his bands, that has finally worked out this state of things.

t?rom the New Zealand Herald, July 22.] The Egtaont arrived at daylight yesterday morning from Tauranga. She brought with her 344 rank and file of the Ist Waikato Regiment, and 18 officers, under the command of Colonel Harrington. The poor fellows no doubt have severely felt the being torn away from their own settlement and sent to another part of the Province. The most of them had left behind them at Tauranga the house and cultivated garden on which they had been located, and on which they had expended their savings from their pay, in hopes of making for themselves permanent homes. How many of them will ever return again to Tauranga is hard to say. probably none—for there is little doubt but that the moving away of these poor fellows from their homes is the first act of the Weld Ministry towards the destruction of the Tauranga settlement. Immediately on disembarkation the men Were marched to Otahuhu, where they were to remain during last night. This morning 100 of them will return to town and embark for the Thames district.