WAIROA.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 7, Issue 367, 12 April 1866, Page 3

WAIROA.

(raoa OCB OWN COEBEBPONDBNT.) In.the ‘ Herald* of the 24th March I.notice an account of an expedition to Waikare Moana. The facts are these Tuesday, a party of Government natives, about 130 strong, left Ramoiti, Tamihaua’s pa, under Pitiera Kopu, with, the intention of seeking utu for the loss of Ibaka, a brother of Taiaibank te Huatu, and one of a party of surveyors, who had been cut off a few'days previously by an advance picket of the Hauhaus; (another was shot through the.back, —the rest bolted);—and also to ascertain the truth of a rumour alleging that two hundred of the Uriweras were encamped at the iOnepoto or Waikare Tahekevalley. Having accompanied the expedition 1 can speak of what I saw- The first day’s march took us to Manotawhiorangi on the Waia; the next to Te Auroa, also on the Waiau ; the third day the work began. Tukurangi, hill was ascended in the day time, and a halt called till sundown; —orders being issued that no light, either for pipe or other purpose, should be shown, or gun fired under pain of anything you like. We camped in the Waibi valley, and a cold camp it was. The next day we rose the bills and reached Te Kiwi; stayed all day, and started again at sundown ; crossed the Tutaemaro range in Indian file. So. dark was it that scarce a man could see bis neighbour. Descending the range to a little patch of bush, aTaan named Horomana fired his piece; he had done the same thing the night previously. This so alarmed the people that it was with great difficulty Kopu could dissuade them from returning at once. As it was, we camped in a little dark, swampy hollow. At dawn it was determined to push on, and on we went through wet fern and flax, every moment expecting a volley into uson, on till cultivations, were reached, and traces of recent occupation; Passing a little' lake. Hi Kaka, ' we got the shelter of a tutu And koromiko bushes. Here ws deposited onr packs,. and, prayer* being read/fce gWeAnpiw-iomsiexamißedour *r*M. aad advSMsd silently—Kopw, sad my-

self iu front of him.with some -fifteen -o r eighteen men of the foremost fiie, on through scrub, rockj?, and.at last, into a sort of stone gutter, Completely hid byscrub'. A couple of hundred jfcrdsof-thiv and- we heard, —• “ Atua matua rire idre ban, pal marire hau.” Kopu said to me, “pass the word to move mrickly and not; to fire/’ I halPssmrcely doneso when crack, crack', cracky-—the advance became a.run,—“ kokiri, kokiri, —and an obligato accompaniment of rifle shots as each man rose the fop of the ascent, —was kept up to'the Pai Marire' hymn. After a few straggling shots, the Hau-haus bolted, and made for the landing place, Te Upoko o te Ao, on the-slope of Panekiri, not the Onepoto. Some -escaped- round the rocks, some in the twd canoes, some in the dense scrub with which Panikiri is covered. Having fired tillT was literally black in the face, I tried to persuade the people to cease firing, and make an effort to capture the canoes as they pulled under the shelter -of*the projecting points of Pauekiri bluff. No use : shout and fire if you like; but stir a foot in pursuit they would not. At last a party started up the hilt—a service of danger, inasmuch as no one could stop the random fifing. A fine fellow named Henare, clad in a dog-skin mat. Was bayonetted after giving us liis arms. A child of Bor 9 years,—who had been shot through both legs and carried by his mother until, despairing of saving herself, she, spite of his entreaties, flung him to the ground,— was also bayonetted. Shortly after, an old man was caught hiding amongst the rocks. A bullet laid bare his cheek, but he, defending himself against the charged bayonet, was made prisoner. I begged bis life; but of what avail were my entreaties? They kept him an hour-and-a-half, and then butchered him. This was Te Rawhe: the child was Te Rang! Pumakuao. Others were,wounded and escaped. Two were killed and not found. This we learned from the female prisoner, Te Tautope, wife of Te Hira.— Dr Scott and Mr Preece arrived about noon the same day —having had a most'toilsome march like ourselves —with a reinforcement of some 60 Nuhaka and Nukataura natives. The worthy doctor is, in my opinion, deserving the’ highest praise for attending to his native patients at such an expense of personal toil.'