THE OMARUNUI DESPATCHES.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume XII, Issue 496, 29 July 1867, Page 4

THE OMARUNUI DESPATCHES.

Foe some time past a rumor Las been current that a despatch had been received from the Home Government •which characterised the gallant affair at Omarunui in October last as an “ unwarranted and merciless attack on unoffending persons,” but the reticence of the Government made it impossible to obtain any reliable information concerning it, and much anxiety was manifested by the public for the open ing of the Assembly, when of course the contents of such despatch would be made public. We are in receipt of a copy by the courtesy of the Colonial S jcretavy, and also of the Memorandum of Ministers in reply thereto, which latter we append in full, as it contains at once the charge and its refutation. It is, however, but just to add that when his Excellency’s despatches reached home, the authorities readily admitted the justice of our cause, and the credit due to all concerned iB. the affair :—■

Wellington, 17fch April, 1867. The Responsible Advisers of the Crown in Xew Zealand hare read with extreme regret Lord Carnavon’s Despatch No. 56, of the 28th December last. It is with Terr great reluctance that they feel compelled to animadvert upon it, bat they would Le unworthy of the trust confided to them by the Colony if they silently submitted to the imputations to which the G-orernor, themselves and the Colonial Forces are elike subjected in that Despatch. They believe that they can show that those itnjiuiatiuns are unfounded, and have without due consideration been invested with authority by the Secretary of State. As the Despatch chiefly relates to the removal of Her Majesty’s Regular Troops from JN'ew Zealand, and as His Excellency’s Despatches hare dealt fully with the strictures on his conduct in connection with this matter, convened in thi? and ™*6?ious Despatches, Ministers would not feel bound to comment on this particular Despatch were it not that toward? tbs dose it

circulates calumnies, scarcely disguised under a veil of hypothesis, against the Colonial Government and Her Majesty’s Colonial Forces. Ministers do not now complain that Lord Carnarvon should in effect state, as he has done iu a previous portion of his Despatch, that the Imperial Government would rather abandon the Colonists and the Aborigines of New Zealand to internecine war than extend to the Colony any military aid. They are not aware that any words or action on the part of the Governor or on their part called for such a statement, but they do not desire to question inis professed in--amerencs to me norrors which a war of extermination would, “for a time at least,” entail on both races in this country. Ministers must, however, for the sake of the public character of the Colony, distinctly repudiate the charges indirectly conveyed in the following extracts fromxhe Despatch:— Finally, I must observe that while you thus appear to cling to the expectation of continued assistance from this country, your own reports, or rather the absence of reports from you, shew how little you recognize any continued responsibility to the Imperial Government for the conduct of the war. While iu your despatch of the 15th October, you inform me that a trooper of the colonial forces had been killed by some hostile natives, you leave me to learn from the newspapers that in the neighbourhood of Hawke’s Bay, a body of natives who refused to give up their arms had been attacked by the colonial forces in their pa, (which is said to have been unfortified), and driven into the bush, twenty-three of them being killed and a like number wounded, and that a native village on the West Coast, after being summoned to surren- • der, was attacked by a colonial force, and escape being cut off, about thirty or forty persons were killed.

In the account before me this transaction is described as “ the most brilliant transaction of this guerilla war.” Meantime your own despatches would hardly lead me to suppose that any recognized warfare was in progress. I need hardly observe that if it were at any time alleged in this country that these affairs, described by the colonial press as brilliant successes, were in fact unwarranted and merciless attacks on unoffending persons, I have no authentic means of reply. The first intimation of the calumnies reaches the Governor and his Ministers in this Despatch. So far as Ministers are aware, no question of the justice of the attacks on the Natives, either at Hawke’s Bay or on the West Coast, or of the conduct of the Colonial Forces on those occasions has ever been publicly raised in this Colony, or in the United Kingdom. Nor were they aware until they read the Despatch that the question had even been privately raised. The inference is painfully clear. Tho Secretary of State has allowed himself to be influenced by some secret report, studiously concealed from the Governor, from the Ministers, and from the public, and without resorting to authentic intelligence, or waiting a few days for a Despatch from the Governor, has given authoritative currency to such reports.

Ministers do greatly complain of that fatal facility, unhappily so often illustrated of late in some Imperial Departments of State, of listening to secret slander of the reputation of public men in this Colony, and of investing reports (which otherwise would never come to life,) with the authority of official recognition. Against this system of secret defamation Ministers most emphatically protest. It saps the foundation of all government, and destroys all confidence in public men. In the case of New Zealand, the tacit allowance, if not encouragement, in the War Department at Home of such a system, has, Ministers believe, done much to waste the resources of the Empire and the Colony, and to paralyze their joint efforts to suppress insurrection. The engagements to which the Secretary of State refers respectively took place, near Napier, on the 12 th October, 1866, and, on the West Coast, on the 4th Oct., 1866. Despatches fully reporting the circumstances of each engagement were published in the New Zealand Gazettes dated respectively 26th October, and 11th October, 1866. These Gazettes most probably reached England, and it is presumed, the Colonial Office, before the 28th Dec, 1866 (the date on which Lord Carnavon wrote), and certainly did so before the 2nd January, 1867, and could have been referred to by his Lordship before the mail by which his Despatch came left England for New Zealand. No doubt the reports in these Gazettes if they could not be found in the Colonial Office were republished in English papers, and were accessible to those who preferred to furnish to the Secretary of State information gathered from anonymous accounts in unnamed newspapers, and to found on it and on " private and confidential ” calumnies, imputations of wanton cruelty and coward ice on the part of the Colonial Forces, and of connivance (if not worse) on the part of Governor and his Ministers. The Despatch is dated 28th December, but it did not leave England till the 2nd January. On the 31st December, the New Zealand mail via Panama reached England, having left New Zealand on the Bth November, a fortnight alter the later of the two Gazettes containing the official accounts of the engagements was published. References could thus have been made in England to these Gazettes before the Despatch went. Had that reference been made, or had Lord Carnavon waited a few days until tha Governor’s Despatches arrived, which His Excellency’s absence in a remote disturbed district precluded him from writing previously (a fact which might quite as easily have been learned from newspapers.) Ministers feel assured that His Lordship would not have written in terms so disparaging to the Colonial Forces, and so injurious to the honor of the Colony. Copies of the New Zealand Gazettes referred to are enclosed. The circumstances in each case are short!v these

Napier is a small town containing a population of thirteen hundred souls, of whom more than eight hundred are women and children. It was at the time in question wholly unprepared for an attack, and its neighborhood dotted with small families also quite unprotected reside. In the latter part of September, 1866, a party of armed rebel Hau-hau Natives, strangers to the place, and members of a murderous and bloodthirsty sect of fanatics, who have committed in different parts of this Island fearful atrocities, encamped at s place aDOuu SS7CH irOIII lUS JL cupy oi a letter dated Sth October, iB3S, to the Colonial Secretary from Mr M‘LB3D, reporting the fact, is attached. These Natives persistently refused to explain their intentions; they plundered the settlers and the loyal resident Natives ; and they openly threatened the safety of the town and the outsettlers. Under these circumstances Mr M‘Lean, the Agent of the General Government at Napierand Superintendent of the Province of Hawke’s Bay, promptly took steps to disarm and remove from the settled district these armed fanatics, and he was most patriotically supported by the inhabitants who (for the most part unaccustomed to arms, and for the first time unexpectedly called from their various places of business to engage in active hostilities,) paraded at a few hous’ notice at midnight, marched all night and successfully attacked the enemy in the early morning. In order to show that this engagement was undertaken without the concert of the Imperial Military Officer in Command at INapier, Ministers of enclose a copy of a letter dated 30th Oct., 1866, from Mr M'Leau to the Colonial Secretary, from which it will be seen that the officer referred to offered to co-operate with the men under his command, and that in consideration of their having had on the day preceding the engagement a long march, Mr M'Lean undertook operations without their aid. It will be seen from Mr M‘Lean’s Despatch published in the Gazette, that the rebel Natives had, in addition to former repeated warnings, a special written summons previous to the engagement to disarm and surrender. It will also be seen by a letter enclosed iu Mr M'Lean’s Despatch, from the Eev. Samuel Williams, written after the engagement, that the suspicion of the hostile intention of the Natives was confirmed by the confession of a Native prisoner that their object was an immediate and sudden attack on the town. The confession has since been fully corroborated by subsequet statements of others of these prisoners. The Reverend S. Williams, the writer of this letter, is not a person who would be likely to be led to hasty or unfavorable conclusions on such a subject. He is a clergyman of the Church of England, conversant for the last thirty years with Natives and with their customs, and is the son of Archdeacon Henry Williams, one of the first missionaries in New Zealand. Mr M'Lean, on whom any imputation if true, of “unwarranted and merciless attack oa “unoffending persons’’ would properly rest, has been for more than twenty years in the Public Service Department. He is specially distinguished for his knowledge of the natives, and for his devotion to their welfare. To suppose that such a nan would suddenly belie every characteristic of his life, and be guilty of the wanton crueity to natives imputed to him, is incredible. A character like that of Mr McLean, so well-deserved and so labouriou-ly earned throughout many years of faithful service,—a character, to the merits of which despatches from successive Governors to the Secretary of State abundantly testify,—should have shielded him from the grave imputations resting on no known foundation, and made with such precipitate haste. With respect to the engagement in the village on the West Coast, ministers cannot conceive how it is consistent with bare fact to apply to it the epithet of an “ unwarranted and merciless attack on unoffending persons.” The West Coast, in the neighbourhood of Patea, has long been the scene of native insurrections and of atrocious murders. Major McDonnell, commanding the colonial forces in (hat distric, states in his despatch in the Gazette, that the rebels had become so bold as to render it unsafe to move outside of the redoubt. In this state of affairs, Major McDonnell made, in spite of the smallness of his force and the inclemency of the weather, a night attack with 127 men, on a village in which the rebels were congregated, and at daybreak attacked its fortified huts. When he had captured the village, his force, including seven wounded men, were in a most critical position, as the forest path by which he had come was occupied by reinforcements of the enemy. Isolated in an unknown bush, fatigued by an arduous night march, and by the subsequent severe their return intercepted by an unseen enemy, charged with several prisoners and seven wounded men, Major McDonnell and his gallant lores wero still c<jual to tbs emergency. They repulsed and killed many of the enemy, and brought the wounded and the prisoners back to camp. The description given by Lord Carnarvon of this engagement is that ■ “ a native village on the West Coast, after being summoned to surrender, was attacked by a colonial force, and escape being cut off, about thirty or forty persons were killed.” This description is inaccurate, as the “escape cut off” was that of the assailants and not of the assailed. No doubt the real question at issue is whether an “ unwarranted and merciless attack on unoffending persons” was made. That question is sufficiently answered in the negative by even a slight reference to events during the last six years on the West Coast: The country

in the neighbourhood of Patea has been for that .time the centre of sedition aad fanaticism, and the scene of cold-blooded murders. The natives have been constantly in arms against the Queen, and hare never until quite recently made submission. General Cameron, with two or three thousand men, was engaged for many months in trying to reduce ‘these natives to submission. He entirely failed in that object. General Chute gallantly effected; much, but did not complete his work. For the last twelve -mouths the colonial forces (including, as is always indefatigably laboured to stamp out the remaining embers of insurrection (ready as they are at any time to burst into flame), and to restore tranquilhty. This had to be dona from time to time, as opportunity offered. The colonial forces are not numerous enough nor sufficiently equipped to hold a chain of outposts, and to invest pas with two thousand men and Armstrong artillery. Their warfare may uot accord with war regulations, but it is one necessary for and suited to local cirsumstances, and also one which on the East and West Coasts has already resulted iu briUiant successes which have elicited the warmest commendation both from the Imperial Government and the English press, and have materially tended to the practical suppression of disturbances and to the security of life and property. Ministers think this is a fitting occasion to remark upon the peculiar action of the Imperial Government towards the colony. It is true that the colony has requested the removal of the Imperial troops, owing to the imposition of conditions antagonistic to the existence of responsible Government, to efficiency and economy, and for no other reason. But while acquiescing in their withdrawal, Ministers have to complain ofjthe manner in which it has been effected. Even if it be conceded (a large concession) that, as Lord Carnarvon terms it, all the regiments other than the one battalion proposed to be left in New Zealand, may be regarded as in transitu, and therefore not within the jurisdiction of the Governor of the colony, the same reasoning cannot be applied to that one regiment, and Ministers protest agninst the unconstitutional manner in which the authority of the Governor has been superseded. They contend that it is beyond the power of a Secretary of State to issue instructions to a subordinate officer which virtually cancel the commission held by Her Majesty’s representative in this colony. If the Imperial Government did not consider that their instructions were carried out by the Governor, the obvious course was open to relieve him from hia duties, and not to resort to the unconstitutional course of delegating his powers to a subordinate officer from a desire to avoid such an alternative.

The Governor of the colony, as the representative of the Queen, is an integral part of the constitution of the country, which Ministers are bound, as far as possible, to maintain inviolate, and they are alarmed when a Secretary of State seeks to set aside the constitution by a formal despatch.

Nor is their objection on this point merely theoretical. It has been ascertained trom reliable sources that the rebel natives on the West Crast were on the eve of tendering their allegiance at the very time selected by a subordinate officers to give orders for the withdrawal of Imperial troops occupying certain posts ou that coast. It cannot be doubted by those who know the rapidity with which uews is circulated amongst the natives, that they are already acquainted with the reason of these orders, and understand that these detachments are removed in contempt of Hie authority of Her Macjsty’s representative. Neither can it bo a matter of doubt that no more effectual mode could have been adopted to encourage those iu rebellion. Had the Governor been able to inform these natives who were lately on the eve of making their submission that he would take upon himself the responsibility of removing the soldiers so soon as ho was satisfied of their return to loyalty, it is not mprobable that the outstanding rebels would quickly have submitted. The same objections are applicable to the mode in which detachments have been withdrawn from outposts in other parts of the colony.

While thus objecting to the agency by which, and the manner in which the withdrawal of tbo troops has been effected, Ministers deem it wholly unnecessary ot rebut any opinion which might be entertained that they or the colony objected to their being withdrawn : and they take this opportunity of reiterating the statement made in their memorandum of the loth ultimo, in reference to Lord Carnarvon's despatch No. 49. of the Ist December last, to the effect that they absolutely decline to accede to the terms sought to bo imposed on the colony for the retention of one regiment, They accept the removal of the troops and the consequences, but this being effected, they would observe that the colony has claims which entitle it to, at least, the courteous consideration of the Imperial Government. It is animated by the warmest sentiments of loyalty to the Queen, and feels lively gratitude to the British nation for the aid so generously extended to it in a time of great emergency. It has organized and maintained during the most critical period a force of ten thousand men ; it has expended millions in| the active suppression of insurrection ; it has sacrificed valuable lives, and undergone all the miseries of civil war; it has imposed on itself s large increase of taxation ; but above all, it has undertaken, in the midst of hostilities, to dispense with Imperial assistance, and to fulfil, from its own unaided re-

sources, a task unparalleled in the his' ot colonization. Self-protection in history of other colonies has but too quently resulted in the maltreatment t ultimate annihilation of the natives, 1 New Zealand has made and ia maki 67«rv fn* j w '>**'' OUU fJIV zatioa of the aboriginal race. The Cro\ of Great Britain has contracted sacr in respect of that race, on t faith of which it assumed possession of t country—-obligations which no sophist, can annul, and which cannot, according ' *>•>’ standard of morality, be transferred •jtusi- persons, au# imperial G overtime! nus now a.cogetner relinquished to ti Colonial Government the fulfilment . these obligations. It is strange, therefor that while by its action the Imperial Gc vernment has reposed such implicit conf deuce iu the colonial authorities, it shod in words be so ready to carp at their act and to mistrust their conduct. Nowhei does this strange inconsistency appear i greater contrast than in the despatch noi in question, in the commencement of whicl Lord Carnarvon reiterates, with apparen satisfaction, the abandonment by the Ira perial Government of both races to eacl other, while at the end he so lowly est mates the colonial authorities as to belie] them capable of an “ unwarranted ad merciless attack on unoffending persons of the native race. If that estimate b correct, what satisfaction can his Lordshi’ derive from the contemplation of a: arrangement which entirely vests in th colonists the maintenance of the faith ol the Crown, and even the existence of the aborigines ?

Ministers believe that the colony will honorably fulfil the momentous trust imposed on it. But at the outset of its career, when it is struggling under unexampled difficulties to do its duty, and when Great Britain withdraws all her material aid, it is not too much for the colony to expect from British statesmen some moral aid, even though it consist only in words of encouragement. At such a time and under such circumstances it is uot too much to expect that every constitutional privilege of the colony should be faithfully respected—that the conduct o f the Colonial Government should be regarded with every desire to place on it the moatfavourable construction—and that every word which tends to estrangement from the mother country, and to bitterness of feeling between the colonists and the natives should bo scrupulously avoided by the Imperial Government, Unhappily this has not been the case. The Imperial Government has ignored the constitutional position of the Governor; and has in successive despatches displayed a sense of irritation ana a proueness to take and give offence, which are much to be deplored. Ministers are unable to perceive either equity or good policy in such a course of action. It is unworthy of the great Empire to which New Zealand colonists are proud to belong ; it is unjust to the colony ; and it is dangerous to the welfare of the aboriginal race, to which the faith of the Crowu has been solemnly pledged. Ministers have noticed at length the subjects brought more prominently under review in Lord Carnarvon’s despatch, not because they are entitled to any preeminence among the calumnies which originate with or obtain currency through the instrumentality of olllcers in the Imperial service residing in New Zealand, but simply because they are the most, recent of a series which from time to time have obtained an injurious circulation ia the mother country before an opportunity has been afforded to the Colonial Government to place the facts of each case before the public. Ministers may instance the case of tbe purchase of the Waitotora block,in which the General commanding Her Majesty’s Forces thought it not inconsistent with his duty to send home without any communication with the Governor the statement of a private individual traducing the character of a high official in the service of the colony, by stigmatising the act in which he had been officially engaged as an “iniquitous job.” Ministers would refer also to the startling calumnies sent homo by Colonel Weare, in which accusations are brought against his Excellency, the Commander of the Forces, and the colony, of so serious a character that nothing but a public investigation can possibly meet the requirements of the case. It is true that those charges were in part withdrawn by Colonel Weare on the eve of his departure for England, but Ministers are of opinion that had the Imperial Government been properly jealous of the honor of the persons against whom these charges were made, it would have insisted on a public investigation. The story of the imputed atrocities [might, had Colonel Weare’s request been acted upon, have been inserted through the length and breadth of England, estrtnging the affections and alienating the respect of our fellow countrymen in Great Britain, without the Colonial Government being aware of the existence of such calumnies. Ministers might adduce other iustaaeei of a similar kind, and more notably Mr Commissary-General Jones’ letter to theAssistant Military Secretary of the 20th August, 1865, and Mr-Deputy-Commissary General Strickland’s letters of the Bth November, 1866, as to which latter Ministers, will shortly make a separate communication. _

Grave charges against the Colonial Go* vermnent and the colony, and an objection* able system of secret calumny have not. Ministers feel bound to say, met at the bands of Secretaries of State for the Colo* nies that indignant rejection which the Governor and iTer Majesty’s colonial sub* jects had equally a right to expect vrnen their reputation and conduct we re secretly attacked, E» "W« SiAf iosd.