HORRIBLE MURDER AT MONGONUI.

Hawke's Bay Weekly Times, Volume 1, Issue 17, 13 May 1867, Page 109

HORRIBLE MURDER AT MONGONUI.

New Zealand Herald, 19th April.

By the arrival of the Ivanhoe yesterday ,we learn that a murder of a most; diabolical nature has been committed recently at”Mongonui. The facts that have reached us, in the absence of. our correspondent’s letter, are very meagre, and were only known shortly before the Ivanhoe sailed.

It appears that last, week information was brought to the resident magistrate there that a young man named Smith had been discovered murdered in his whare, in the Victoria Valley, about 26 miles distant. The Resident Magistrate, accompanied by a doctor, at once started overland to the place, and there found the deceased was lying on his bed with his throat cut, his scull and brains completely beaten in and a lat ge cut across his face, which had broken his nose and jaw bone. The foul work, must have been done with some heavy blunt instrument, as the blood and brains were spattered all over the walls and ceiling, as also the window sill, of the whare. From this it must be evident that the perpetrator of the foul deed could not have got away without also getting a fair share of the blood sprinkled oil his clothes. Revenge seems to have been purely the murderer’s object, for nothing in the hut was touched, arid not the slightest signs of pl/nder were visible; when first discovered the door of the whare was locked outside.

Who the perpetrator of this horrible tragedy is no one knows, and we* are sorry to hear that there are very few chances of its being speedily traced up, for we are informed there is no policeman or constable stationed in the district at all. Surely this matter should be looked to, aud a detective might be well spared from. Aucklaud for the purpose.

The deceased,- Smith, was a very quiet, inoffensive young man, and well liked by the’settlers at Mongonui, near which place he has resided for about eighteen months. He was formerly, wo hear, a lawyer’s clerk, and then an assistant surveyor upon first coming to Auckland, and afterwards went down the coast to settle upon hia land.

Various conjectures were rife at Mongonui as to who could have committed this murder; some suspect some white men, aud some the Maoris, amongst whom, we hear, deceased has been of late frequently cohabiting, and it is thought wiiether a fit of jealousy has not resalted iu this awful tragedy. The character of the wounds, however, are not such as a Maori would have inflicted.

An enquiry had been held into the circumstances, and an open verdict of wilful murder against some person or persons unknown, returned. No doubt fuller particulars will reach us next mail from Mougonui.

Last night the following extract from a letter dated Kaitaia, April 16, was kindly handed to us for publication by a gentleman iu town: —

A fearful murder was committed here on Wednesday last, the victim being poor Henry Smith, from Sydney, a young man universally liked by the natives for his kind and obliging manners towards them. He was found tomahawked in his bed, and we are all quite at loss to account for it; but the chiefs are enquiring and looking out, so that if the perpetrator is a native he will soon be discovered and handed up to justice. It is the first murder in this district, and the natives abomiuate it. Many think the murderer to be a white man, of whom there are several bad-looking characters prowling about here.