Te Kooti.

Manawatu Herald, 20 April 1893, Page 2

Te Kooti.

■ .- ■ » *• The death of Te Koofci recalls the wonderful alteration that has taken place on this coast since the year 1868. Then Wanganui was but a small place and Marton only a straggling village, and Foxton but a collection of a few houses, better known by travellers as Awahou. All the country now teeming with population in the Sandon, Carnarvon, Feilding, Pohangina, Palmerston and down to Paikakariki was practically ' unoccupied; = 'Whatr ( ? few people there were, were quickly collected together owing to TeKooti's movements. Some time prior to 1868 Te Kooti with many other ttabives Were expatriated ,to the Chatham islands and he determined to escape. How this was 6ffeete9 is a matter of history but : sufficiently interesting to. be again retold. In July .1868 the schooner!.''; Rifleman " was at the. Chatham's, and the Maori prisoners were employed/ in discharging the stores.' ; The captain being on shore, at a signal from To Kooti the natives rose,, killed, the only guard who. offered (resistance, overpowered and bonnU the boarded the vessel; seized the cfrew, and ordered the mate, on pain' C! of death to navigate them to NeW'Zealand. He consented to. db "so, atid no further violence -wfts exhibited. Te Kooti possessed hitiiself of the contents of the treasury, about £400, secured aoout forty stand rof ]afmg and ammunition, sWpp^d^tha i6B prisoners, with their 64 women, and 71 children, and, in order* to'ipreve'nt pursuit, cut the cable of tha ketch " Florence " the orify Mother vessel in port, and sent her crew ashore. Sail was made and on 10th July the " Rifleman " arrived at jNew^, Zealand at a place six miTessoullh i' of Gisborne, where the natives landed. The 4 ' Rifleman ' ' instead of ' notifying at the nearest settlement, what had been done, sailed to "Wellington arad reported there. ' The popuiation of Poverty Bay was t^en occupied by only 200 European's. When first brought, tb bay Te JKoqti refused to surrender but promised he would not molest anyone unlees his freedom was threateriecL^ ! It appears now to have been a great pity that he was not allowed^ ?to depart in peace. Attempts we're made to capture him which brought in return the horrible massacres of Poverty Bay. ' ' About the same time Titokowaru rose in rebellion oh the West; coast and defeated the small, detachments sent against him, so that he di»ve all the settlers north of Wanganni into that town and : practically beseiged it. The Haulhaft ;mpyement had got firm hold of a large number of the natives on the coajst below Foxton, and they wera .Very- ill disposed to the settlers; ■ ■ *-J This brief recapitulation brings us to the point where Te Kooti's movements more especially disturbed the settlers in the Manawatuj Districfc. We may as well explain that there were no roads out 6t Foxton in those days, the • road ' to Palmerston being a track across the Himatangi run to the crossing place over the Oroua river where how the road bridge is built. To get to ,it nearly a mile of bush track had ■; to be passed through. Riders had v to place their saddles in a canoe' and swim their horses across the river. To Palmerston the traok was through the bush and followed the windings of the Manawatu river. There wire

but few settlers, we do not pretend to remember all, but Bishop Monrad, Mr and Mrs Sly, and Mr Peter Stewart lived between Jackeytown firld Palmer'storh 111 Painierstoh desolation 1 was the order of the day there" oeirJrf orle tl acconimoda'tion " hduse, near the site oi the preseilt gasworks, and a slab whare which w.aa the Government survey office. Not another building. Above Palmerston Mr Dalrymple had lately taken up a heavily bushed section, now T?e Matai, and the late Mr A. Grammar and Mr Waugh lived near Rawkawa, on land now owned by Mrß\ Cobb, This wag about all the population up that Way* tile ' tfoaxi ' , really trdck; across the ranges tteiiig up on the railway side of tfie gorge': There were a good many settlers around Motoa, but few down the boast. The ferry at the mouth of tHe ri,vjer; niariaged hy Mr ,Langley, was the chief crossing place b ! ver the Manawatu, the beach from Pai kakariki to Rangitikei being the main road. . One night, at this time, a foreign pedlar stayed at Mi Langley's public , ho\»se ,jinct .crossed the river in the following nidr'riirig with his pack horse and goods to proceed down the coast. After he had got over the Ohau, and was stooping down to put on his socks some natives jumped out from the sandhills and grievously assaulted him with toma-hawks and left him nearly dead. " He managed some- ' how; to get back to Langley's and Word wad brought td the late 1 Captain Hoblrtson of the attack. Mr Halcombe happened to be travelling down the coast that night, and was at Langley's, and, as a J.P. took the unfortunate man's statement, who shortly after died. This naturally caused a feeling ot insecurity, finding the road to Wellington thus blocked. The Justices and leading men held a meeting during which a niesseilgdr rode in and informed them that lifcokowaru had surrounded Wanganui and was intending to cross the river and march down the coast. This neither was pleasant news, but, to top it all, the same day intelligence was received somehow, how, at present we are unaware, that Te Eooti having finished a massacreing expedition in Povery Bay was comjog through the Manawatu Gorge to join Titokowaru. All the information, we may state, came from reliable persons, who unable to state accurately the movements of the two Maori leaders, pointed out their likely direction, therefore the scare was not from foolish imaginations. The Justices and the settlers determined that some steps must be taken to secure the safety of the outlying settlers, and plucky messengers went forth to Pahnerston, Motoa and to the South of the river bidding them to come to Foxton. We had no militia then nor volunteers, and had therefore a very small supply of avrns, but all there were, were brought into the Main street for use Main street Foxton then boasted the following buildings— the Presbyterian church which had been just completed ; an old store on the site occupied by Mr T Ennis' shop, now standing, by the bye, on the Avenue opposite the reading room, being thai building just newly painted and done up ; the main portion only of Messrs Hennessey Westwood & Co's store then owned by Mr J. W. Liddell, and an old building now at the rear of the Post office whioh used to. be the Athenaeum. The buildings were not many, and around there were only a very few other houses, such as the White Harfc hotel now part of Mr Cawston's hotel, and the Adelaide hotel now used as a residence by Mr Cook ; a house, part of that facing the river by the Station master's house, and two houses near where Mr Ray resides, and the house which was incorporated in Mr Border's old hotel which has lately been pulled down ; and the late Mr Gray's store which stood in the paddock on the river bank at the corner of Harbour street and the Motoa road. All the settlers in and around Foxton brought their women and children into LiddeFs store, where the males -went out in turns to act gentry-go. All through that first night came settlers with ther families looking much alarmed and distressed. The following day witnessed the arrival of of the more outlying settlers who had to abandon all their belonging to chance After a day or two the outlying settlers decided on leaving their families in Foxton and going to their properties themselves, otherwise ruin stared them in the face. The settlers held a meeting at which it was determined to erect a stockade and a strong working party was formed, some of whom went up the Avenue which was then a fine bush and cut down whole trees which were carted by those who had teams to the site chosen for the erection of the stockade, a spot on a rise in Mr Duncan's paddock neaely opposite the schoolmaster's residence. These trees were. carried up the rise and reared by many powerful hands into. tbe trench cut to receive them, thus forming a wall twelve feet high of solid timber. Inside a platform was laid and loopholes cut in the walls. The stockade had corners built out so as to cover the outer'! walls. The idea was excellent, the execution good, but fortunately it was never entered ov .used. . It is

only fair to say that the Natives had always asserted that there should be no fighting in the Manawatu, it was " tapu'd," and there never haa been, but it Was the wisest to be prepared. The Natives around tIS, the late Ihakara and Kereopa always assured ds of their friendship and support, which was lleVer doubted by those who knew them best. At the same time it is worth placing on record that certain sections of the natives who were not of the tribes comprising those on the war path; were much troubled at these events, and kept, from Jackeytown to Mofcoa, a gUal'd day and pight. They feared the apin'oaeh of thedG men as much as the Europeans did. . We are right, in stating that Te liodti .troubled* '.us exceedirigly ifl those days and his death htis recalled some events that make strange reading in this year 1893. It shows how vast a change twenty four years has taken 1 place in this Britain of the South, with every proSpect of tbe next twenty five years showing an even more extraordinary change. Such a slight insight as we have been able to give off hand will yet help our young friends to remember that trie work p£ .do.lonisa.tion more nearly approached the " heroic" " to what it now does, and that the sue. cess of those who bore the heat and burden of the early times are deserved they got and worked for it, though a new generation delighteth to dub them " social pests " and such like unsympathetic terms. Those who are now enjoying life in this colony have to thank those hearts of oak, the brave early colonists, for holding possession of the country for" them.