Orakau Memories

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 318, 31 March 1928, Page 11

Orakau Memories

REWI’S GALLANT STAND 64 Years Ago To-Day THREE-DAYS BATTLE SIXTY-FOUR years ago to-day Pakeha and Maori were at one another’s throats in the tiiree-day battle of Orakau. Cameron was making his last and decisive blow in the Waikato war. It was at Orakau that the Maoris, surrounded by overwhelming odds, made their memorable stand, and when asked to surrender shouted back defiantly that they would fight on for ever and ever. Such heroism however, had to give way to superior numbers and weapons and trained military skill..

f|N' March 31, 1864, the acrid smoke of sulphurous gunpowder floating heavily over peach groves not yet harvested, and the din of battle, marked the beginning of a three-day struggle by a band of 300 Maoris against 1,800 well-armed troops. The ill-starred effort of Rewi and his allies for freedom for their lands and for a voice in the government of the country, as promised by the Treaty of Waitangi, ended three days later in a welter of blood and misery, when a battle-shattered column of natives, haggard of face and with bloodshot eyes, dashed out of their fort. In hollow-square formation, with their women and children shielded by the uaked breasts of the men, and with picked warriors at the head of the column to batter a lane through the cordon of troops, the besieged garrison, emerging from a corner of the shell-hammered pa, moved slowly toward the shelter of the swamps, much to the surprise of the English army. Orakau was Cameron’s last and decisive blow in the Waikato war. He had driven the tribes from Koheroa to Rangiriri. At Ngaruawahia the Maori king's flag was floating defiantly in the breeze, but the pa was deserted. An almost new confederation contested with hi-j on the Waipa, the river of the fort (of the Waikatos), and at Paterangi, Hairini, and Rangiaowahia the red line pushed back the Maoris, until Cameron's advance-post rested at Kihikihi. and the quiet Puniu separated Maori and Pakeha. “The place of the trees,” Orakau, was then a picture of agricultural content. Maize, wheat, potatoes, kumeras, grapes, melons, and other foodstuffs grew in profusion. A church looked out over the thatched whares on the slopes and the fernclad ridges, ending in a swamp. A flour mill driven by water-power ground wheat, and shipped the products to Auckland. REWI’S FEARLESS TRIBES The Maoris had only one thought—the prolongation of the war for their rights. The land-grabbing of the Government aud its supporters was likened to the gorging of a bullock on raurekau leaves. The tribes wanted to keep the blood, argument north of the river barrier. They were heartened by allies from the fearless tribes of the Urewera. Rewi’s people. High ground In the peach groves of Orakau was selected as a site for the pa. The ridge was known as Karaponia, a mutilation of California, where some of the men had penetrated in the gold rushes. On March 29, working in relays because they were short of spades, the Maoris commenced to build the fort, 80 feet by 40 feet, with an outwork at one corner, and a post and rail fence surrounding it. The walls were constructed of clay and fern, and 280 men and about 20 women and some children were the garrison. On the break of day on March 31, the whole of the little force was at prayers. Rewi declared that he fought under the religion of Christ, and -couted the beliefs of the other leaders, who felt dark at ignoring the tried beliefs of their ancestors. When prayers ended, one of the men announced that he had been watching for some time the approach of an English column, and almost before the garrison could reach the pa they were attacked The fortification was far from com-

plete. The Royal Irish, hurled at the enemy, reeled under the massed fire, and as the dense smoke lifted all along the walls a second rush was also stopped. Extra forces arrived, and the pa was completely surrounded, and t!*> water supply cut off. Caged like animals, the garrison stood by its guns to face the ordeal of siege, many of the men being armed only with tomahawks. At a range of 350 yards the guns were unloosed, but the Armstrongs failed to breach the flimsylookiug clay ramparts. A sap of 120 yards was feverishly commenced. The foggy morning on the second daycut off the combatants from sight of one auother, and Rewi counselled fight while the visibility was poor. The Urewera men were for remaining. SURRENDER SCORNED The besieged were forced to use pieces of apple branches for lack of bullets. On the third day of undiminished shooting Havelock came up with reinforcements, and the hand grenades. One thousand eight hundred troops ringed the band in the pa. As the grenades fell on the rough shelters, the Maoris dashed out the wicks and saved the powder, or else hurled the bombs back at the English. In the afternoon Cameron urged the pa to surrender. The offer was scornfully refused. Much has been written of Rewl’s answer, but history bears little witness that he ever actually appeared on the walls. However, the will of the garrison “to fight on for ever and ever” was conveyed clearly enough to the messenger from Cameron. Ahumai, a Hthe-limbed and handsome girl-wife, stood forth to announce that if the men must die the women and children must die too. Poor Ahumai! She was to receive four ghastly wounds. Tortured with pain and wracked with anxiety for the safety of her kin, she crawled through the fern to the river, beyond which Jay hope. A year later, unmoved by hate or revenge, she saved the life of Lieutenant Meade, R.N\, at Taupo. Cameron was loth to kill the Maoris, and Havelock ejaculated: “Rare plucked 'uns! ” The fury of battle broke out afresh without restraint on the natives, cooped in a space little larger than a dance hall. Parched throats refused to swallow the potatoes roasted by the women in the shelter of a pit; thirstmaddened wounded groaned, and lay unattended. The dead were gathered together, and interred in a shallow trench, with the drone of shells for a requiem. In desperation, with the sap touching the outworks, the battered 60 remaining on their feet resolved on flight. BLOOD LUST When the Imperial troops reached the pa, they found a wounded lay reader of the Anglican Church piteously holding up a stick with a white flag on it; nearby, leaning over the burial trench, was a wounded woman taking a last long look at the face of her husband. As she threw back the earth, a dozen bayonets reached for her. Gilbert Mair, swinging his carbine, forced away the soldiers, hurling one into the ditch. He carried the woman to an angle, and left her to succour another. When he looked around, the first woman was a corpse —cruelly bayonetted. Out on the swamps the Maoris, broken and reckless, clawed their way to the river, a line of corpses marking the alley of retreat. Old Tupotahi, with his right collarbone broken hy a ball, thrust the fingers of the useless right hand in his teeth, and with a gun in his left hand fought a passage to freedom. A young man of fine build, by kneeling and presenting his gun. repeatedly stopped the pursuers of a party which included a young woman. When he was shot, it was found that his gun was empty! A gum tree marked the site where the Armstrongs were placed. Most of the other material evidence had vanished when the present Orakau monument was erected.