MR WERIHE TUIRI

Taupo Times, Volume III, Issue 114, 2 April 1954, Page 9

MR WERIHE TUIRI

There was a large attendance of mourners on Saturday, March 27, at the funeral of the late Mr Werihe Tuiri, which took place at Waihi, Lake Taupo, at the ancestral burial ground of the Te Heuheu family. Leading figures from many Maor tribes of the North Island were present. On the previous day King Koroki and party had visited Waihi to express the sympathy of the Waikato people. The funeral service was conducted. by the Rev. Father Nederhof, pallbearers being members of the Tuwharetoa Trust Board.

Deceased, a leading chief of Ngati-Tuwharetoa, was a son of the late Te Tuiri Takiwa, chief of Ngati- Wharekawa of Mokai and Tihoi, who was well-known in Taupo as a contemporary and friend of such early Taupo f amilies as the Rickits, Gallaghers, Nobles and Crowthers. Deceased's mother was Te Rohu, a daughter of Te Heuheu Horonuku (Patatai), the Ngati-Tuwhartoa chief who prej sented the three mountains of Ruapehu, Tongariro and Ngaruahoe to the Crown for a National Park. The late chief had been chair- I man of the Tuwharetoa Trust Board since 1944, and was much interested in educational matters. He represented the Maori race at the Eucharistic Congress in Australia in 1928. His two sons were in the Maori Battalion in the Second World War, and the younger, Pompey, was killed in action at Cassino. Mr Tuiri's death has deprived the Tuwharetoa people of an elder who was a leader in his own right and who had a wide knowledge of Maori tradition and affairs.