A STORY OF THE THIRTIES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 281, 6 May 1915, Page 6

A STORY OF THE THIRTIES.

THE FATE OF THE HARRIET AND HER SURVIVORS.

Thus the Lyttelton Times:—ln the 'th.irt.ies of last century the 240-ton harquc Harriet, which combined whalechasing with trading, was one of the most regular visitors from Port Jackson to the New Zealand coast. On April 28, 1834, she was wrecked at a place now known, as.Harriet Beach, near Cape Egmorit, and in the fighting whieh followed between the castaways and the Maoris twelve out of the twenty-seven men of the crew were killed, and their bodies went into the man-eaters' ovens. The Harriet's people retreated' along the beach in the direction of Moturoa—where New Plymouth now stands —firing as they went, but.one after another fell, and at last the survivors were captured. Captain Guard was 'permitted to leave with five men in one of the boats which the natives had brought from the wreck, leaving the rest as hostages; tlie:r release was conditional on Guard bringing back some gunpowder. The Maoris detained his wife and children, .find took them to Waimate and Orangituapeka, two strongly fortified villages on the sea coast not far from the present town of Hawera. There they were the prisoners of the Maoris for five months, and although they were not injured, they were treated very callously by their barbarous captors. Mrs. Guard spent the winter in a half-naked condition; all she was left to wear was a single garment; later she was given some mats. She became knowli amongst them as "Peti," the native pronounciation of her Christian name, Betty, Meanwhile Captain Guard had made his way to Sydney, and when he told his story the Governor of New South Wales despatched 11.M.5. (Alligator, accompanied by the colonial schooner Isabella, to the New Zealand coast for the purpose of rescuing the captive white people. Calling at Moturoa, the warship took off the eight sailors left by Guard, and then sailed for Te Naniu, near Cape Egmont, where she landed a force who met the Maoris in a skirmish. Then the ship went on to Waimate, at the mouth of the Kapuni river, where the longmissing white woman was brought off in a canoe with the younger of her two children, a little girl named 'Louisa. She was dressed, it is recorded, in two beautiful "kcrowai" mats, the parting gifts of the Maoris, which covered her from neck to feet. No sooner had she been taken to the Alligator than tho frigate and the schooner opened fire and shelled the Maori forts and the canoe ileet in the river for three hours.

After this very one-sided piece of work, wliich was considered by the naval men a justifiable act of retribution, the ships sailed away, but returned on Octol)cr 8, landed a force of sailors, marines and soldiers, with a six-pounder gun, regained tho remaining child, little Jack Guard—who was brought along on the shoulders of a Maori chief—and then fought the natives and attacked the lofty pas overlooking the beach. The hill castles were rushed and scaled, and soon the British ensign was Hying from the summit of Waimate pa. These eneounters were the first engagements between a regular British force and the Maoris. In "Old Jack" Guard's home, where ho has lived for nearly two generations, at Tort Underwood, are a brace of water-color sketches by a sailor friend of his depicting the rescue from the TaTanakis ami the bombardment of the pa in wliich, as a tiny child, he spent a cruel winter with the savages of Old New Zealand.