DESPATCH FROM THE SECRETARY

Wairarapa Standard, Volume I, Issue 28, 15 July 1867, Page 3

DESPATCH FROM THE SECRETARY

OF STATE. (Presented to the General Assembly by command of His Excellency.) Downing Street, February 28,1867. Sir, — I have received through the Secretary of State for War, copies of two despatches, dated respectively the 13th and 16th November last, which you addressed to Major-Gene-ral Chute, requesting that one company of Her Majesty’s troops might be stationed at certain redoubts in the Patea district, to enable the colonial forces to be “employed as covering parties for the surveyors,” and that Major Rocke, the officer commanding in the district, might be instructed to give all the protection in his power to the surveyors who were completing the survey in the vicinity of the redoubt at Turaturamokai.

It does not appear whether the surveyors, for whose protection the Queen’s troops have been sought, are employed on disputed or confiscated land ; but I must at once point out to to you that the employment of Her Majesty's troops in detatched posts at all, and more especially if on disputed or confiscatedjand, is at direct variance with the instructions you have received as to the future employment of Her Majesty’s troops —particularly in. iny predecessor’s despatch of the 27th November, 1865, and I am compelled to express my decided disapproval of it. The large confiscations which have taken place have been viewed with the greatest apprehension by Her Majesty’s Government, and if it is found that any portion of the confiscated lands can only be surveyed or be held with the aid of a military force, that duty cannot be allowed to devolve on Her Majesty’s troops, but must be left entirely to the charge of the colonial forces should your responsible advisers consider it necessary. I have therefore requested General Peel to inform General Chute by the present mail, that the employment of her Majesty’s troops in this service cannot be approved, and that, in accordance with former instructions, the force retained in the colony must be concentrated, and not be placed in distant and isolated posts, or employed as a police. I have, &c., Carnaevow. Governor Sir George Grey, K.C.B.