Tuhoe - The Colonial Period

The Colonial Period

Tūhoe had little direct contact with the early European settlers. The first major contact occurred when the iwi fought against the settler government in the battle of Ōrākau in 1864. Rewi Maniapoto, who had some tribal links to Tūhoe, visited the Ureweras in 1862 and persuaded them to take part in the rebellion against the government against the wishes of some of the elders. Initially reluctant, Tūhoe showed their committment by giving Rewi ammunition to back the rebellion. During a cease fire in the Battle of Orakau, under flag of truce, Gilbert Mair, a translator, was shot in the shoulder by a Tūhoe warrior. Nearly all Tūhoe at the battle were killed. The following year authorities accused Tūhoe of sheltering a Hau Hau murderer, Kereopa Te Rau who had killed,beheaded and eaten the eyeballs of CMS missionary Karl Volkner in the Volkner Incident. Initially Tūhoe had cooperated in tracking down the Hau hau leader and had even taken him prisoner. Tūhoe tried to use him as a bargaining chip but the government demanded Te Rau be handed over for trial . Tūhoe then released him and Te Rau hid in the Ureweras . As punishment, the government confiscated 5700ha or about 7% of Tūhoe land on its northern coastal border in 1866. The confiscated Tūhoe land adjoined the land confiscated from Bay of Plenty rebels after the battle of Gate Pā. The Crown took Tūhoe's only substantial flat, fertile land and their only access to the coast for kai moana (sea food). The Tūhoe people retained only interior, more difficult land, setting the scene for later famines.

In 1868, Tūhoe sheltered the Māori leader Te Kooti, a fugitive who had escaped from imprisonment on the Chatham Islands.Te Kooti arrived in the area witha large group of escaped convicts,fully armed with modern weapons he had stolen from the ship he had hijacked. It is doubtful if Tūhoe could have resisted his demands for sanctuary. Some Tūhoe joined his armed Ringatū band but later it was also Tūhoe who betrayed Te Kooti's whereabouts to the government forces. Some even joined the government forces in hunting him down. Government forces punished Tūhoe who supported Te Kooti during the manhunt. Te Ara, the Online Encyclopedia of New Zealand, notes:

"Old enemies of Tūhoe fought on the side of the government; they carried out most of the raids into Te Urewera during a prolonged and destructive search between 1869 and 1872. In a policy aimed at turning the tribe away from Te Kooti, a scorched earth campaign was unleashed against Tūhoe; people were imprisoned and killed, their cultivations and homes destroyed, and stock killed or run off. Through starvation, deprivation and atrocities at the hands of the government’s Māori forces, Tūhoe submitted to the Crown."

After these events, Tūhoe isolated themselves, closing off access to their lands by refusing to sell, lease or survey them, and blocking the building of roads. Historian Jamie Belich describes the Urewera as one of the last zones of Māori autonomy and the scene of the last case of armed Māori resistance: in 1916 the New Zealand Police Force arrested the Tūhoe prophet Rua Kenana on charges of making illegal alcohol after a gun-battle in the Urewera left 10 people killed or wounded. The police conducted the raid "like a military operation" entering alien territory. Belich states that significant European penetration did not occur in the Urewera district until the 20th century. A road was built by the government from Rotorua to Ruatahuna in 1901 to end the isolation of Tūhoe by opening up the first motor road. Tūhoe did eventually realise especially in the Great Depression that to grow their local economy they needed good roads to the outside world. They went as far as donating land for roads. As early as 1906 Tūhoe had given land for roads and even offered free labour to assist in the construction but building arterial roads in the Ureweras had a low government priority. In the early 1900s traces of gold were found in the Ureweras and Rua Te Kanana tried to sell illegal mining rights to raise money. At the same time Rua wished to sell very large areas of land to the government to raise funds for his new Jerusalem, but despite having a petition signed by every Tūhoe adult the government insisted that he stick to the law. In the 1920s Gordon Coates, Minister of public works went to the area to check its suitablity for a railway and to discuss roads. The land was very steep with the Poverty Bay Herald descibing the gradient as "one in nothing". Coates knew that by this time Tūhoe were refusing to make any contribution to the road at all. The mountainous terrain was daunting for farming. Tūhoe could not accumulate any capital to develop land they had cleared from 1907. Instead they sold all their sheep and cattle to pay for legal costs. These debts were not paid until 1931. In the early 1930s the government helped develop Tūhoe land at both Ruatoki and Ruatahuna. The government were aware that, like many New Zealanders in the Great Depression, Tūhoe had hard times. In 1934 a teacher wrote that "they have no money apart from what is given by government as Family Allowances and Old Age Pensions". In 1936 a report recognised that land development at Maungapohatu Mountain (a Ringatu stronghold),"would be a social success if undertaken". The report pointed out that the venture would probably fail if Tūhoe were required to pay back both the interest and the capital. In 1937 after several other studies the government decided that it was uneconomic to invest in roads or settlements. By this time the isolated Maungapohatu settlement had collapsed anyway. The Tūhoe population was always small. Living conditions were very bad. School records from the 1920s and 1930s show a very high death rates especially of children. 75%of those who died were people under 25. The main causes of death were infectious diseases such as influenza, gastro enteritis, typhoid and whooping cough. Between 1924 and 1936, the Depression period,57 people died in a community of 30 families.

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