Sidestep: The Colonialists of Rekohu (it's real name)

This post is about those who invaded, killed, enslaved a people and took over a land not theirs. No, we aren't talking about the British, the French or any of those now known as Pakeha - I'm referring to Maori themselves... on what we know as the Chatham Islands. In it, there is conflicting information as many sources have just that...!

In 1835, a group of defeated Maori hitched a ride to a new land on a European ship after hearing about some strange people. This land previously unknown to any Maori was called Rēkohu (by the original inhabitants). These new people were able to get there because they had heard from European ships that a peaceful people existed far out to the east of the South Island of NZ.

These people were by all accounts a peaceful race, but it is not them specifically that this post is about. It is about those who invaded, killed, enslaved a people and took over a land not theirs. I am referring to two tribes. These two tribes has lost their traditional lands to others through war and conquest. They were Ngāti Tama and Ngāti Mutunga. Both these tribes have received millions for 'cultural redress and loss of land'.

Those of these two two tribes that travelled over were Maori and these Maori were, in fact - colonialists in the same manner and meaning as referred to Europeans in regard to Aotearoa.

While it is true that sealers had already altered the fragility of life on Rēkohu, the tangata whenua (Moriori) were still free of disease and free within their own land. These sealers were harming the Moriori by decimating the seal population, but they were not invaders as they were picked up after a period of months with their pelts... they were more like temporary 'poachers'. Yet when these Maori invaders arrived they deliberately, and violently, killed 20% of the inhabitants and enslaved the rest. I can't recall any stories of Europeans doing such a thing, neither can anyone else including Maori.

Life was already hard with life expectancy around age 32, with around a third of the population dying in infancy. What killed them early in life (pre-invasion) was not predators, warfare, or starvation, but damage to their teeth from a lifetime of gritty shellfish.

It is well documented that in 1835, members of the Māori tribes Ngāti Tama and Ngāti Mutunga, living in what is now Wellington, New Zealand, decided to migrate to the Chatham Islands. In fact this is untrue... they did not 'decide' at all, they were forced to leave their lands by another tribe and therefore left to seek new lands. And they didn't just 'migrate' - they went there with the intention of invasion. In November 1835 after a series of beach front hui which discussed the possible invasion of Samoa and Norfolk Island (yes, this was discussed), Maori took part in the invasion by sea of the Chatham Islands which were closer. Together with Ngati Mutunga, they captured the mate of The Lord Rodney and threatened to kill him unless they were taken to the Chatham Islands. after they reached the islands, the tribes took part in a slaughter of about 200-300 Moriori, raping many women, enslaving the survivors, and destroying the Moriori economy and way of life. Some then returned home to Taranaki.

Already we can begin to see the mistruth about traditional land being honoured by Maori and dishonoured by Pakeha - the whole saga of rape, pillage and death by Pakeha alone, is a gross and hypocritical lie, perpetuated by the Maori intent on money and media - intent on anything that makes them money. Anyway, in 1835, and brought over in European ships, around 500-900 Maori men, women, and children arrived on the shore, determined to take the land they found there through a practice called “walking the land,” where they moved across the island and settled wherever they liked. Moriori who disagreed or attempted to retain their districts were summarily slaughtered. In other words, these two tribes, already disinterred from their own 'traditional lands' (and knowing how that felt), engaged in genocide and occupation of a people and lands that were not theirs. Hang on... doesn't this sound like what Maori accuse Pakeha of? Yes, it does, and it does because it is!

Soon after their arrival and with the growing threat of intimidation, about 1,000 Moriori gathered to discuss what they should do. This invasion was different to previous arrivals (sealers), who had come, taken resources, and then left again. Some younger Moriori men argued that Nunuku’s law was designed to protect them from one another, and did not apply to those who were not Moriori. They needed to fight back, they said, or risk certain death. Older chiefs disagreed. Nunuku’s law was a moral imperative. Disobeying it would compromise their mana, a complicated and multifaceted term comprising integrity, prestige, and strength. The Moriori resolved not to fight. The Māori seem to have decided at roughly the same time that a pre-emptive strike was necessary. Shortly afterwards, hundreds of Moriori were slain by Māori. They did not fight back. “They commenced to kill us like sheep,” one survivor said later, “wherever we were found.” At least 220 men and women were killed, and many more children.

Recordings of a council of Moriori elders from 1862 lists all adult Moriori alive on that day in 1835. One cross meant they had died or been killed; two crosses meant they had been cooked and eaten, a Māori custom common to land disputes on the mainland. Those who had not been killed were enslaved, separated from their families, and prohibited from marrying. Many died of illness, over-work, or kongenge, meaning dispiritedness or despair. The historian André Brett correctly argues that what took place was not mass killing, but systematic genocide: “Māori viewed Moriori as a different and inferior people and killed individuals on the basis of their membership of the Moriori group.” In fact, they were genetically indistinct from one another. It was genocide, and a repeat of what Ngapuhi, under the leadership of Hongi Hika, did to many tribes in the north and south islands of NZ decades before.

FOUND SCATTERED ON THE BEACH WHERE THEY WERE KILLED

Within 30 years, there were only around 100 Moriori people left. An already broken people suffered injustice after injustice - not just 30 years of slavery; but the awarding of 97.3 percent of the Chatham Islands to Ngāti Mutunga Māori in an 1870 Native Land Court decision; and the systematic portrayal of Moriori as a “lazy, stupid people,” genetically distinct from Māori and Polynesians, in a 1916 copy of School Journals, a series of educational magazines used across New Zealand elementary schools. In that regard the Crown aided Maori in destroying the Moriori's right to their own land.

And even after taking control of the islands of Waitangi on Rēkohu (Chatham Islands), Ngāti Tama and Ngāti Mutunga fought amongst themselves eventually - such is the nature of the Maori. Once allies they fought for control of land and Ngāti Mutunga eventually won.

Back in NZ it is true both tribes lost lands to other tribes and Europeans, but is this any different to what they did to the Moriori who now had to share the islands with the Maori invaders? Did Europeans kill Ngati Tama where they stood on the beach, and did they enslave them? Did they eat them? No. But this is what Ngati Tama did to the Moriori when they saw and regarded them as 'inferior' beings, the same way a few Europeans incorrectly viewed Maori.

The original tribal lands in North Taranaki were invaded by Waikato tribes during the Musket Wars after a series of longstanding intertribal wars stretching back to at least 1807. Ngāti Mutunga in turn joined with Ngāti Toa and the smaller Ngāti Tama tribe to invade the Wellington region. Here they fought with and defeated the Ngāti Ira iwi, took over their land and extinguished their independent existence.

During the conflict in Taranaki over land in the 1860s and subsequently, Ngāti Mutunga left en masse from the Chatham Islands, joined with other iwi in rebelling against the Crown's decision to purchase land from Maori. This led to at least 23 Ngāti Mutunga taking part in the Parihaka occupation of disputed land and their subsequent arrest. In 1865 Ngāti Mutunga land was confiscated under the New Zealand Settlements Act 1863. However provision was made for Ngāti Mutunga people who had not rebelled by the returning of 9,000 acres of land, and later in 1870 a further 15,000 acres. The land was returned to individuals. The later land was mainly inland and most was then sold off. It is unknown how many Ngāti Mutunga existed in the rohe as many had taken part in the invasion of the Chatham Islands. Based on the present Ngāti Mutunga population of 2,000 (c. 2007) it was possibly about 200.

Despite the Chatham Islands being made part of New Zealand in 1842, Māori kept Moriori slaves until 1863. So while complaining of Colonialist takeover, Maori kept slaves a further 19 years until European prevented it from continuing... yes, it was the Europeans that prevented it continuing - not Ngati Mutunga deciding to stop! That is a very important point to note. Se aspects of Maori culture can be just as offensive now (200 years later) as Maori deem colonialism (from 200 years prior) to be.

Rekohu is the Chatham Islands real name but Maori renamed it Wharekauri. That name doesn't make sense because there is no Kauri and therefore you can't have any connection to it on Rekohu. There is no official explanation of what Wharekauri actually means other than the Maori name for Rekohu. So Maori took a land not theirs, renamed it, and that name still sticks. The Maori complain Europeans names should be eliminated from NZ and replaced with Maori names. I sort of agree they should, except it seems a bit hypocritical in the light of some renaming conquered Rēkohu with Wharekauri...? If they can call Rekohu 'Wharekauri' then surely Pakeha can called Mt Taranaki "Mt Egmont' without correction.

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One account says centuries of independence came to a brutal end for the Moriori people in December 1835.

On November 19 of that year, a ship carrying 500 Maori armed with guns, clubs, and axes arrived, followed on December 5 by a shipload of 400 more Maori. Groups of Maori began to walk through Moriori settlements, announcing that the Moriori were now their slaves, and killing those who objected. An organized resistance by the Moriori could still then have defeated the Maori, who were outnumbered two to one. However, the Moriori had a tradition of resolving disputes peacefully. They decided in a council meeting not to fight back but to offer peace, friendship, and a division of resources. Before the Moriori could deliver that offer, the Maori attacked en masse. Over the course of the next few days, they killed hundreds of Moriori, cooked and ate many of the bodies, and enslaved all the others, killing most of them too over the next few years as it suited their whim.

To that, a Maori conqueror explained –

“We took possession… in accordance with our customs and we caught all the people. Not one escaped. Some ran away from us, these we killed, and others we killed — but what of that? It was in accordance with our custom.”

Summary

Ngati Mutunga lost land to Waikato tribes and fled to and with Ngata Toa and Ngata Tama, they invaded the Wellington region where they fought and defeated another tribe and took their land. Yet they complained about Europeans doing the same thing as a result of war. Yet with further conflict, they went to another island and did the exact same thing to someone else, only worse, without retaliation. This is surely the worst moral hypocrisy regarding land grabs, and genocide that has ever occurred on these islands, worse even than Hongi Hika, for at least he didn't claim the land of those he slaughtered, he 'merely' wanted utu (revenge) upon his enemies, and went home again after his murderous genocide was over and others had gained the musket and his overpowering advantage had slipped away. Cowards are like that. I believe he was a coward. Yet he was also a generous man to the European so there is good and bad in everyone.

Let no one tell you Europeans are worse than Maori and that murder, rapes and forced change is the domain of white skin color only - for that rhetoric smacks of both racism and hypocrisy. Yet that is what is taught in schools and by academia. It's shameful not to tell ALL the stories, the good, the bad and the ugly. For it is all history and to try and erase some of it to suit one skin colours is a most appalling modern crime.

A reasonable conclusion

Tina Makereti wrote the book "Where the Rēkohu Bone Sings" in 2014. In it she states.....

"I want to say two things. One is that as the Waitangi Tribunal stated in its report of the Manukau Harbour, the starting point for any reconciliation must be an acknowledgement of what actually happened even if to make that acknowledgement is painful. Secondly, once the story has been told, Ngati Mutunga and Ngati Tama need feel no shame about what happened in 1835/36. As the book and the evidence make clear, what they did was tikanga or custom at that time, in those circumstances. On the other hand, it was not tikanga according to the custom of the Moriori as spelt out by Nunuku. That is the source of frustration and hurt."

Now if the Maori slavers and murderers need feel no shame because of the 'customs' of the time, then Europeans need feel no shame for what they did for what was the 'custom' of the times... in those circumstances.

It can only both or none, Tina.... stop being a selective racist.