South Taranaki’s secret history
Posted 14 April 2009 // Caren Wilton
Welcome to Manaia
We went to Manaia in South Taranaki for Easter – an odd choice for a holiday, really. Even Murray, owner of the 103-year-old Waimate Hotel, where we stayed, looked dubious: ‘Do you have family here?’ he asked.
No; we’d driven down the coast road after WOMAD a few weeks earlier, and had our curiosity piqued by the signs that said ‘Soldiers’ cemetery’, and ‘Cape Egmont lighthouse‘, and ‘Parihaka Pa‘. Our Easter plan was to stay in Ōpunake, actually, but the Kneeboard Surfing World Championships were on and all the accommodation was full.
We were the only guests in the Waimate Hotel; not even the bar was open, because it was Good Friday. Murray told us that recently the place had been full, occupied by workers at the Kāpuni gas plant, but they’d all gone home for Easter.
Our room overlooked Manaia’s central Octagon, with its band rotunda and two granite obelisks, one commemorating the two world wars, and the other the men of the armed constabulary who died fighting the Ngāti Ruanui leader Tītokowaru in 1868.
Dairy tankers roared past, gleaming, on their way to the Fonterra factory at Whareroa, outside Hāwera. Yarrows bakery, opposite the hotel, was quiet, and the elegant 1911 post office was now home to a tattooist and an ‘alternative art gallery’. In the distance, Mt Taranaki, snow-topped after Thursday’s cold snap, was emerging from its thick cover of cloud.
Soldiers’ memorial, Te Ngutu-o-te-manu
On Saturday we went looking for Te Ngutu-o-te-manu, the pā where government forces made spectacularly unsuccessful attacks on Tītokowaru in August and September 1868. My atlas showed a historic place on an unnamed back road to the north; other than that, we had little to go on. We trawled up and down the narrow country roads, finally spotting a sign and driving into a bush-clad clearing where a tall white cross stood as memorial to the soldiers.
Ōhawe military cemetery – through the gate, over the fence, across the creek, up the hill
Almost as hard to find was the Ōhawe military cemetery, despite a large sign on the main road and an AA sign in the small beach settlement. We drove around and around, finally catching a glimpse of a monument in a hillside paddock behind a large hedge. We went through a gate, then picked our way through cowpats and thistles, climbed gingerly over an electric fence and jumped a creek to finally reach the small fenced area with its yellow-lichen-covered memorial to the Crown soldiers who died storming Ōtapawa pā and in other 1860s battles.
We gave up altogether on our search for Moturoa, another pā where Tītokowaru repelled government forces. An AA sign to the battle site points inland from Waverley, but once on the side road there’s no guidance at all. We were tired by then, and didn’t mind turning back – but it seems a shame that these remnants of South Taranaki history are so well-hidden.
If you’re out hunting for these sites, Te Ngutu-o-te-manu is on Ahipaipa Road, north of Ōkaiawa, and the Ōhawe cemetery is on farmland on Ōhawe Terrace. Let me know if you ever find Moturoa.
Was Mine Host Murray by any chance the same Murray who appears in Flight of the Conchords? Surely he was from Taranaki?
For anyone else that got stumped:
Piqued
1: to arouse anger or resentment in : irritate
2a: to excite or arouse especially by a provocation, challenge, or rebuff
2b: pride
Wonderful to see someone else getting excited about war memorials, Caren! The Ōhawe memorial has an interesting history. It was put up by James Livingstone ‘President of the Republic of Hawera’ in 1907. Livingstone was a settler who had actually fought against Titokawaru at Te Ngutu-o-te-manu in 1868. Eleven years later his land was ploughed up under orders from Te Whiti during the Parihaka conflict. Livingstone organised the Republic of Hawera because he was frustrated at the lack of government action against the ‘uppity Maori’. The memorial which he built by hand was on ‘his’ land. Another great memorial and place in the area well worth seeing is at Turuturu mokai, near Hawera, where there is a magnificent pa site and a memorial to the battle between Titokowaru and the colonial forces. It is reputedly one of the oldest pa sites anywhere, which is perhaps why Titokowaru was so vexed when the settlers built a redoubt on the site.
I can only envy this Easter story of discovery in a small New Zealand town. My own Easter ‘trip’ took my two young daughters and I to the Richard Seddon Memorial and top of the Bowen Street cemetry. The girls were amazed at the age of the family graves and the loss of such young lives - finding it hard to comprehend an olden day world where child mortality was so commonplace. They were also equally amazed to read that Richard Seddon warned against giving women the vote for fear of it resulting in a loss of femininity; an archaic notion.
I understand there’s ongoing occupation of the Turuturumokai site - which may enliven my forthcoming research visit. To find Moturoa, drive inland from that AA sign for about 6km while holding Nigel Prickett’s ‘Landscapes of Conflict’ open at page 128 so you know what to look for. Easier to do in an automatic….