The attack at Matawhero
- When
- 9 November 1868 – 10 November 1868
- Where
- Matawhero
- Reach
- Local
Te Kooti and about a hundred men attacked the settlement at Matawhero before dawn. Around sixty people were killed, roughly half Māori and half Pākehā.
Te Kooti had returned from Rēkohu four months earlier, deported without trial and refused the hearing he had asked for repeatedly. Shortly before midnight on 9 November his party moved on Matawhero, where land of his own had been taken by Major Reginald Biggs. The killing was targeted rather than indiscriminate: Biggs, Captain James Wilson and those holding confiscated land were named. By dawn around sixty people were dead, among them women and children of both peoples. What to call it is still argued over.
Regions affected
Sources
Written for this project from these references rather than copied from them. Follow a link to read the full account, or to check this one against the original.
Related
Te Kooti escapes from Rēkohu
Deported without trial, Te Kooti seized a schooner, sailed 300 prisoners home, and led a four-year pursuit through the Urewera that never caught him.
Gisborne and Te UreweraThe siege of Waerenga-a-Hika
Government forces and Ngāti Porou besieged a Pai Mārire pā inland from Tūranga for six days. Hundreds of prisoners were later deported to Rēkohu without trial.
Waerenga-a-HikaThe raid on Maungapōhatu
Seventy armed police marched into the Tūhoe prophet Rua Kēnana’s community in the Urewera. Two men were shot dead, including Rua’s son.
MaungapōhatuThe 28th (Māori) Battalion
Te Hokowhitu-a-Tū
A volunteer battalion organised by tribal area fought through Greece, Crete, North Africa and Italy, and took proportionally the heaviest casualties of any New Zealand unit.