War & conflict

The burning of the Boyd

Between 66 and 70 crew and passengers were killed and the ship burned at Whangaroa, after the flogging of a rangatira’s son aboard. For some years afterwards few ships came to New Zealand.

The Musket Wars

Musket-armed war parties reshaped the map of Māori New Zealand. Perhaps 20,000 died and whole districts changed hands before the fighting burned out around 1840.

Te Rauparaha’s migration to Kapiti

Ngāti Toa left Kāwhia and migrated south, seizing Kapiti Island as a base that controlled Cook Strait and the trade passing through it.

The Elizabeth affair

A British captain hid Te Rauparaha’s war party aboard his brig to capture the Ngāi Tahu chief Te Maiharanui — an affair that strengthened calls for an official British presence.

The Harriet affair

A trading ship wrecked near Cape Egmont and its survivors were attacked. The rescue that followed brought British soldiers into combat in New Zealand for the first time.

Invasion of Rēkohu and the Moriori

Te whakaeke i Rēkohu

Ngāti Mutunga and Ngāti Tama sailed to the Chathams and took the islands. The Moriori, holding to their covenant of peace, chose not to resist and were nearly destroyed.

The Wairau affray

An armed Nelson party tried to arrest Te Rauparaha over disputed Wairau land. Twenty-two settlers and at least four Ngāti Toa died.

The Northern War

Ngā Pakanga i te Tai Tokerau

Hōne Heke and his supporters felled the British flagstaff at Kororāreka four times, the last during the attack in which he and Kawiti sacked the town. Ngāpuhi fought on both sides. The war ended at Ruapekapeka, an engineered pā built to absorb artillery.

Hutt Valley and Whanganui campaigns

Fighting over disputed New Zealand Company purchases spread through the Hutt Valley in 1846 and up to Whanganui in 1847. Governor Grey had Te Rauparaha seized in a dawn raid and held without charge.

First Taranaki War

British artillery opened on Te Kohia pā, beginning a year of fighting over the Waitara purchase that ended in an inconclusive truce.

Invasion of the Waikato

Te riri ki Waikato

British and colonial troops crossed the Mangatāwhiri to break the Kīngitanga — the key conflict of the New Zealand Wars, with 12,000 imperial and 4,000 colonial troops eventually available.

Battle of Rangiriri

Kīngitanga defenders held the central redoubt against repeated assaults; next morning a white flag raised to ask for terms was treated as surrender.

Battle of Ōrākau

About 300 defenders held an unfinished pā against more than 1,400 troops for three days, then broke out through the British lines in daylight.

Gate Pā — Pukehinahina

The heaviest bombardment of the New Zealand Wars failed to break the pā, and the assault that followed was routed by defenders firing from concealed trenches.

The siege of Waerenga-a-Hika

Government forces and Ngāti Porou besieged a Pai Mārire pā inland from Tūranga for about six days. More than a hundred prisoners were later deported to Rēkohu without trial, joined by others and their families.

Tītokowaru’s campaign

Riwha Tītokowaru won a run of victories with a much smaller force and drove the colonial army back towards Whanganui, then in February 1869 his army fell apart at Taurangaika before the colonial assault.

Te Kooti escapes from Rēkohu

Deported without trial, Te Kooti seized a schooner and brought nearly 300 prisoners home from Rēkohu. Colonial and Māori forces pursued him for almost four years and never caught him.

The attack at Matawhero

Te Kooti and about a hundred men attacked the settlement at Matawhero overnight. Sources put the dead at between about 50 and 70, Māori and Pākehā, among them women and children.

The ambush at Ōpepe

A detachment of Bay of Plenty Cavalry was surprised in camp at Ōpepe, near Taupō, by Te Kooti’s advance guard. Nine of the fourteen troopers were killed and their arms and horses taken.

The battle of Te Pōrere

NZHistory calls it the last major battle of the New Zealand Wars, fought at a British-style redoubt below Tongariro. Te Kooti lost thirty-seven men and escaped wounded.

New Zealand troops sent to the South African War

The first overseas war New Zealand fought as a country: about 6,500 men and 8,000 horses, and some 230 deaths.

New Zealand enters the First World War

About 100,000 served overseas from a population of just over a million. Around 18,000 died and there were some 41,000 instances of wounding or illness; no other British dominion lost a higher share of its military-age men.

The Gallipoli landing

New Zealand troops landed on the Gallipoli peninsula on 25 April. In all, 2,779 died, about one in six of those who served there. The date became the country’s day of remembrance.

The raid on Maungapōhatu

An armed police expedition marched into the Tūhoe prophet Rua Kēnana’s community at Maungapōhatu in Te Urewera to arrest him. Two men were shot dead, including Rua’s son.

Passchendaele — the worst day

An attack on Bellevue Spur in Flanders mud, against uncut wire and without effective artillery support, killed 843 New Zealanders in a few hours.

New Zealand declares war on Germany

‘Where she goes, we go’ — 140,000 served overseas and nearly 12,000 died, from a population of 1.6 million.

The 28th (Māori) Battalion

Te Hokowhitu-a-Tū

A volunteer battalion organised by tribal area fought in Greece, Crete, North Africa and Italy. Its casualty rate was almost 50% above the average for New Zealand infantry battalions.

Kayforce sent to Korea

About 4,700 New Zealanders served in Kayforce and 1,300 on navy frigates during seven years in Korea; 45 died, 33 of them during the war.