Wairau Affray

The Wairau Affray, also known as the Wairau Massacre or the Wairau Incident, was the first significant armed conflict between Māori and British settlers after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. On 17 June, 1843, four Māori and 22 Europeans were killed at Tuamarina, 10km north of what is now Blenheim, when an armed party of New Zealand Company settlers clashed with Ngāti Toa over the purchase of land in the Wairau Valley. 

Gold, C. Scene of the Wairau Massacre, 1851. Alexander Turnbull Library, B-103-030
Click on image to enlarge. 

The Nelson Settlement, planned in England, was to consist of 221,100 acres of cultivable, arable land. Despite warnings of insufficient land of suitable quality in Tasman and Golden Bay, the settlement proceeded. When the New Zealand Company realised it was 70,000 acres short, surveyors were sent to the Wairau Plains in Marlborough.  They and senior Ngāti Toa chiefs, including Te Rauparaha and Te Rangihaeata, were adamant that the Wairau had not been sold. They believed that ownership of the Wairau should be decided by Land Commissioner Spain, who was coming to Nelson to hear the Company's claims to land in the region. The Company was unmoved, and ordered three survey parties to the Wairau to begin work. The Ngāti Toa chiefs petitioned Spain to hear their claim immediately, but he declined to interrupt his Wellington hearings.

Gold, C. Wairau April 1851, Alexander Turnbull Library, A-329-014
Click on image to enlarge

Te Rauparaha, Te Rangihaeata and other senior Toa chiefs travelled to Nelson in early 1843 to convince the Company to withdraw from the Wairau. They escorted the survey parties from the Wairau to the Company's ship, offering no violence to the men or their equipment, although they burnt temporary shelters made from local materials, and destroyed survey pegs and ranging rods.

When the survey party returned to Nelson, Magistrate Thompson issued a warrant for the arrest of Te Rauparaha and Te Rangihaeata, on charges of arson. Thompson and Arthur Wakefield, the Company agent in Nelson, recruited forty-seven Special Constables (many labourers) and sailed to the Wairau to execute their warrant. Most recruits had no police or military training, and some had never handled a weapon. The weapons themselves were not in good condition.

On 17 June 1843 the Company party formed on one side of the Tuamarina Stream, with Te Rauparaha and his party, including women and children, opposite. Despite pleas for peace by the Christian chief, Rawiri Puaha, Wakefield and Thompson ordered their ragtag constabulary forward.

Wairau Massacre Memorial [Erected 1869,Tuamarina Cemetery].  The Cyclopedia of New Zealand [Nelson, Marlborough & Westland Provincial Districts].  Click image to enlarge

There are differing accounts of what triggered the battle. Māori accounts say that Te Rongo, Te Rangihaeata's wife, was the first to die, perhaps from a stray shot. The ensuing skirmish saw several Special Constables killed and the remainder put to flight. Some who attempted to surrender were executed by Te Rangihaeata, as utu for the deaths of his wife and comrades, and as retribution for other perceived evils and insults. These included the failure to convict the whaler, Dick Cook, for the rape and murder of Te Rangihaeata's close relative, Rangiawa Kuika (sister of Rawiri Puaha, and wife of James Wynen) and her child.

Twenty-two Europeans, including both Wakefield and Thompson, and between four and nine Māori died at the Wairau. There were immediate impacts. Ngāti Toa vacated Marlborough to support their chiefs in the North Island, many Te Ātiawa in Queen Charlotte Sound returned to Taranaki, and Māori who stayed feared they would be attacked by Government forces. European settlers were shocked and frightened, a Public Safety Committee was formed, and Church Hill in Nelson was fortified.

Governor FitzRoy, who arrived in New Zealand in December 1843, investigated the Wairau Affray and exonerated Te Rauparaha and Te Rangihaeata. When Spain sat in Nelson in 1844 he declared that the Wairau had not been sold.

2008

Updated April 2020

Sources used in this story

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