ngapuhi

The Northern War

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  The Northern War, fought in the Bay of Islands in 1845-46, was the first serious challenge to the Crown in the years after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. Its opening shots marked the beginning of the wider North Island conflicts that are often referred to as the New Zealand Wars.

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• Page 2 – Origins of the Northern War

  Actions by the colonial government cost Bay of Islands Māori trade and other opportunities. Heke feared that chiefly authority was now subservient to that of the British Crown

• Page 3 – The sacking of Kororāreka

  The sacking of Kororāreka (Russell) shook the settler population. About £50,000 worth of property was destroyed, and there was panic in Auckland. Some settlers sold their land

Waitangi Day

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  Every year on 6 February, New Zealand marks the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840. For most people, Waitangi Day is a holiday; for many, and especially for Māori, it is a time for reflecting on the Treaty and its place in modern New Zealand.

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• Page 2 - The first Waitangi DayGovernor-General Lord Bledisloe gifted the Treaty House and grounds at Waitangi to the nation in 1932. Two years later there were celebrations at Waitangi to mark the date of the

New Zealand's 19th-century wars

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  War changed the face of New Zealand in the 19th century. Many thousands of Māori died in the intertribal Musket Wars between the 1810s and the 1830s. There were more deaths during the New Zealand Wars of the 1840s to 1870s between some Māori and the Crown, which for many tribes had dire consequences.

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• Page 2 - Pre-1860 conflictsDuring the Musket Wars of the 1810s-1830s thousands of Māori fled from their traditional lands, opening large areas to potential Pākehā (European) settlement. In 1840,

Musket Wars

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  Thousands of Māori died in the intertribal Musket Wars of the 1810s, 1820s and 1830s. Muskets changed the face of intertribal warfare, decimating some tribes and drastically altering the territorial boundaries of others.

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• Page 3 – Beginnings

  The Ngāpuhi chief Hongi Hika is usually seen as responsible for beginning the Musket Wars.

• Page 4 – The arms race

  Diplomacy, arranged marriages, gifts, asset-stripping (taua muru) and escape were all used to avoid fighting. When these methods failed, the common response was to seek an

Go-betweens

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  An important feature of early cross-cultural contact in New Zealand was the role of intermediaries (kaiwhakarite) who acted as go-betweens – people from one culture who lived within the other culture and helped bridge the gap between the two.

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• Page 4 – The first woman settler?

  Charlotte Badger is believed to have been one of the first two European women to live (albeit briefly) in New Zealand.

The death penalty

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  The first execution in New Zealand was that of a young Maori named Maketu, convicted at Auckland in 1842. Walter Bolton became the last to be executed when he was hanged at Mount Eden prison in 1957. In total there were 83 verified executions for murder and one for treason in New Zealand between these dates.

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• Page 2 - The first executionOn 7 March 1842 Maketu Wharetotara, the 17-year-old son of the Ngāpuhi chief Ruhe of Waimate, became the first person to be legally executed in New