Apetition is a form of writing that addresses the public sphere. It is specifically directed to those in authority who have the power to effect positive material change in the lives of the supplicants. As such, petitions are relational, for they call on an established connection with the petitioned, and remind the addressee of their obligation to investigate an injustice, provide redress and relieve the suffering of the writer. Because the right to petition is open to all citizens, they are ‘a popular form of political participation’ typically utilised to bring public attention to an issue and mobilise support for reform.1 New Zealand’s most well known petitionary actions of the colonial period are the women’s suffrage petitions, culminating in the granting of universal suffrage on 19 September 1893.
Māori were early and active petitioners. Northern chiefs appealed to King William for protection and friendship in 1831, while several deputations seeking an audience with Queen Victoria carried petitions to England in the 1880s. At the same time Māori regularly addressed petitions to the governor. Such was the volume of petitionary actions, a dedicated government committee was established to review, investigate, and make recommendations on them in 1871. Many Māori women took the opportunity provided by this official forum to publicise issues of relevance to them, and to engage in political debate and discourse. This chapter examines the petitions sent by Māori women to the Native Affairs Committee during the final three decades of the nineteenth century, at a time when Māori communities and families faced a range of social and economic pressures from which they sought relief.
Women were signatories to petitions before the Native Affairs Committee was established, such as Eruea Parirua’s 1865 petition concerning a Crown Grant for land she claimed at Wairoa,2 but it was the Native Affairs Committee that received the bulk of Māori petitions after 1871. In a small number of cases, Māori petitions were sometimes sent to other committees, such as Kenehuru (Eliza) Meurant’s 1873 petition for an inquiry into the loss of her lands, which was investigated by the Public Petitions Committee, set up in 1865, and to whom Māori sometimes directed their appeals.3
Although routinely drawn upon as sources by historians and legal scholars, the petitions Māori sent to the Native Affairs Committee have not yet been considered as a body of writing. This contrasts with a lively and substantial scholarship dedicated to nineteenth-century indigenous petitioning across the British empire and the United States, which stresses the petition both as a form of writing and as a political act. Scholars argue for petitions as a vital source of information about indigenous engagement with the state. For some Australian historians, petitioning is perceived as ‘a crucial means by which Aboriginal people made claims and sought redress’.4 In a context where Aboriginal voices are rare in colonial archives, Australian scholars embrace petitions, regarding them as embodiments of Aboriginal aspirations and a window onto their perspectives on colonial power and authority in the mid-nineteenth century.5 In Canada, Megan Harvey regards the petitions Coast Salish people sent to colonial and Canadian governments from 1864 to 1874 as protest texts. For Harvey, petitions demonstrate how the Coast Salish ‘incorporated textual communication into their expanding vocabulary of political conduct’.6 Ravi de Costa, drawing on examples of petitionary actions from Australia, New Zealand and North America, claims they ‘document the productive links between the moral world in which indigenous people sought co-existence, the governing authority and that realm, and their own identities within it’.7 That is, petitioners actively reminded colonial officials and imperial figures of their moral obligations, using the vocabulary and ideas of Christian humanitarianism. Emphasis on petitioning as a form of activism is not confined to the British colonies, for indigenous petitioning in the Spanish colonial world is also framed politically as ‘a collective process of voicing a complaint’.8
Māori petitioning has also been characterised as a form of political protest based on collective action.9 In contrast, this chapter examines the petitions directed to the Native Affairs Committee, which tended to be appeals from individuals, or families, rather than from large collective entities, although these were received at times. Guy Finney estimates that in the final three decades of the nineteenth century the committee received over 2300 petitions, ‘representing tens of thousands of signatures’, the majority from Māori, and mostly relating to the subject of land.10 During those decades, the House of Representatives referred the petitions of around 145 Māori women to the committee. Between them, these 145 women were signatories to a total of 217 petitions investigated by the committee.11 This number reflects the fact that some women were active petitioners, repeatedly sending appeals for investigation.
Māori women’s petitioning peaked in the 1890s. This increased engagement with the state is partially explained by their participation in temperance and suffrage campaigns, in organisations such as the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, as well as their own committees within the Kotahitanga movement, but it was also influenced by their lived experience. Women and their families felt the effects of dispossession through confiscation of land and the activities of the Native Land Court, and this was a catalyst for many individual women to petition for redress. Tania Rei identifies the final twenty years of the nineteenth century as two decades of crisis, and this is reflected in women’s petitioning. In the ten years from 1886 to 1896, Rei found ‘at least forty petitions concerning land issues were presented to Parliament signed by Māori women on their own account or on behalf of iwi’.12
Female petitioners, who ranged from chiefly women or large land holders, to widows, the elderly and the impoverished, actively sought to put their claims in writing, for they understood that petitions offered, ‘a way of raising the profile of an issue, ensuring that matter was noted in the official records of Parliament and attracting the direct attention of lawmakers, Ministers and government officials.’13 Common petitionary issues included requests for rehearings before the Native Land Court, payment disputes with the Crown and private sellers, succession issues, surveys and land frauds.14 Although a large proportion of the 217 petitions from women were concerned with land, a small number petitioned for personal reasons, often relating to a slight against their reputation, or women used the petitionary process to bring attention to the actions of others. For instance, in her 1898 petition Metapere Rōpata: ‘complains of having been turned out of her house at Waikanae by Wi Parata, her father.’15
Summaries of petitions presented, as well as the committee’s decisions, can be accessed through the digitised corpus of the Appendices to the Journal of the House of Representatives (AJHR).16 A bilingual report of the committee was published annually in the AJHR. Unfortunately, these reports abridged the petitions, and only referred to the supplicants in the third person. For example, petition No. 309 was described as follows:
No 309. – Petition of Maraea Taunakiwehe.
PETITIONER complains that her name was omitted from the title to a block of land called Whakapoungakau Pukepoto, in which she alleges she has large claims. She asks that her name may be put in the title to that block.
I am directed to report as follows: That this petition should be referred to the Government for favourable consideration.
17th August, 1888.
[TRANSLATION.]
No. 309. – Pukapuka-inoi a Maraea Taunakiwehe.
E whai kupu ana te kai-pitihana mo te kapenga o tona ingoa i tetahi poraka whenua e karangatia ana ko Whakapoungakau Pukepoto. E ki ana hoki ia he nui ana take i roto i taua poraka. A e inoi ana ia inaianei kia whakaurua tona ingoa ki te karaati ia ki taua poraka.
Kua whakahaua ahau kia ki penei: Me tuku tenei pitihana ki te Kawanatanga kia whiriwhiria e ratou.
17 o Akuhata, 1888.17
The original petitions, held by Archives New Zealand in Wellington, were usually written in the first person, and are accompanied by other correspondence, including letters from the petitioner, their family or supporters, as well as government reports, memos and other documentation that reveals the official response. What these files also reveal is a substantial and rich body of Māori writing, including by women, yet to be investigated in any depth.
As a form of writing, petitions tended to adhere to a formal structure; they drew upon official vocabulary, deployed standard phrases and words, and were often deferential in tone. This likely reflects the fact that Māori made use of intermediaries to compose the texts, possibly relying on lawyers who were familiar with the format and formal language requirements. Maraea’s petition (No. 309) follows the formal structure in many respects: it adheres to a standard format in its composition, beginning with an address to a higher authority, followed by a statement detailing the grievance, and closing with a request for relief or prayer for assistance. Unfortunately the original text, submitted in the Māori language, is missing, so we have only the official English-language translation:
Katikati
June 9th 1888.
To His Excellency the Governor and to the House of Representatives in Parliament Assembled.
Your Excellency and Sirs
Greeting
I wish to bring under your notice a serious injustice inflicted upon me in the consequence of the omission of my name from the title of a block of land at Rotorua called the Whakapoungakau Pukepoto block. I have large claims to that block and have no interests in any other lands. My claims through ancestry are admitted by all persons concerned and my name was put into the title at the original hearing of the block but when the subdivision was being made it was omitted and it was known that my name was left out by the Interpreters of the Court in arranging the names alphabetically. My two daughters who derived their claim from me were admitted into the title and my grandchildren, the children of Kaikaramu, who are some of the principal chiefs of the land as well as my great grandchildren were admitted as owners upon the same grounds while, I, the person through whom they claim am excluded.
For the reasons I have advanced I appeal to your Honourable House and to His Excellency the Governor to shew me some consideration after you have considered my letter and devise some means by which my name can be put into the title to my land when the Court sits to complete the subdivision. (The Court was adjourned owing to the Tarawera eruption Mr. Clarke being the presiding judge and it was then that my name was found to have been omitted).
May you be pleased to consider the injustice that has been done me living as I am upon the land of other persons at Katikati and send me a reply to my petition.
From your obedient Servant
(Sd.) Maraea Taunakiwehe.18
Of the petitions submitted by Māori in the final three decades of the nineteenth century, the majority were composed in te reo, and then translated by a government official into English. While translators attempted to render te reo into English as accurately as possible, this could obscure the oral elements of the text. As the Abenaki scholar Lisa Brooks notes, while in format, style and rhetoric, petitions generated by indigenous peoples often followed European conventions, they also retained elements common to customary forms of orality such as metaphor and symbolism.19 It is commonly acknowledged by print-culture scholars that, ‘Māori often wrote as they spoke.’20 This view is based on deep engagement with Māori letters and the corpus of Māori-language newspapers, but Māori-language petitions also share this characteristic. Because they were translating text from te reo Māori, which could draw upon metaphor and other oral forms, into the English language, government officials had to translate, and also explain the petitioner’s meaning.21
English-language explanations, expressed in the formal standardised language of government, often failed to replicate the rhetorical and emotive power of a Māori-language petition. An extract from Rīpeka Turipona’s 1884 petition concerning her land near Tauranga, which she claimed was sold without her consent, offers one illustration.
Ki a Paranihi Minita Whakahaere o te taha Maori me nga Mema katoa e noho ana i roto i te Paremete tena koutou
He Pitihana tena naku kia tirotirohia mai e koutou aku tono, I te Takiwa i tu ai a Hone Hianga hei Minita
Ka timata taku tuku atu i a aku Pitihana kaore i whakaaetia, mai, Muri iho ka tu ko te Roretana hei Minita ka tukua atu ano aku Pitihana kaore i whakaaetia mai
Muri iho katu ko Paraihe hei Minita katukua atu ano e au aku Pitihana kaore na aku i whakaaetia mai
Ko aua Pitihana aku i tukua atu e au i te tau |
1878 |
I tukua atu e au aku Pitihana i te tau |
1879 |
I tukua atu e au aku Pitihana i te tau |
1880 |
I tukua atu e au aku Pitihana i te tau |
1882 |
I tukua atu e au aku Pitihana i te tau |
1883 |
I tukua atu e au aku Pitihana i te tau |
1884 |
Kua rongo nei au ko koe te Minita whakahaere mo te taha Maori ka ahu atu taku Pitihana kia koe kia whakaritea mai e koe aku tono
[official translation]
This is a petition of mine for you to carefully consider my request. During the time that Mr Sheehan was Native Minister I commenced to forward my petitions, but there was no notice taken of them. After this Mr Rolleston was appointed Native Minister and I sent a petition to him also, but it met with the same fate. Then Mr Bryce was appointed to the same office but my petition met with the same result. I forwarded petitions during the years 1878, 1879, 1880, 1882, 1883 and 1884 and as I have now heard that you are the Minister for Native Affairs, I have sent a petition to you also to see what you will do for me.22
There are some slight differences in meaning between the Māori-language petition and the translation. For instance, Rīpeka uses the words ‘kaore i whakaaetia, mai’ which means ‘were not agreed to’, and she states this repeatedly, whereas the government translation renders it as ‘that there was no notice taken’. Rīpeka also lists every petition she submitted by year, whereas the English translation folds this information into one sentence, effectively minimising the repeated and persistent attempts for redress. Rīpeka also asks that her requests ‘kia whakaritea mai e koe’ meaning ‘to be sorted out by you’, whereas the English translation suggests something far softer, removing her direct language and underplaying the urgency of her appeal, not to mention her emphasis on obligation and responsibility. As Jane Caplan notes, in moments where there were competing languages and differential levels of expertise in literacies ‘this gap in comprehension or translation could be exploited by those who knew how to use it’.23
With a palpable sense of exasperation T. W. Lewis (Under Secretary, Native Department) wrote in a memo to the Native Minister: ‘The writer applies to every succeeding Native Minister & nearly every year for land to which she says she is entitled at Tauranga.’24 Rīpeka had no case, claimed Lewis. She did not give up though, putting into action a statement on her 1882 petition that only her death would stop her from writing. Her government file opens in 1877, and closes in 1899. During those years, Rīpeka’s repeated attempts to obtain redress took place against the backdrop of personal loss. Over that time she gave birth to twelve children, none of whom survived infancy. While every petition was ignored or rejected, she was also grieving for a baby, and for the children who would have succeeded to her interests. Rīpeka died in 1905.25 She is buried next to her husband, Anglican clergyman Wiremu Turipona (d. 1896) who actively supported his wife’s land claim. They lie together in the grounds of Holy Trinity Church, Parawai, at the location where they actively served and supported their community.
As a body of writing, the petitions might be formulaic, but the messages they contain are not. While they all share a common focus on dispossession, they also demonstrate the variety of ways in which Māori women sought to challenge the state, and the specific strategies they used to articulate their feelings. We can see this more clearly when we look at the original petitions and their associated document ation as the petitions slowly moved their way through official processes. Petitioners’ strategies included the use of scribes, persistent and regular petitioning, and a willingness to address their claims to a variety of forums in writing, of which the petition is just one example.
Intermediaries played important roles in the petitioning process. Maraea’s petition (No. 309), outlined earlier, was sent to the Native Department, who in turn traded memoranda with Native Land Court officials. Chief Judge William Gilbert Mair acknowledged that he could not ‘understand why her name was omitted from the List unless her own people did it intentionally’. However, he asserted that the court was not at fault if the name had not been submitted, and that Maraea’s daughter, Hēni Pore (Jane Foley), had been present and should have looked after her mother’s interests. The officials debated by what means it might be possible to include her name on the Crown Grant, but given that the subdivision had not been completed, it seemed reasonable that this could be effected. Maraea (or Pihohau or Pikokau) of Te Arawa was an elderly woman; she had been taken captive by Ngāpuhi after the fall of Mokoia in 1823, 65 years earlier.26 It is doubtful Maraea was familiar with the court’s processes.
Nothing happened for several years, until in 1892 Maraea wrote to John Ballance, Premier and Native Minister, requesting that her case be revisited. Although the initial letter was written in Māori, it is clearly influenced in style by formal English correspondence. Maraea signs it with an ‘X’, so it is likely that her daughter, Hēni Pore, who had had an extensive formal education, composed it for her.
Katikati
Maehe 11 [1892]
To His Honourable the Native Minister
E Pa, kua whaihonore au inaianei ki te tuhi atu kia koe, i runga i te mana kua whakawhiwhia atu kia koe, no kona ka tukua atu tenei tono aku kia koe hei ata hurihuri mau, notemea kua pa tetehi mate nui noa atu kia hau, ko taku mate tenei, kahore aku whenua e noho nei au i te ao marama. Ko nga whenua o aku tupuna i tika nei kia taka mai kia ahau, he maha, he nui atu hoki, a i runga i nga whakahaere he a te Kooti Whenua Maori, a etehi tangata hoki o te iwi, ka kore atu ena whenua ia hau, ko nga whenua e tika kia taka mai kia hau kei Rotorua. I mahi nui ano taku tamahine a Heni Pore (Jane Foley) ki te whakahaere i taku take, a he roa te taima kahore i tu i te Kooti. Na he tono tenei naku kia koe, kia pai mai koe ki te homai e tetehi whenua moku, he wahine maori hoki au kua kaumatuatia a ko au ano ki te rapu oranga moku i runga i te whenua o te tangata ke, heoi na mau e huri huri mai taku tono.
Na to pononga her
Na Maraea X Taunakiwehe
mark
Kaituhi titiro hoki Heni Pore K. Raihana a ka whakarite nei au i taku tamahine ia Heni Pore hei kaiwhakahaere maku i runga i tenei take e mau iho nei mo a muri ake nei.
her
Na Maraea X Taunakiwehe
mark
Kaituhi Kaititiro hoki
Heni Pore Kai Whakamaori Raihanatia
Jane Foley Licensed Interpreter.
[official translation]
Katikati
March 11th. 1892
The Hon
The Native Minister
Sir,
I have the honor to write to you under the ‘mana’ of the office you hold. I submit this, my application for your careful consideration. A serious ‘mate’ has come upon me, that is to say, I have no land in this world. My father possessed much land to which I had the right to succeed. Through the wrong dealing of the court however and of some of the people these lands passed from me. The lands which should fall to me by right are at Rotorua. My daughter, Jane Foley, did much in the conduct of my claim and after a long time the court (?disallowed) it.
This is an application of mine requesting that you will be pleased to grant me a piece of land. I am a Maori woman and am now getting very old and I work for my own living on land that does not belong to me. Do you carefully consider my application.
From Your Humble Servant
her
Maraea X Taunakiwehe
mark
Witness –
Heni Pore Licenced Interpreter
I hereby appoint my daughter Heni Pore to act as Kai-whakahaere for the above ‘take’.
her
Maraea X Taunakiwehe
mark
Witness J. Foley – Licensed Interpreter.27
Also in Maraea’s file is a letter from her daughter arguing that her mother’s case fell under the provisions of section 13 of the Native Land Court Amendment Act 1889. This section provided a process by which a person could claim ‘that his interest has been prejudicially affected by any error or omission committed or made in any decision or order of the Court’, and allowing the Chief Judge to make an order ‘for the purpose of remedying such error or omission’, so long as the existing owners had not already sold, leased, mortgaged or otherwise legally bound the land.28 Judge H. G. Seth-Smith reported back to the Native Department that Judge J. A. Wilson had ‘found & reported that the omission of her name was intentional and not the result of any error or omission within the meaning of the section above referred to[.] The application was accordingly dismissed.’ The Acting Under Secretary W. J. Morpeth recommended the Native Minister reply that, ‘you do not see that you can do anything for her.’
Maraea’s employment of an intermediary to help compose her text marks the petition as a collaborative act, or what Martyn Lyons describes as a form of ‘delegated writing’.29 It is often difficult to uncover who these scribes and intermediaries were, but they played a key role in assisting Māori to engage with the colonial system. As Bradford Haami notes, many tribal groups had scribes who attended courts, especially the Native Land Court, and made a written record of the proceedings, so it is not unreasonable to suggest that they may have composed petitions.30 Colonialism gave people opportunities, offering social and economic mobility to a group of people who supported and fostered petitioning as scribes, interpreters and lawyers, both Māori and Pākehā, for land loss was such a palpable issue within Māori society.31 Scribes included women; daughters wrote petitions for their mothers, for example, Hēni Pore, a well educated woman, who in her role as a licensed interpreter became familiar with the formal language of government and with legal proceedings, and developed an understanding of the complexities of nineteenth-century native land legislation. Hēni Pore is not the only example. Ruiha Teira petitioned on behalf of her mother in 1881, and Mereana also campaigned in writing for her mother, Jane Maria Phillips.
Petitions were the product not only of several hands, but also many voices. In some instances, senior women spoke for their kin, wider community or hapū, expressing the collective view by leading a petitionary appeal. A good example comes from Ngāi Tahu, who hold mana whenua for the South Island, excluding the very north of the island. Ngāi Tahu’s experience of land loss is quite different to that of tribes in the North Island where the government, and then settlers, purchased blocks of various sizes, often in a piecemeal fashion. Ngāi Tahu were dispossessed of their territory through a series of ten land sales between 1844 and 1864; apart from the three Banks Peninsula purchases, the blocks sold were massive in scale. Kemp’s Purchase (1848) was the largest, incorporating most of Canterbury and Otago, totalling about 20 million acres (over 800,000 hectares), or almost a third of the whole country, for £2000, amounting to about 41.7 acres for every penny received. Henry Tacy Kemp, the government’s purchasing officer, among other pledges, had promised Ngāi Tahu ample reserves, but Walter Mantell, who was given the responsibility to draw these up, allowed only 6,359 acres, later admitting that, ‘My rule, in calculating what quantity of land I would give the Natives, was that I allowed ten acres to each man, woman, and child…. In making the allowance I tried to allow as little as the Natives would agree to take.’32 By the last decades of the nineteenth century the lack of a sufficient land base had resulted in economic marginalisation and impoverishment for the tribe.
Ngāi Tahu leaders began to pursue their kerēme (claim) in 1871, regularly petitioning for the land sales to be investigated. Well known petitioners include John Tōpi Pātuki, H. K. Taiaroa and Horomona Pōhio, but women were equally involved in the political process, leading petitionary actions and also giving evidence to any resulting commissions of enquiry. Guy Finney argues that because the majority of land-related petitions heard by the Native Affairs Committee (around 85 per cent) concerned private grievances, it was, ‘predominately a body at which to direct personal grievances rather than a body in which to direct political protest.’33 However, Ngāi Tahu leaders used petitions to remind colonial officials of the promises made under Kemp’s Purchase and the obligations established by that agreement, which the Crown had failed to address.34
The Treaty of Waitangi did not enter the vocabulary of Ngāi Tahu petitions. Instead, their appeals were based on the promises made under Kemp’s Deed, and many Ngāi Tahu whānau pursued local claims on this basis. In 1893 Pīpī Kōruarua wrote to Hōri Kerei Taiaroa, Member of the House of Representatives (MHR), Ngāi Tahu chief and parliamentary representative for South Island Māori, about littoral land at Te Waihora (Lake Ellesmere):
Taumutu
Hanuere 16
Kia Hori Kerei Taiaroa
eta tena koe[.]
Kia mohio mai koe e mate noku me oku hoa koia au i tuhi atu ai mau etuhituhi ki te Kawanatanga kia whakatapua to matou kaika ara te pa o waikakahi i te taha hau whakarua o te Roto o Waihora. Ko tenei pa, ko Waikakahi e pa tawhito ano. i te tau 1844 i te hoko a te Keepa i te poraka ongaitahu i reira ano a matou e noho ana me o matou whare e tu ana[.] i reira matou i te wa o matara. Ki taku mohio ko Tukupane, Ko tamakeke: ko ipika kote hikawera me tahi atu i reira e noho ana[.] e inoi ana au kia tono koe kia Rahuitia e te Kawana mo matou[.]
Heoi ano naku na pipi Koruarua metahi atu
[official translation]
Taumutu
January 16. 1893.
To Hori Kerei Taiaroa
Sir, greeting[.] Know you, it is because I and my friends are not well that I write to you. Will you then write to the Government and ask them to have our ‘kainga’ that is the ‘Pa’ at Waikakahi on the North East side of the Waihora Lake set apart for us. It is an old pa and was in our occupation and we had houses standing there in the year 1844, when Mr Kemp affected the purchase of the Ngaitahu Block. We were occupying it in Mr Mantell’s time, and I think too that Tukupane, Tamakeke, Ipika, Te Hikawera and others were living there. I request you to move that it is reserved by the Governor for us.
Sufficient
Pipi Koruarua &rs35
Taiaroa put their request to Alfred Cadman, Minister of Native Affairs, adding: ‘I know for a fact that many applications have been made for that Pa, my impression was that it had already been set apart.’ The Native Department referred the matter to Judge Alexander Mackay, who was unsure of its location. He thought that Pīpī was wrong about it being inhabited, and that it likely ‘had been sold to Europeans long since’.36 The following year Pīpī Kōruarua and Rōra Tāwhā petitioned Parliament.
Taumutu 8th Aug 1894.
To the Honorable the Speaker and Members of the Legislative Council.
We your Petitioners are Native women living at Wairewa and Taumutu. There is a Pah called Waikakahi situate on the Eastern side of Waihora Lake in the Provincial District of Canterbury.
Before the arrival of Europeans in this colony the Waikakahi Pa and its adjacent fern grounds and eel weirs were in the occupation of our Ancestors.
T[sic] In the year 1848 your petitioners heard of Mr Kemp who is said to have negotiated the purchase of the Ngaitahu land.
Your petitioners heard at that time that the natives were to retain their Pas and kaingas where they lived. Your petitioners knew this to apply to this particular Pa when Mr Mantell was Commissioner.
Your Petitioners were living there at that time and it was not until your Petitioners married that one went to live at Taumutu and the other at Wairewa. We did not know that our birthplace had been taken by the Govt.
It was not until years afterwards that we knew the Govt had taken Waikakahi Pa.
One of your Petitioners spoke to Mr Alex Mackay Commissioner about Waikakahi Pa but has not received an answer.
Your Petitioners also wrote to the Government last year about the matter and were told that the Waikakahi Pa had been made a reserve for school purposes.
We your Petitioners pray that our Pah and sacred places and eel fisheries and fern workings may be returned to us, or such other relief granted to us as your Honourable D[sic] Council may consider just and equitable.
And your petitioners will ever pray
-Rew-Pipi Koruarua
Rora Hupariki Tawha37
The Native Affairs Committee requested more information from the govern-ment’s officers. The Superintendent of the Canterbury Province had set the area aside as a reserve in 1873, but as the paperwork was not at hand little else was known. The women received a letter from C. J. A. Haselden, the Under Secretary for the Justice Department. Three years later they dictated a letter in reply, reacti vating their appeal.
Taumutu 16 Oketopa 1897
Ki te Hon Minita Maori
Tena koe
Kote pukapuka a Te Hekeretini hekeretari o te tari onga Ture ote 2 Nohema 1894 morunga i ta maua pukapuka inoi mo to maua kainga mo te Pa o Waikakahi[.] E tono ana maua kia whakahokia mai kia maua[.] Apiti ki a maua mahinga kai[.]
Kua rongo maua kua hoatu taua pa mo nga mahi kura, me nga mahinga kai tetahi kua hokona ranei, ki nga Pakeha. he mea pai kia whakahokia mai kia maua te kainga tuturu o maua me o maua matua[.] He mate nui rawa tenei no maua[.] Kaore nei maua i hoko i to maua Pa meo maua kainga. Kei ta maua pukapuka tuatahi nga Take o ta maua inoi. Kaore maua i te mohio kite haere kite Tari Komihana ote Karauna i Otautahi[.] ki to maua mohio kataea ano e H. K. Taiaroa te whakaatu te Pa o Waikakahi, i runga i tetahi maapi[.] Ka pai maua kia ohoro tenei mate nui o maua te whakaoti[.]
Na o korua Pononga na Rora Tawha
Na Pipe Koruarua X
Tona tohu
[official translation]
Taumutu October 16th 1897
The Honble Native Minister
Greeting. With reference to the letter from Mr Haselden Under Secretary for the Justice Department and dated the 2nd of November 1894 on the subject of our letter making application in respect of our ‘kainga’ at the Pa at Waikakahi that we asked be returned to us with our cultivations we have now heard that that ‘pa’ has been given for school purposes and the cultivations [illegible] or that it has been sold to Pakehas[.] it would be a proper thing to give back (to us) what are our permanent ‘kaingas’ and which belonged to our parents. This is a very grievous calamity to us because we never sold our ‘Pa’ & our cultivations. the grounds of our appeal are set forth in our first letter. We do not know we should go to the Commissioner of Crown Lands at Christ Church in this matter. We feel sure that H. K. Taiaroa could indicate the Waikakahi Pa on the plan map. We would be pleased if this great grievance of ours will be speedily settled.
From your humble servants
From Rora Tawha
Pipe Koruarua X mark38
Officials undertook further investigations. The Chief Surveyor asked J. E. March, Superintendent of Village Settlements – responsible for new Pākehā settlements – to enquire into the matter. He spoke to George Robinson, ‘a very old resident’ who had ‘a slight knowledge of the Pa’, which he believed local Māori had abandoned thirty years earlier. Although March had been unable to meet the women, he dismissed them as unreliable sources of information, stating ‘it is doubtful if either can give any definite information on the subject’.39
The problem for officials was that they could not be sure exactly where the pā had been sited. The women state that they resided at the pā in the 1840s when Mantell was Commissioner. Even if they had been living there in the 1860s when, according to Robinson, Māori abandoned it, they should have been able to point out its location. But it appears that there was no real effort to get them there to do so. Instead, officials dismissed the women’s knowledge preferring to rely on an archive that did not contain all the information required. The last memorandum attached to this file states that the Canterbury Superintendent had made a reserve but ‘through an oversight it was afterwards sold, and the Government afterwards compensated the Natives by making a smaller reserve in the same locality and all offering them a large area elsewhere’, and, ‘It will very probably be found that the site of the old pa is private property’.40 It is therefore unlikely that they were successful in their claim.
Pīpī and Rōra exemplify how letter writing was often an important precursor to petitioning. Letters had the advantage of operating at a more personal level, being almost as good as a private interview. Māori MHRs as well as the Native Minister received letters from Māori on a regular basis containing appeals for assistance, redress, or relief. Miriama Huriwai, of Ngāi Tahu, appealed for assistance in 1891.
Kanuihitaone Hurae 30 1891
Ki a Hone Keepamana minita Maori tena koe
Ko au ko Huri Wai e Wahine no te iwi o ngaitahu i noho ki Te Waponamu [sic]
No oku take katoa iroto o nga wenua o ngaitahu kua maua e te Kawanantanga me te kore te tahi moni paku nei hei aroha kiau kua momona te iwi pakeha e noho ana i runga i te oneone i heke nei nga toto oku tipuna i runga i te ringa kaha ko au kei konei e noho mate ana i te kai kore i te weruweru kore mo oku tau nga 78 nui atu ranei toku ruruhi metoku mate kai toku haere kirikore toku mate i te hau aitu pai atu kia au me hemea i horo iho ki runga ia au nga hiwi me ngapuke pai atu ho ki mehemea i tahupokia mai au e nga waipuke o tenei o o [sic] penei
Kua kore au e kite i tenei mate
E koro e te minita maori mete kawanatanga e inoi tenei na ku kia tau mai ta koutou manakitanga ki runga i to koutou pononga kamutu ia[.]
Na Miriama Huriwai Kaipara
Kia Hone Keepamana minita maori kia ora koe mate atua koe e tiaki waitohua
[official translation]
Canvastown
July 30th, 1891
To Hon. Mr Cadman
Native Minister
Greeting
I, Huriwai, am a woman of the Ngaitahu tribe resident in the South Island.
All my interests in the land of the Ngaitahu have been seized by the Government without the payment to me of even the smallest sum of money as an equivalent for them. Europeans are living in affluence upon the lands for which the blood of my ancestors was shed, while I am in want of sufficient food and clothing. Better would it have been for me had the mountains and hills fallen on me or that I had been carried away by the floods, then I would not have been reduced to my present state of poverty.
Friend, the Native Minister and the Government, I appeal to you to show your servant some consideration.
Ended from
Sgd. Miriama Huriwai Kaipara41
The official translation collapses some sentences together and excludes some key details. For instance, in the Māori-language petition Miriama specifies she is 78 years of age, and emphasises her suffering from want of warm clothes and food. Repetition of key words and phrases has an important role to play in petitionary appeals, directing emphasis to the supplicants’ dire situation. Miriama’s letter speaks repeatedly of suffering, but this word does not appear in the official translation. She also asks the minister and government to show ‘aroha’ or compassion for her, an elderly woman. In phrasing and style, Miriama’s letter looks very similar to a formal petition.
In content, Miriama’s letter is also political in nature, for she holds the Government responsible for her landlessness and poverty. Because letters are often interpreted as largely personal documents strongly associated with women, they have tended to be discounted as political documents. Jessica Horton, writing about Australian Aboriginal women, argues that their letters are a form of political writing.42 Normally, says Horton, women’s letters have been used by scholars to demonstrate resistance, while men ‘critique’ and are therefore politically active.43 Given that Māori women’s petitions were supplemented or preceded by ‘letters of complaint that contain long, detailed, and original narratives’, their petitions should be considered within the context of a longer tradition of written protest and critique of the state.44
As Pīpī and Rōra’s efforts demonstrate, a petition could emerge from letter writing campaigns directed at a wide range of officials, that aimed to draw attention to an injustice. Individuals or collectives often turned to petitioning once all other avenues for redress had been exhausted. Many would not have their cases resolved for decades. So while petitioning was a tool available to assert claims, or to lodge a protest, it relied upon a public sphere willing to listen, investigate and act upon their prayers or protests. The phrase ‘I will not desist from writing to you’, which provides this chapter with its title, comes from Rīpeka Turipona, who campaigned for two decades to gain redress, without success.
While petitions are exciting sources for gaining access to indigenous perspectives and responses to colonialism, this has to be considered alongside the official responses. The state could ignore a protest, and dismiss the recommendations of the Native Affairs Committee, meaning it was up to the petitioner to keep the issue alive. Gaining government interest in one’s case often required persistence on behalf of the petitioner, and also the resources to travel to Wellington to give evidence before the committee. Many petitions that dragged on for decades related to contested decisions of courts in the 1870s and 1880s, and these often centred on the exclusion of individuals from land grants. If individuals were not present when either the Compensation Court or the Native Land Court sat, it was an uphill battle to gain justice.
In 1878 Te Korowhiti Tuataka (Mrs Douglas) petitioned Parliament about her exclusion from a grant of land, previously confiscated, investigated, and returned to its original owners by a compensation court. Her petition, in which she claimed to be a principal owner, was sent to the Native Affairs Committee, which took evidence from witnesses in September 1878. The petition and the minutes of evidence were laid before the House, and subsequently published in the AJHR.
Petition.
To the Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled at Wellington.
THE PETITION OF TE KOROWHITI TUATAKA, IN WHICH SHE PRAYS THE ATTENTION OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES TO THE MATTERS HEREINAFTER SET FORTH,
Sheweth,–
That my lands Pukepoto, Ohauiti, and Te Karai belonged to persons deceased, of whom I am the true representative.
2. That these lands were confiscated by the Government and subsequently returned to their original owners, but about that time the principal owner died, and the land fell to me and to my younger sisters (or cousins).
3. That Mr. Henry Clarke, Commissioner, chose the persons whose names were to be in the grant for that land. My younger sisters’ (or cousins’) names were inserted, and mine was left out, notwithstanding that all the Maoris said that I was the principal owner. He (Mr. Clarke) paid no heed to that.
4. That, subsequently, the said land was leased to Captain Morris, M.H.R., and then sold, and he is now seeking to have the sale ratified by the Government.
5. That Mr. Clarke assisted Captain Morris in obtaining the said land.
6. That Captain Morris told my husband, Edward Douglas, that he heard all the Natives admit that I was the principal owner of the said land.
7. That I made an application to Mr Fenton (Chief Judge, Native Land Court), in which I asked him to explain how the land stood and he replied that it had not been passed through the Native Land Court.
8. That I have made many applications to the Government for redress for my grievance suffered at the hands of Government Office, but nothing has been done. Your petitioner therefore prays your Honorable House to take her causes of complaint, as above stated, into your consideration, and afford such relief as to you may seem fit. And your petitioner will ever pray:
TE KOROWHITI (her x mark) TUATAKA,
Witness : – E. Douglas. Wife of E. Douglas, Ferryman, Te Wairoa.
Wairoa, 19th July, 1878.45
According to H. T. Clarke, Major Mair was Commissioner in 1869 when the land was investigated. Clarke had taken over in 1871, and in the following year Te Korowhiti Tuataka and her Pākehā husband Edward Douglas visited Clarke’s office to discuss her claims. In evidence to the Committee, she stated:
When we went to Mr. Clarke’s office we found there Hamiora Tu and others. I do not remember who the others were; I do not know them. We found Hamiora Tu and his friends engaged with Mr. Clarke on some business of their own. We had been there about half an hour waiting, when Hamiora Tu said to Mr. Clarke, ‘We will defer our business for the present, because it will take a very long time.’ Mr. Clarke agreed to that, and then he asked my husband some questions, which I did not catch, because I was not acquainted with the English language. When he finished talking to my husband in English, he turned to me and said, ‘What have you come to talk about?’ and I said, ‘I have come to talk about the land of my father.’ He said, ‘What land do you refer to?’ I said, ‘Pukepoto and Ohauiti.’ He said, ‘It won’t do; you are too late for the Court. Where were you when the Court sat?’ I said I was at Mercury Bay at that time. I said to him, ‘Knowing, as you did, that the Court was going to sit, why did you not send me a letter informing me of it?’ He said, ‘Well, it is too late.’ He told me to go away that the talk was over about these lands. That is all I have to say about that interview.
183. [The Chairman.] When he told you you were too late, did he admit your claim or deny it?—He admitted my claim, but told me I was too late.
184. He said that he was aware you had a claim I should like you to be specially distinct upon that point —Mr. Clarke admitted that I had a claim, but told me I was too late.46
When testifying, Clarke’s memory became decidedly weak. He said, ‘I have a very indistinct remembrance of a woman who had married a European coming to see me, and I suggested to her the proper time for her to appear was when the case was opened.’ Although he claimed that he had printed notices circulated amongst Tauranga Māori, he had not advertised hearings in newspapers, as would have been done if it had been a Native Land Court case.47
The committee’s report considered that ‘the non-insertion of the peti tioner’s name in the grant arose probably partly through the forgetfulness of her own people’. However, Te Korowhiti’s relatives may have left her name off on purpose. Her husband, Edward Douglas, had fought in engagements during the New Zealand wars, including against Ngāi Te Rangi at the battle of Gate Pā.48 This may well have been the reason her relatives may not have seen to Te Korowhiti Tuataka’s inclusion in the Compensation Court award. It is clear from her testimony that she had a valid claim, although she appears inexperienced, and unfamiliar with the legal processes she was dealing with. In the end the committee determined that no unlawful acts had taken place, but as ‘the petitioner had some right to have her name inserted in the grant’, it recommended another Commission of Enquiry.49 It appears the committee’s recommendation was not acted upon, for she continued to petition the House on an annual basis, sometimes several times a year. The emotional cost and burden of having to persistently pursue her land rights was belatedly recognised by the committee in its 1890 report on yet another one of her petitions. Her regular petitionary actions caused them to recommend the government, ‘inquire as to whether the Native Affairs Committee’s reports upon previous petitions in this matter have received due attention, as the restlessness of the evidence and reports, extending over a period of ten years, suggests an indifference that must be very distressing to the petitioner.’50
Petitioners needed to be persistent for their cases often wound their way through the political process slowly, and it was incumbent upon the individual concerned to keep their appeal alive in the minds of officials. Cases could take decades to be resolved to the satisfaction of the petitioner, as was the case with Emily Buckworth (Emeri Maraea Mautaranui, see chapter 3). The government file on the case begins in 1865, with a declaration from Emily’s aunt, Elizabeth Fulloon, stating that she ‘lived with and was dependent upon my late brother James Fulloon who was murdered by Natives on the East Coast of New Zealand on or about the twenty second day of July 1865’.51 Several decades later, in August 1891, Emily submitted the following petition:
To the Hon.
The House of
In Parliament assembled
Wellington
The humble petition of
Emily Maria Fulloon sheweth.
That on May 16th 1865 my father James Fulloon, Govt Agent was murdered by Maoris at Whakatane, while on board the Govt Cutter ‘Kate’ anchored off Whakatane Heads, I Emily Maria Fulloon being at that time 10 months old. I was born on the 26th July 1864.
My father James Fulloon was a native of Whakatane, & had large claims to land in the District by being closely related to Te Mautaranui a chief of the Ngatiawa and Urewera tribes. My relationship to the said James Fulloon can be proved by all old Maoris here and by subsequent Land Courts held here & in which I as his child have always been admitted.
The Govt in confiscating the land on the East Coast confiscated the greater part of the land in which James Fulloon had claims and in awarding lands at the Confiscation Courts held here afterward none was awarded to James Fulloon or his wife & child.
Neither myself or my mother have ever received any monetary or landed assistance from the Govt.
Wherefore your petitioner humbly prays that your Hon. House will compensate me to the extent of £500 for the loss I have sustained thro the confiscation of my fathers lands and for his murder by Natives here while in the employ of the Government. There is no land in this District now owned by the Govt of equal value to the land confiscated.
I may state that I am James Fulloon’s only child.
Mrs Buckworth
nee Emily Maria Fulloon
Maori name Maraea Te Mautaranui
Whakatane
Bay of Plenty
15th Aug 9152
Petition No. 611 was sent to the Native Affairs Committee, which recommended it be, ‘referred to the Government for favourable consideration.’53 Emily’s petition was not, however, favourably received, causing her to write a letter to the Native Minister on the matter in December 1891. In style, the handwriting in the letter is different to the August 1891 petition, which suggests that Emily used a lawyer to compose the petition. Her letter, written in a steady and elegant hand, requested further consideration, and provides further evidence that petitions were part of a range of writing strategies and forums for gaining redress which Māori used regularly and persistently. Letter writing offered the petitioner another opportunity to lay out their case, which is what Emily proceeded to do, emphasising the death of her father while in government service as a basis for compensation, which she sought in the form of the resolution of her land claim:
Whakatane 5th December 1891
To The Honourable
The Native Minister
Wellington
Sir
I have just received a letter from Wellington dated 21st November, stating that under your instructions, my Petition to the Government has been rejected. I only spoke to you about my claim at Opotiki on the 20th November; I hardly think this letter can have been written with your knowledge on the 21st November.
I will now give you full particulars of my case as follows: –
In the year 1865 my father James Fulloon, Government Agent, arrived at Whakatane in the Government vessel ‘Kate’ he was sent to Whakatane to raise a Native Contingent; he was murdered while asleep on board the vessel. My father had large claims to land at Whakatane as he was closely related to Te Mautaranui, an influential chief (now dead) of the Urewera and Ngatiawa tribes. At the time of my father’s death I was only a few months old and was brought by my mother on the Government steamer ‘Luna’ to my father’s funeral. The Natives took my mother & shewed her all the lands to which I was entitled to, being the only child of Hemi Te Mautaranui (James Fulloon). My mother then returned with me to Auckland and afterwards married Mr George Brown, Native Interpreter. Some years after my father’s death the lands on the East Coast were confiscated, amongst other lands a good deal of that to which my father was entitled.
A Court of Compensation was held at Whakatane of which I think my mother knew nothing, and, at which my aunt Elizabeth Fulloon was awarded 50 acres of arable land here also some sections in the township. I may state that the natives here tell me they knew nothing about Elizabeth Fulloon having been awarded this land & further had they known so, they would have objected as I, as his only child had prior claims to his lands. I have been often asked why I was not receiving a pension from the Government, being the only child of a Government official, killed while serving the Government.
You asked me why I have not put in this claim before, as a girl I did not think of these things, as I was living with my mother, and had no wants.
I am now married and have several children and I think of them. I come back to live at my native place, and find the lands once owned by my father, now owned by Europeans, owing to his lands being confiscated, or awarded to others who have no claim to them. I think when you have read this, you will agree that I have a very strong claim on the Government, not only on the account of the confiscation of my father’s lands, but also as the only child of a Government official, killed while on Government Service. I think the reason given in the letter from Wellington for rejecting my claims, viz, that Elizabeth Fulloon was compensated, a very poor one, and the letter I think cannot have been written by your direction, if so, I hope after reading these particulars of my case, you will reconsider your decision. In conclusion, in putting aside my just claim, as the child of a Government Servant killed while on Public Service, I would only ask that a portion of my ancestral lands be returned to me.
I am
Your most obedient Servant
Mrs M. Buckworth
neé Maria Fulloon
Although written with composure and assurance, the letter had little effect, for it was followed by a second petition, dated 23 August 1892, the content of which followed closely the first petition, but included further details drawn from Emily’s December letter to the Native Minister.
The Hon. The House of Representatives
Wellington
In Parliament Assembled.
The humble petition of Emily Maria Fulloon showeth.
That on May 16th 1865 James Fulloon, Government Agent was murdered by the Natives while asleep on board the Government Cutter ‘Kate’ anchored off the Whakatane Heads.
My father had been sent to Whakatane by the Government for the purpose of raising a Native Contingent.
I was at that time about 10 months old. I was born on the 26th July 1864.
My father James Fulloon was a native of Whakatane, and had large claims to land in the Whakatane District being closely related to Te Mautaranui a leading chief of the Ngatiawa and Urewera Tribes.
My relationship to the said James Fulloon can be proved by all old Maoris still alive here, and by subsequent land courts held here, at which my claims as his child, to any lands in which he was interested, have always been admitted.
The Govt. in confiscating the Maori lands on the East Coast confiscated the greater parts of the land in the immediate neighbourhood of Whakatane in which my father held large interests the said lands being owned by the Ngatiawa and Urewera Tribes as the records of the Native Land Courts will show; and in awarding lands at the Compensation Court afterwards held here, none was awarded to James Fulloon’s wife and child. Neither my mother or myself have ever received any monetary or landed assistance from the Government.
The old European residents here always thought I was receiving a Pension from the Government and when told I had never received any assistance of any sort I was strongly advised to bring my case before the Government, not only on account of being James Fulloon’s child, but also to try and get some compensation for the loss of my fathers lands through confiscation, the said lands being now the most valuable in the District.
Wherefore your Petitioner humbly prays that your Hon. House will compensate me to the extent of £500 for the loss I have sustained thro the confiscation of my father’s lands and for his death while in the service of the Government.
Mrs C. Buckworth
neé Emily Maria Fulloon
Maori name Maraea Te Mautaranui
Whakatane 23rd August 189254
Four months later, Emily again wrote to the Native Minister seeking information on the progress of her 1892 petition for: ‘I have not heard anything about it.’55 In March 1893, Native Minister Cadman received an alarming letter claiming Emily was inciting local Māori against the government surveyors. Its author, Oliver Creagh, selectively quoted from a letter he claimed to have received from Emily requesting he pass on her suggestion that she was willing to use her influence to quell resistance at Rūātoki if the Native Minister promised to get her petition recognised by the Government. Cadman immediately telegraphed Creagh to, ‘Inform Mrs Buckworth that Government will make no such promise but proceedings will be taken against her if it can hereafter be shewn that she has incited the Natives in any way to break the law by stopping the survey.’56
Offended by the words and tone of the telegram, Emily wrote a long and angry letter to Cadman.
Whakatane
To the Native Minister, Wellington.
Sir,
From the tenor of a telegram which Mr O.M. Creagh, surveyor, showed me today, from yourself, stating that if I incited the Uriwera [sic] Natives to obstruct the ‘Survey on which Mr Creagh is engaged I should be arrested’ I think you must have been misinformed by Mr Creagh as to what I have done in this matter. Some few days ago in course of conversation with Mr Creagh he mentioned to me that he had spoken to you when in Auckland about my influence and mana in the Uriwera [sic] country, and he told us you had quite altered your opinion with regard to my Petition to the Government as you had been told personally that I lost no land by my father’s death, and that he was of opinion that the Government would reconsider their decision with regard to my petition. The following day I sent a letter to Mr Creagh of which I enclose a copy. Mr Creagh told me a few days afterwards that he had sent a telegram to you stating what I had said in my letter to him, and I was very much surprised and annoyed when Mr Creagh showed me your reply to his telegram which almost states that I was inciting Natives to oppose the survey.
On the morning of Monday 6th inst. which was the day on which the Natives were to decide whether or not they would allow the survey to proceed I went to the meeting expecting to see Mr Creagh and learn what was his reply from you to his telegram. No reply had come. I may tell you, and I think Mr Creagh can tell you the same, that one word from me would have decided whether the survey should proceed or not. Not having a reply from you through Mr Creagh and considering the way I have been treated with regard to my Petition, which for two Sessions has been favourably recommended to the Government, I made up my mind to say nothing, for or against the survey, as I did not wish to see trouble amongst my people, but I told the Natives to use their own judgment. I have written this letter, as I wish you to thoroughly understand I have in no way incited the Natives to stop this survey; and I should feel obliged if you would kindly send me a copy of the telegram Mr Creagh sent to you, as I feel you have been misinformed, or otherwise you would not have worded your telegram in the way you did.
I have the honour to be,
Yours faithfully,
M. Buckworth
Maraea Te Mautaranui, Whakatane, March 8 1893.
Enclosure.
Copy of my letter to Mr Creagh
Dear Mr Creagh,
Will you on behalf of Mr Cadman give me in writing a promise that my Petition to the Government shall be recognized, if I come up to Ruatoki on Monday and use my influence with the Natives to allow this survey to proceed without any further trouble. The majority of the Natives who are now against the survey proceeding are my near relations. I should like a reply to this before Monday in writing or perhaps it would be better for you to come and see me. After hearing what Mr Cadman said to you, when you spoke to him, re my Petition to the Government, I would accept a written promise from you on his behalf that the recommendations of my Petition by the Native Affairs Committee to the Government be complied with.
Cadman had received false information from Creagh, who claimed, ‘Mrs Buckworth is the chief instigator in opposition. Reported she advised Natives cut telegraph wires if disturbance occurs.’57
Emily wrote again on 4 October 1895, this time directing her letter to the Premier Richard Seddon. She sought an answer to her petition, and asked: ‘what compensation I may look for and that the same may be granted as soon as possible.’58 She received a third rejection of her claim for compensation.59 The final document in her file dates to February 1911, and is Emily’s response to a letter from T. W. Fisher, Under Secretary of the Native Department, concerning the final settlement of her claim. With an air of resignation she responded:
I suppose as this is the best the Government intend to do for me I must accept the amount offered, although it has cost me nearly £200 in expenses during the last 22 years to prove my claim.60
Jane Maria Phillips (Ngāti Ruanui) also fought for compensation over several decades. Unlike Emily Buckworth, Jane had support from her family. Born at the Bay of Islands to Kōtiro Hinerangi and Alexander Grey, Jane’s two sisters left an imprint on the public imagination and the archival record. Her sister Sophia gained fame as a guide at Rotorua’s thermal district, and bore witness to the devasta tion of the 1886 Tarawera eruption.61 Another sibling was Lucy Lord, also known as Takiora Dalton, who has left behind a significant documentary trail, having corresponded regularly with Donald McLean during the 1870s about her claims to land in Taranaki (see chapter 4). Jane’s petition for redress dates back to the confiscation of land from ‘rebels’ in Taranaki, specifically to ancestral land called Pōnui to which her sister Lucy Lord had unsuccessfully sought to gain title. As West Coast Commissioner, William Fox had investigated and dismissed Lucy’s claim in the 1880s. Nevertheless, Jane continued her sister’s claim, staking her rights to the land as Lucy’s successor.62
The Honourable the Speaker, and Members of the House of Representatives of the Colony of New Zealand, in Parliament assembled.
Sir and Gentlemen,
This the petition of Jane Maria Phillips humbly sheweth.
Firstly. That I am a halfcast [sic] of the Umutai hapu of Ngatiruanui Tribe, of Taranaki, and a direct descendant of the principal chiefs of the same.
Secondly. That I am 55 years of age, and therefore not trying to get claims recognized to which I have only recently become entitled. The claims of which I am about to speak existed long before the war. I have never participated in the slightest degree in any of our Tribal lands. My immediate ancestor Ponui was a non-combatant during wartime, and my sister Takiora was Government guide and interpreter to the forces. I mention this to show that my nearest relatives were not rebels.
Thirdly. In 1865 I came to Taranaki to lay my claims to land, but the military authorities would not allow me to come up country to communicate with the Natives. In 1867 I returned, but with the same result. After this I wrote to the Government of the day and Sir Donald McLean assured me that my claims in the Waimate Plains and other blocks near the coast would be remembered, but I never heard any more about them. My husband about this time was appointed to a Native School in the north, and I held the position of assistant teacher. I sent my eldest daughter down to Taranaki but she was told she could not represent her mother and her claims – she being the offspring of a halfcast by a European – were not acknowledged.
Fourthly. I came to Taranaki in September last year (1893) at the death of my sister. I found that, though she had had large areas of land she had disposed of them all, but of course that is nothing to do with this petition. What I mean is that I found that the lands in which I am interested had all been confiscated and reserves made for the Natives. I was told by the Public Trustee, New Plymouth, Mr Rennell, that it was too late for me to be put in to the Reserve grant as it would be too much trouble to revise it. Though he was aware that there were many in the Deed who should not be there and many left out who should be in. Of course the interests in the blocks that have been confiscated I can see it would be impossible to get as they are so divided by leases to Europeans. The isolated position in which we were placed (School Teaching) among the Natives in the North prevented us hearing anything about the extent of the West Coast land confiscations.
Fifthly. I can clearly show my ancestral rights in the lands of the Waimate Plains: Waihi; Turangatapuwai; Rakuku; Ketemaraea; Howata; Te Aoroa; Kaitawa; Te Ponui-a-Rina; Te Matapu; Akire; Opuora; Te Aratira; Heretoa; Waipa &c. These are all big blocks, but have been confiscated, with the exception of the reserves into which it is too late for me to be admitted. I also have a good interest in ‘Te Ngaere’ block a proof of which is the fact of my three cousins Onetu, Ngaauta, and Tekenui, being the largest shareholders therein. But the same and my claim could not be considered as it would reopen the whole question. My claims in the abovementioned can easily be proved.
Sixthly. I am not a ‘tutuha’ [sic] or person of no consequence in the hapu as can be gathered from the claims of my mother’s first cousin Te Wharerata being recognized as being first, he has the largest share in the Reserves and my mother’s other cousin by a younger branch, ‘Wairau’ by name is recognized as next to Wharerata, but it is of course easily ascertained that I am no imposter.
Seventhly. Seeing that (notwithstanding that the law now admits the claims of children of halfcastes by Europeans) I am debarred from prosecuting my claims on behalf of myself and my children, I would pray that your Honourable House would be pleased to take my case into favourable consideration, and grant me compensation in land, for the loss of my ancestral and birthrights, if through want of knowledge, I have not complied with some law regarding limit of time for making application. I pray this may be graciously overlooked ( for surely a misapprehension cannot obliterate a right) the peculiar position in which I was placed being taken into consideration. Should your Honourable House be graciously pleased to grant me compensation, I would be willing to take an equivalent value in land in the Hokianga district.
Trusting that this my petition, shewing the hardship under which I am placed ( for the rebels and disloyal natives have fared better than I) may meet with your favourable consideration. And your petitioner will ever pray.
I have the honour to be,
Gentlemen,
Yours most respectfully,
Jane Maria Phillips63
Although the committee recommended the Government ‘make full inquiry into the petitioner’s case and grant such relief as may appear necessary’,64 Jane’s son, John G. Phillips wrote to the Premier Richard Seddon in April 1896 about her petition for ‘we have not heard any more about it’.65 It appears they got no satisfaction because in 1898 Jane sent another petition to the House for consideration, but this time submitted it jointly with her sister Sophia.
To the Honourable the Speaker of the House of Representatives.
Sir,
May it please your Honourable House to take into consideration this, the respectful petition of Jane Maria Phillips on behalf of herself and sister Sophia Taiawhio and which sheweth.
1. That your petitioners are half-castes of the Ngatiruanui tribe of Taranaki.
2. That they are over sixty years of age and therefore contemporaneous with the elders of the tribe.
3. That their joint families number 25 persons sons and daughters.
4. That their immediate ancestors and themselves have always been loyal subjects. Their late younger sister Takiora acted as guide to the troops during the West Coast Campaign and Sophia being guide at the Hot Lakes at Rotorua.
5. That I (Jane) on two occasions endeavoured to reach my people, but was compelled by the Commander of the forces to return to my then home in Auckland, though assured that my land interests would not suffer.
6. That your petitioners have no land for themselves or children from which to make a living, nor were they granted an interest in the West Coast Reserves.
7. That one family in the Umutai, father, sons and daughters descendants from the same family of ancestors as your petitioners have 370 shares in the reserves, while the late Wharerata and Wairau (each descendants from the same family) had ninety shares each and the child of the latter (notwithstanding she already had a large personal interest, as have each of the young children) inherited all her father’s shares, while Wharerata’s (who died without issue) was shared among the different branches of the tribe the greater part going to his mother’s side. This is against all Maori custom and will ultimately tend to divert the interests in these reserves to persons who have inter-married with the tribe.
8. Your petitioners pray that your Hon. House will consider their unfair position, their loyalty, their age and the hardship this state of affairs imposes upon their grown-up sons and daughters and will grant them land as compensation for what they have lost through the rebellion of their people and also their just interests in the reserve.
I am
most respectfully
Jane Maria Phillips66
Like Te Korowhiti Douglas, petitioning was Jane’s final opportunity for redress, for she had exhausted other avenues. In 1882, her daughter Mereana Paraea, hearing that her aunts had received 200 acres each at Taranaki, requested the claims of her mother and herself be investigated for they were ‘equally strong’.67 She was directed to the West Coast Commission. That year, Jane’s husband appealed for consideration in a letter to William Fox, who was then hearing claims for title to confiscated land in the region, to have his wife’s claims acknowledged. George Phillips revealed to Fox that ‘I have written to the Native Minister and Department several times’ on the subject of her claim to lands at Taranaki and, ‘was informed an opportunity of bringing them forward would be afforded under the West Coast Settlement Act, and Mr Richard Hobbs, M.H.R. told me that I should write to you and could use his name as a guarantee of the justness of the claim. Mrs Phillips is a sister of Mrs J. Dalton (Takiora) who has received some large amounts both of money and land on account of the family interest in land on the plains, and I should think that her so successfully establishing her claims would only strengthen my wifes [sic].’68 Fox’s note on the letter dismisses Jane’s application because, ‘Takiora’s claims were those of a resident member of a tribe & chiefly for special services supposed to be rendered by her towards the acquisition of lands by the Govt. & otherwise. Mrs Phillips cannot claim on either ground.’69
Confiscated land was the subject of a number of women’s petitions, often representing the interests of their families (see chapter 3). Early petitioners included Wikitōria Tautawe, who sought compensation in 1871 for the loss of lands at the Bay of Plenty included in confiscations, ‘she having been prevented by illness from attending the compensation court’70 and Martha R. (Keke) Cowell, who petitioned in 1872 for the restoration of confiscated lands in the Waikato.71 Hārete Hikairo sought the return of her mother’s interests in Waikato land in 1873.72 Rāhera Tiwaia sought 2000 acres in the Waitōtara district, confiscated by the Crown, which should be returned to her on account of her loyalty during the war, and for saving the lives of two Europeans.73 Loyalty and humanitarian acts were common grounds for seeking return of confiscated lands, which were often taken indiscriminately.
In 1881, Ruiha Teira petitioned the House on behalf of her mother. The official translation of Ruiha’s petition is all that remains:
This Petition
The Humble Prayer of L. M. Plumbridge (Ruiha Teira)
This is my Petition to the House to consider the suffering of my mother.
This is what Sir William Fox said to me when the Commission was appointed with reference to the One hundred acres, on the 13th August 1880, he asked me why I laid claims to land while my mother was still living. My mother appeared before the Commission when here but received no favor from Sir William Fox.
I now therefore wish the House to look into the grievances of my mother, for the person who has left Parihaka will not return there again.
The Government ought to consider this matter.
From
Your Petitioner
Ruiha Teira
(L. M. Plumbridge)
Opunake74
Ruiha and her family ‘took no part in the rebellion’, yet their land had been swept up in the confiscations.75 Theirs was ‘a substantial grievance’, reported the committee, and one that was admitted by the House for a number of years, but ‘never dealt with’ and therefore ought to be ‘finally disposed of without further delay’.76 Her petition was sent to William Fox, West Coast Commissioner for investigation, who ultimately rejected it.77
By the 1880s and 1890s, petitions presented reflected the variety of ways in which dispossession was practised. Increasingly petitions addressed exclusions from lists of owners set out by the Native Land Court, for example, Hōriana Hōne and 33 others, who sought redress in 1883 relating to a Native Land Court adjudication that they believed led to the loss of their land block through sale.78 Others sought redress from the impact of inaccurate surveys.79 Land taken by the local council for a road without any compensation was the catalyst that spurred Hāriata Ngāheko into action. She petitioned for redress, and threatened to put up a toll-bridge if the claim was not investigated.80
Petitions reflected too, divisions within communities, in addition to the marginal circumstances under which some women lived. Ngāhauporoaki (of Ngāti Ruanui) petitioned in 1884, claiming a man ‘who assumes the power of a chief’ had turned her off her land awarded to her by the West Coast Commission, and had ‘destroyed her house; she now has no land to live on.’81 By the 1890s, petitioners seeking relief from landlessness and poverty or access to fishing reserves, and protests against passage of legislation appeared with regularity.
At the same time as land loss was taking its toll, women were also petitioning to obtain financial control over their land interests, which were subject to restrictions under Native Land legislation. Emma Rolfe sought the removal of restrictions from land, ‘so that she may deal with the land as she thinks proper.’82 Agnes Simeon (Ākanihi Kurakitoro) wanted to ‘be allowed to deal with her lands herself’ and prayed for the removal of restrictions on title for they ‘prevent her properties being properly and profitably worked’.83 Inuwaiti de Thierry also sought to gain control over her land and her future, ‘so as to enable her to dispose of what is useless, and thus save her home for herself and her family.’84
Emma Rolfe brought her case for the removal of restrictions on alienation of 100 acres in the Tikorangi District to the Native Minister, instructing her lawyer to write to him on the matter in April 1886. In support of the application, her lawyer was ‘instructed to explain’ that, ‘about £500 has been spent by Mr Rolfe in buildings and other improvements chiefly on the Eastern half of the section, which is not included in the application but will if it is complied with still remain under the present restrictions. This eastern portion contains the homestead.’85 Emma’s husband had accumulated debt, ‘and a little money is also required to add to the livestock on the farm. What is necessary could readily be obtained by a mortgage of the least valuable half of the land which Mrs Rolfe who cannot legally effect a mortgage would make over to her husband for that purpose, the other half of the section being amply sufficient as a provision against distribution from want of enough land to cultivate.’86 No reply is recorded, but in November 1887, Emma petitioned on the matter. This was a collaborative endeavour, for, as her husband Frederick W. Rolfe noted in the cover letter addressed to their local MHR that accompanied the petition: ‘I trust you will present it for us and at the same time do your utmost to carry it through’.87 There was a great deal riding on this request, for a successful petition would extract them from economic disaster, allowing them to retain their home.
Although the petition was in Emma’s name alone, it was likely initiated by her husband and composed with his knowledge and support. Following a pattern of the late nineteenth century, petition No. 260 adopted the third person, which reflected Emma’s use of a lawyer to compose the text:
To the Honourable the Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives in Parliament assembled.
The Memorial of Emma Rolfe wife of Frederick William Rolfe of Tikorangi in the Provincial District of Taranaki, Farmer.
Sheweth.
That your memorialist is a half-caste, being the daughter of a European father and a Native mother, but was brought up with and educated as a European and in the year 1873 intermarried with her present husband.
That by order of the Native Land Court held at New Plymouth on 7th day of August 1887, before John A. Wilson Esq. a Judge of the Native Land Court Two hundred acres of land situated in the Ngatirahiri [sic] Block No.1, in the said Provincial District of Taranaki being the allotment No.103 in Block V on the map of the Waitara Survey Dist. was awarded to your Memorialist and her children, all of whom are under the age of 21 years.
That by the said grant the said allotment of land is made inalienable without the consent of the Governor in Council.
That at a Native Land Court held New Plymouth on 7th August last your Memorialist was named and appointed guardian of the infant children.
That Frederick Wm Rolfe the husband of your memorialist has with your memorialist and their family resided on the said land for about ten years & has spent large sums of money amounting in all to over £500 in building, fencing and other improvements.
That your memorialist (having considered the amount of money expended by her husband in cultivating and improving the said allotment of land, and that such monies were spent and improvements made by him on the understanding with the other native owners of the said block, that the said allotment, when the land was partitioned, would be the absolute property of your memorialist and her children, and would be subject to their disposition) is desirous that the restriction on alienation of the said property contained in the Crown Grant to be issued in pursuance of the said order of the Native Land Court should be removed that your memorialist may be enabled to transfer all her right and interest in the same to her husband, and rest in him full control thereof.
That part of the Matarikoriko Reserve, containing twenty five acres or thereabouts, was on the division of the said reserve at the Native Land Court at Waitara on the 19th July 1887 before the said J. A. Wilson Esq. awarded to your memorialist and her infant son Henry G. Rolfe and your memorialist was then appointed trustee for the said son H.G. Rolfe but the said piece of land is subject to the above mentioned restriction as to alienation.
That in the interests of herself and her son the said H.G. Rolfe your memorialist is desirous that the said restrictions as to alienation should be removed from the said land so awarded to them in order that the same may be utilized either by mortgage or by sale to the holders of adjoining lands, as from the position and area of this land (25 acres only) it is practically useless.
Your memorialist therefore humbly prays that Your Honourable House will sanction the removal of the restriction in alienation, on the said 200 acres of land in the Ngatirahira Block so as to permit the transfer of the same and the full control thereof to the said F. W. Rolfe, and that you will further sanction the removal of the like restriction from the 25 acres part of the Matarikoriko Reserve in order that the same may be mortgaged or sold, or grant such other relief as to your Honorable House shall seem fit.
Emma Rolfe
The Native Affairs Committee recommended the Government remove the restrictions, for they appeared ‘unnecessary & unjustifiable’.88 Native Department officials were suspicious, though, and urged caution, fearing, ‘if the application was granted that the property would soon be lost, as it is the intention of Mrs Rolfe (in the event of her application being acceded to) to transfer the property to the husband, and it is the latters intention to mortgage it. This I do not think we should allow.’89 The petition was declined. Emma Rolfe continued to pursue her application, writing numerous letters to the Native Minister, reminding him of previous recommendations, promises and the obligations, but with little success.
Māori women’s petitionary appeals addressed the material circumstances of their living conditions. For those at the wealthier end of the spectrum, this amounted to protecting their large land interests, but for those at the other extreme, who were in poor health, elderly and frail, or widows, they petitioned to fend off starvation. Most of the petitions received, though, were from women in between these two extremes: those with small land interests, who sought to regain land lost through a range of colonial mechanisms. Women critiqued colonial institutions in the process of their appeals. Huingapaura Rangihatau’s appeal set out in the final paragraph of her 1895 petition regarding her exclusion from the Waihī block sums up the general feeling: ‘This is a prayer from me asking you to grant us relief – do not make us paupers and wanderers in New Zealand’.90
Women’s petitions, it should be noted, were part of a larger corpus of writing that demonstrates their political will to gain redress, dating from the 1850s. One only has to look at the letters Māori women sent to Donald McLean to see these laid the foundations for petitionary appeals. Māori were well versed in writing to political figures, so a petition offered yet another forum for articulating their protest as well as their land rights. Fiona Paisley and Kirsty Reid describe petitions as a formulaic style of writing, which over time took on an increasingly bureaucratic nature, becoming a kind of form-filling exercise, but this does not mean the content of petitionary appeals is unimportant or generic.91 Because of their bureaucratic nature, forms do not get the same attention as more active writing styles and genres, such as letters and manuscripts. Their deferential tone also lends petitions a passive character, yet the examples offered in this chapter demonstrate that petitioning was an active form of writing; it required the petitioner to locate a scribe or intermediary to translate the claim into the appropriate language, and, most significantly, petitioners actively and tirelessly campaigned to keep their claims alive, often for decades.
As noted, the most well known petitionary action led by New Zealand women were the suffrage petitions, culminating in the Electoral Reform Act 1893, which extended the franchise to all women in the colony. Māori women signed these petitions, and were active in the campaign for voting rights. In expanding our vision to women’s petitionary appeals sent to the Native Affairs Committee, the everyday realities of colonial life for a cohort of Māori women, who spoke for their whānau and communities, is brought to the fore. As such petitions are not only an archive of Māori women’s political activity, they also ‘often articulate the more personal details of their lived relations.’92