Wairau Affray - Aftermath

Aftermath

Reverberations of a reported massacre were felt as far away as England, where the New Zealand Company was almost ruined by the news of "British citizens being murdered by barbarous natives". Land sales almost halted and it became obvious the company was being less than honest in its land purchasing tactics and reports on the events in local newspapers were far from accurate.

In the Nelson area settlers became increasingly nervous, and one group sent a deputation to the Government complaining that those who had died had been discharging their "duty as magistrates and British subjects ... the persons by whom they were killed are murderers in the eyes of common sense and justice".

In late January or early February 1844, a month after taking up his post, incoming Governor Robert Fitzroy visited Wellington and Nelson in a bid to quell the hostility between Māori and British, particularly in the wake of the Wairau incident. So many conflicting statements had been published that it was impossible for him to decide who had been at fault. However he immediately upbraided New Zealand Company representatives and the editor of a Wellington newspaper, The New Zealand Gazette, for their aggressive attitude towards Māori, warning that he would ensure that "not an acre, not an inch of land belonging to the natives shall be touched without their consent". He also demanded the resignations of the magistrate who had issued the arrest warrants for the Māori chiefs, but he was already dead.

From Nelson, Fitzroy and his officials sailed to Waikanae in the North Island, where he conducted a one-man inquiry into the incident. He opened proceedings by telling a meeting of 500 Māori: "When I first heard of the Wairau massacre ... I was exceedingly angry ... My first thought was to revenge the deaths of my friends, and the other pakeha who had been killed, and for that purpose to bring many ships of war ... with many soldiers; and had I done so, you would have been sacrificed and your pa destroyed. But when I considered, I saw that the pakeha had in the first instance been very much to blame; and I determined to come down and inquire into all the circumstances and see who was really in the wrong."

Te Rauparaha, Te Rangihaeata and other Māori present were invited to recount their version of events, while Fitzroy took notes and interrupted with further questions. He concluded the meeting by addressing the gathering again, to announce he had made his decision: "In the first place, the white men were in the wrong. They had no right to survey the land ... they had no right to build the houses on the land. As they were, then, first in the wrong, I will not avenge their deaths."

But Fitzroy, who had a background as a humanitarian, told the chiefs they had committed "a horrible crime, in murdering men who had surrendered themselves in reliance on your honour as chiefs. White men never kill their prisoners". He urged British and Māori to live peaceably, with no more bloodshed.

Settlers and the New Zealand Company were incensed by the Governor's finding, but it had been both prudent and pragmatic; Māori outnumbered settlers 900 to one, and many iwi had been amassing weapons for decades, giving them the capacity to annihilate settlements in the Wellington and Nelson areas. FitzRoy knew it was highly improbable that troops would be despatched by the British Government to wage war on the Māori or defend the settlers. FitzRoy's report was endorsed by Colonial Secretary Lord Stanley, who said the actions of the party led by Thompson and Wakefield had been "manifestly illegal, unjust and unwise", and that their deaths had occurred as a "natural and immediate sequence". William Williams, a leading Church Missionary Society missionary, also clearly apportioned blame to "our countrymen, who began with much indiscretion & gave much provocation to the natives".

The effect of the massacre and the passive reaction of Fitzroy set in train a chain of events that still rumble through the New Zealand courts today. Its immediate effect was to alarm settlers in New Plymouth, who also had insecure title to land purchased under not dissimilar circumstances to Wairau. FitzRoy was very unpopular and was recalled to be replaced by Governor George Grey.

A memorial at Tuamarina cemetery was erected in 1869 to commemorate the European casualties of the incident, with the names and the occupations listed on the inscription. This rohe (area) has been the subject of a lengthy but successful land/compensation claim by the original Rangitane Iwi who are recognized as the tangata whenua (home people). Compensation of some $2 million is to be paid by the government of New Zealand. This was the iwi displaced by Te Rauparaha's heke in the 1820s. After the massacre Te Rauparaha never returned to the Wairau Valley. Later he was captured by the British for organizing an uprising in the Hutt valley and was imprisoned on a ship in Auckland. Grey let him out of prison to attend the Kohimaramara conference. Te Rauparaha was then released as he was sick and the government became the owners of much of the unsold land in the Wairau Valley when Te Rauparaha gave up his claim.