Tommo and Hawk
Page 26
‘The pa was a strong place from which the ancestors defended their land, a fort built upon their ground and under their own feet. But since the pakeha have brought the musket here, more than twenty thousand Maori have been killed defending their forts. These are not Maori who have been killed by the pakeha. These are Maori who have been slain by their own kind— those who have used the white man’s gun to kill their own people! These traitors, who know the pa well, have defeated it with the gun. The British have even more guns— huge ones that can tear down the palisades and tear up the ground. The Maori pa cannot always withstand the British system of war. We must have another system.’
There is much concern among the rangatira at this denigration of the pa. Chief Wiremu Kingi is patient though firm and in the end, he rules that we will try this new kind of warfare. He turns to his younger brother, War Chief Hapurona, who has a mighty reputation but who has said little during the discussion, leaving the task of reconciliation to his brother.
‘What say you, Hapurona? How shall we fight?’
All are silent as War Chief Hapurona speaks. ‘The Maori are quick to fight and slow to learn, but I do not agree that we must give up the system of the forts.’ The men murmur their approval at this, and my heart sinks. ‘There are times in war to attack and times to defend,’ the war chief continues. ‘With the pakeha we have always defended, and sometimes this has been right and sometimes it has been wrong. Black Maori is right, we must use both systems to be effective in this war.’
Wiremu Kingi turns to me and nods that I should reply. I have been so anxious to persuade him to embrace my new method of warfare that I have not seen the whole situation clearly as Hapurona has. ‘War Chief Hapurona is our commander and what he says is right. It shames me that I have not understood this more clearly before,’ I say, with my head bowed.
The old chief responds, ‘You are not born a Maori, nor have you been a warrior, so you would not know the advantages of fighting a defensive action from a well-constructed pa.’ He turns to Hapurona. ‘Will you allow the Black Maori to be a general under you, to advise you in his ways?’
Hapurona walks over to me and places his hand on my shoulders. ‘I shall prepare the feathers for a general’s cloak.’ He laughs. ‘It is not often I must look up into another man’s face. The women will need to gather many more baskets of feathers for the Black Maori.’
I tell Wiremu Kingi that I am greatly honoured but since I have not proved my courage in battle, I would be happy to be an adviser only.
The chief appears surprised at this. ‘And if we should be defeated, who shall we blame? A mere adviser? Bah! We must have a general so that he is worthy of being put to death should he fail us— or of being honoured should we succeed.’
The rangatira laugh heartily at this and approve the appointment. Chief Wiremu Kingi then says, ‘Black Maori, when you persuaded me not to fight the governor in the Waitara, that is something only a good war chief would do. You shall be a general for us, like those the British have, and we shall call you Black Hawk.’
And so I have been named General Black Hawk. I am a little afraid that I shall let the Maori down in this whole affair. Though they have agreed to fight small wars, they are by no means unanimous, and the tohunga led by the old priest are against it. I shall have to prove myself very soon with War Chief Hapurona, or I shall be greatly shamed and Chief Tamihana will be disgraced by me.
I return to my tribe to tell my chief of Wiremu Kingi’s decision. Of course, I must also tell Tommo.
Tommo is not amused. ‘Have you gone crazy?’ he screams, banging his fist hard down on the table. ‘General Black Hawk, is it? You think the pakeha don’t already want your head on a plate? Listen, mate, they’ll string you up by your balls outside Auckland Post Office while singing the flamin’ Hallelujah Chorus!’
‘But you said you wanted to come with me. You and your fighting axes, Tommo Te Mokiri!’ I say.
‘Yes, but that was when it were just me and you! Me, a regular soldier and you, an adviser, safe in the background. Nobody’d know nothin’ about us being there. Then, when it’s over, or if it goes badly, we can scarper, piss off, slip into the night!’ He pauses and glares at me. ‘Now you’re a fucking general. The flamin’ pakeha will see it as treason! Remember we’re escaped prisoners. They’re gunna have your guts for garters, mate, if they ever puts two and two together and gets four. Mine, too! But I got to be with you, Hawk— I’m not letting ya go on yer own.’
‘Tommo, please wait here,’ I beg. ‘What if something goes wrong or we are captured? Makareta is with child. You would not wish her to be a widow.’
‘Makareta already knows we got to go away,’ Tommo snorts. ‘I’ve told her I’ll come back some day to fetch her and the child. I’m coming all right, but that don’t mean you ain’t an idjit! Promise me when this is over, if we comes out alive, we’re gunna get out of here.’
I nod my head.
‘Promise, Hawk! Swear it on Makareta’s baby!’
‘I promise we’ll go back to Hobart Town as soon as Wiremu Kingi’s war is over.’
‘No! I don’t want to go back to Mary yet. We’ll go to Sydney.’
‘Sydney then, I promise!’
We are sitting in Tommo’s hut and I am glad when Makareta comes over with some food. She will cool Tommo’s anger. It’s difficult to be angry with Makareta present. She has a mischievous grin, laughs often and loves Tommo with all her heart. She cannot help but touch him as though he is a part of her every desire. ‘What will you name the baby?’ I ask her, hoping to end the unfortunate subject of General Black Hawk.
‘Icky,’ Makareta smiles.
‘Ikey,’ Tommo corrects her.
I laugh. ‘I’ll wager he’ll be the only Ikey Solomon who is Maori in the whole world or ever to come. But what if it is a girl, how shall you name her?’
Makareta frowns and looks downcast. ‘I would want a son for Tommo. We have not thought of a name for a girl.’
I hesitate a moment, then venture, ‘If it is a girl, may I suggest a name?’
‘I know! You want to call her Mary, don’tcha?’ says Tommo, now somewhat mollified.
‘No, I had thought— Hinetitama?’
Makareta gasps and brings her hand to her breast. ‘That is a name which may only be used for a Maori princess! It cannot be, Black Hawk! They will not allow it. Hinetitama is the daughter of Hineahuone, Woman Made From Earth, the first Maori woman. The mother of the earth called her daughter Hinetitama, the Dawn Maiden, because her cheeks were the same colour as the morning light.’
‘That is beautiful, Makareta. If you should have a girl, I will ask Chief Tamihana if he will grant his permission to name her thus. I am rangatira, perhaps he will allow this honour through me.’
‘He will not, Black Hawk. The tohunga and the ancestors would be angry. I do not want a tapu on my child!’ She is most distressed, so I change the subject.
‘It will be a boy,’ I say quickly. ‘There is a saying among the pakeha that a mother’s beauty is stolen by a girl child in the womb, but if it is a son, the beauty remains.’ I smile. ‘And you, Makareta, are more beautiful than ever.’
Tommo sighs and rolls his eyes at this sentimental notion but I can see Makareta is pleased. Besides, her good manners do not allow her to show further disquiet. Her frown disappears and she laughs. ‘You are right, Black Hawk. We will have Icky Slomon and save everyone much trouble.’
‘Ikey,’ Tommo repeats, ‘I-key So-lo-mon!’ He rolls his eyes, as though he has tried to teach her a hundred times and failed.
Makareta ignores him. ‘Now you must eat,’ she says, putting a large, steaming clay pot of fish and vegetables down in front of us.
‘Ikey Solomon never saved anyone any trouble!’ I laugh as I reach to fill my platter.
Tommo chuckles too. ‘So, what’s wrong with Mary?’ he asks. ‘It is our mama’s name after all.’
‘Nothing,’ I say, ‘Mary is a fine name, Tommo.’
But my thoughts have flown back to Hinetitama, and as soon as I return to the village of Chief Wiremu Kingi I try to find her. It is a large village of a thousand souls, perhaps more, but a widow of such beauty would, I feel sure, be well known.
My hopes are quickly dashed. All the wahine I ask about Hinetitama look anxious and shake their heads. ‘We have no wahine of that name, General Black Hawk, not in this tribe,’ they say. I come to believe it is a conspiracy, led by Chief Wiremu Kingi, to keep me from Hinetitama and, although I search widely, she is not to be found. I take to looking at every woman’s face I pass. There are many who are great beauties, for the Maori are of the Polynesian race and perhaps the most handsome people on earth. Though many are comely, none could be mistaken for Hinetitama. I know from Makareta’s explanation that the chief has honoured me with a princess, not just an ordinary wahine. But this makes it stranger still. A disappearing princess is surely an odd occurrence. Perhaps, after all, it was a dream? I have resolved, if ever an opportunity arises, to ask Wiremu Kingi if he will let me see her again. My heart is broken by her disappearance and I try hard to concentrate on matters of warfare instead.
I am now so engaged with the Maori and their struggle that I am too busy for thoughts of home and too occupied to yearn for our dear Mary. Christmas passes unnoticed amongst the tribes, although I send our greetings to mama.
I have not told Mary of my close involvement with the Maori fight against the pakeha, informing her simply of Tommo’s recovery to health in Tamihana’s village. If she suspects I dissemble, she says not a word. Nor does she refer to the bitter argument that preceded our leaving. Instead, she writes of the brewery and of the loving thoughts she holds for her two boys. I am anxious about how we shall ever get to see her again, but for now we prepare for guerrilla warfare against the settlers and my mind is much occupied with this.
In great secret, War Chief Hapurona and I plan our first attack against the settlers. But before we can carry it out, martial law is again declared in the Taranaki by Lieutenant-Colonel Murray, who is commander of the militia and the Taranaki Rifle Volunteers, a mounted corps armed with carbines, revolvers and swords. The pakeha soldiers do not wait for us to come against them but immediately attack, looting and burning several Maori villages without warning. The war has begun in earnest, for it is now clear from these actions that the settlers will use whatever force is needed to occupy Maori land.
‘We must drive the pakeha from their farms into New Plymouth,’ I cry, ‘empty the whole countryside.’ New Plymouth is a town of some two and a half thousand souls, which depends on the surrounding countryside for food or else must obtain it by sea. War Chief Hapurona agrees and small units that can move quickly over the terrain are sent out in a series of daring night-time raids. In each are two or three of Tommo’s fighting axes from Chief Tamihana and they prove most effective. Tommo has lengthened the handle of the axe so that it may be used to fend off a bayonet or even in the manner of the taiaha, the Maori fighting stick. In these raids we do not kill the settlers, but simply force them from their farms with their women and children, thereafter burning and looting their homes and taking possession of their livestock.
Soon New Plymouth has become the only safe haven for all the pakeha in the district and the countryside is empty save for the Maori. The soldiers have fortified the town and created a citadel on the site of an old Maori pa, now known as Marsland Hill. From here they plan to defend New Plymouth against our attack. We are well pleased with this development, for we have no intention of attacking the town but only plan to contain the pakeha within it.
It is now that War Chief Hapurona and the old chief show their great skill as leaders. Hapurona commences to build a pa about nine miles from New Plymouth. He has studied the trenching systems the British have used to fortify the town, and he constructs his pa with a double row of palisades containing rifle pits and similar trenches. We also have underground passages to protect us from the British artillery.
The pa holds one hundred fighting men, whom Wiremu Kingi places under the command of War Chief Hapurona and his chief aide, a Maori war leader named Tamati Kapene. Though one hundred men is not much of a fighting force, we hope that it sends a direct challenge to the British militia to come out of New Plymouth and get us. We trust they will think this small force presents a great opportunity for a victory, and an easy one at that. ‘They will think it is the old times when the Maori fight on the defensive,’ Hapurona explains, ‘and it will give them great heart. This is the way they think they know how to defeat us.’
After much debate, I persuade Wiremu Kingi to purchase a hundred double-barrelled shotguns. At first the rangatira and even the chief are in great doubt about the wisdom of this, thinking the new rifled muskets to be much the better weapons. They have long used shotguns to shoot duck and small game and have even fought with them before, but they have only a few in their armoury. It is my plan to use the shotgun as the main weapon of defence, to entice the British near and greet them with a hail of buckshot at close range.
Though I know little of guns, my argument is simple enough. A shotgun charged with buckshot is deadly when used close-up, which is the way fighting occurs in the pa. It has double the barrels and hence twice the fire power of a musket. The fact that the shot will pepper widely is to be recommended in close combat, and at ten or fifteen yards, it will kill more effectively than the pu— the musket— with its single lead ball.
As I point out to the war council: ’We will have the shotgun and the long-handled fighting axe as well as the taiaha, the spear, and the musket. All the enemy will have is the musket and the bayonet. At close range, when the British storm the pa, we will be the better armed.’
‘Oh, so now General Black Hawk would be an expert on fighting in a pa. Do I not recall he was altogether against it not so long ago?’ It is the voice of Hapurona’s aide, Tamati Kapene, who from the beginning has opposed me in almost every endeavour. He is against guerrilla warfare and would return to the old methods if he had his way.
Tamati Kapene is in charge of organising the defence in the forts and though he is most talented, he is vainglorious for a man not more than twenty-five years of age— even I, at nineteen, can see this. As the son of a chief he has risen quickly and he is said to be a brave man. I do not contradict him but simply answer that we are no worse off with the shotgun and the axe, for we still retain all the traditional Maori weapons as well as the musket. ‘We have added the shotgun and the axe without losing anything,’ I point out.
My argument carries the day. But although in favour of the shotguns, War Chief Hapurona has decided that I shall remain an observer when the Maori fight in a pa, until I am well enough acquainted with the Maori fighting system.
Meanwhile my brother is also preparing for war. Tommo’s men have not yet been tested in open warfare with the long-handled fighting axe, which the pakeha have come to call the tomahawk, after the American Indian weapon. This is, of course, a coincidence and not intended as a compliment to me and Tommo. However, it is not lost on the Maori warriors who think the pakeha must fear the new weapon to have named it in our honour. I explain the real origins of the axe’s name to Hapurona, for of course the pakeha do not know about Tommo and still think of me only as the Black Maori. But he laughs. ‘General Black Hawk, it is our luck that the men think it so. They will follow you and Tommo the better for it.’ In Hapurona’s pa there are fifteen axe fighters from the Tommo Te Mokiri and among them is my twin, so that I am secretly most afraid for his life.
We are still waiting for the British to come after us when Hammerhead Jack turns up. ‘I have come to fight with my brothers,’ he says simply. ‘I have one eye and one arm, but one eye is sufficient to see the British. My one arm will use a fighting axe and my eye will see it find its mark between the two eyes of the British soldiers.’
I ask if Hammerhead Jack might be my a
ide and it is agreed. Tommo is greatly pleased by this. He has spent much time teaching Hammerhead Jack the fighting axe, and knows him to be a formidable opponent who will do much more than his share in any fight. He is much reassured that he will be by my side in the event of close combat.
A few days later, in early March, we hear that the British have moved out of New Plymouth with a contingent of four hundred officers and men, as well as a naval detachment with artillery. Although they have only nine miles to go, they come with a long baggage train of wagons and carts.
I send out a small war party to reconnoitre and they report that the column is exceedingly well guarded by the 65th Regiment and that the navy is well equipped with heavy artillery. It is as though they expect to be attacked at any moment, for horsemen constantly patrol their flanks. This is not surprising as the surrounding country is wooded, scrubby terrain criss-crossed by ravines and gullies, with giant flax providing plenty of cover. Given their surveillance, it will be difficult to catch the British column by stealth. Moreover, there is little hope of cutting off their supplies. The Maori do not have much respect for the British regular who fights in the ordered and predictable manner of Waterloo and the Crimea, but I believe it will be a tough battle.
The British build a large redoubt overlooking the river and this becomes their base. War Chief Hapurona and Chief Wiremu Kingi decide our forces are too few, and their reconnaissance patrols too well armed, to attempt to ambush them. So, in the time-honoured manner of the Maori, we wait for the enemy to come to us. In the meantime, we send urgent word to Chief Tamihana and several other chiefs asking for their support against these superior odds. My chief, Tamihana, has already sent fifteen axe fighters with Tommo but he sends a dozen more, and encourages the Ngati Maniapoto, the Waikato and the South Taranaki tribes to also come to our aid. Though we are still greatly outnumbered, our overall strength is much increased by the time the British attack.