It lasted just six days. But for the people of Tūranga, the battle of Waerenga-a-Hika in 1865 changed everything.
The small pā, about 10km inland from modern-day Gisborne on the East Coast, became the scene of one of the bloodiest chapters in the New Zealand Wars.
At least 71 people from the settlement were killed. Many more were wounded, imprisoned without trial, and exiled to Rēkohu Chatham Islands.
Vast tracts of “prime Māori land” were eventually lost, and with them, generations of history and identity, say Mihingarangi Forbes and Annabelle Lee-Mather, the team behind the NZ Wars Collection on RNZ.
Yet for many Kiwis, including those who grew up just kilometres from where it happened, the battle barely registers.
“I wasn’t taught anything about the New Zealand Wars at high school,” journalist and producer Lee-Mather says. “We learnt about international conflicts and historical moments, but never about the New Zealand Wars.”
Like for many New Zealanders, her education about her own country’s past came much later.
She supports the young people who successfully campaigned for New Zealand wars to be recognised and taught in schools.
“Every chapter we’ve done in this series has been a revelation, things that happened that I had no idea about,” she says.
“To actually understand what happened at Waerenga-a-Hika has been a huge learning for me, and particularly the impact on the iwi in terms of so much of the adult population being wiped out as a result of this war.”
Her latest documentary with Forbes is the sixth chapter in the acclaimed NZ Wars Collection.
But she says unlike earlier campaigns, where iwi largely fought alongside allies against Crown forces, the Waerenga-a-Hika battle unfolded in a far more complex landscape.
“There were inter-tribal dynamics,” Lee-Mather says. “The Pai Mārire movement was emerging as both a religious and political resistance movement, and iwi in the region had largely enjoyed successful economic relationships with settlers while maintaining sovereignty over their own lands.
“But they were sitting on prime real estate.”
The pressure to acquire that land was building – “despite their best efforts,” she says, “war was coming”.
Forbes, who also presents the documentary, says communities in Tūranga watched events unfolding in Waikato and Taranaki with growing alarm.
“They had great relationships with Pākehā settlers. There was respect on both sides for each other’s sovereignty, business and economics,” she says.
“But when they started seeing what was happening elsewhere in the country … they began asking, ‘Are we next?'”
They were, and what followed wasn’t simply a military campaign.
“One thing about the New Zealand wars is that almost never was there a standing army on the iwi side,” Forbes says.
“There were always children and women and pregnant women and elderly because that’s how a kainga or a pā operated.”
Waerenga-a-Hika, she says, was also a centre of culture – “it was a pā full of artists and musicians and gardeners and orators.”
The war devastated not only lives, but knowledge, language and culture.
Yet Forbes says what struck her most at the documentary’s premiere was hearing descendants reflect not only on what was lost, but on what somehow survived.
“They may have lost the memory of their ancestors and 90 percent of their whenua,” she says, “but the gifts remained”.
The region continues to produce renowned carvers, kapa haka performers, writers and artists.
“It was incredible watching people realise that legacy had continued through generations.”
One of the documentary’s most powerful voices belongs to 18-year-old Nikki Pewhairangi, who has been tasked by her iwi to learn and preserve the history of Waerenga-a-Hika.
She recounts the forced exile of prisoners who were shipped first to Napier, then to the Chatham Islands without trial.
As they were taken away, many scooped up handfuls of earth, rubbing it across their faces and bodies.
“They knew they were never coming home,” says Forbes, who admitted she was emotional during her interview with Nikki.
“It wasn’t just what she was saying. It was watching a young first-language te reo speaker reconnecting with these ancient mōteatea and discovering this trauma carried through generations.”
Lee-Mather says the emotion only deepened during post-production, and at the premiere, surrounded by whānau, kuia and kaumātua, there was barely a dry eye in the room.
“My husband said he could barely hear the documentary because Mihi and I were crying so much,” she laughs.
“But it was such a privilege. To have people trust us with these stories is extraordinary.”
Forbes is careful not to describe the documentaries as the definitive history, instead labelling them “stories” of Waerenga-a-Hika.
“We never presume we’ve got the complete factual story,” she tells The Detail. “The Crown’s perspective has been very well documented through archives, historians like Vincent O’Malley, and official records.
“What hasn’t been well documented are the stories of the people.”
Forbes and Lee-Mather say they first approach iwi and ask whether they will entrust them with telling their story, and then the featured historians are chosen by the iwi themselves.
“We’re not trying to create the definitive history of these battles,” says Lee-Mather. “We’re seeking out the oral histories handed down through generations – stories that reveal the humanity and the personal impact of these wars.”
Once people understand the history, Lee-Mather says, they begin seeing New Zealand differently.
“I have faith in the rangatahi of New Zealand Māori, Māori Pākehā, Pacific Islanders, new New Zealanders … we’re on our way towards great things, and I believe nothing will stop that.”
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