Manaia NZ Wars memorial

This memorial is one of two obelisk monuments situated in the Octagon at the centre of the south Taranaki township of Manaia. It records the names of 71 men of the Armed Constabulary and the Patea Field Force who died in 1868–69. During this period, these colonial forces undertook operations against Tītokowaru in south Taranaki and Te Kooti at his East Coast stronghold of Ngatapa.

The 18-foot polished granite memorial was commissioned from Aberdeen, Scotland, in 1884. On 27 December the Hawera & Normanby Star reported that the memorial, with an 800-letter inscription, was expected to be ready ‘in about nine months’. Eleven months later, the Star reported that the memorial had arrived Wellington and was due in Manaia within days. On 15 March 1886 it was positioned on Main Street by Messrs Twigg and Cave under the supervision of Mr Stewart.

The memorial cost about £700. Much of this money came from a fund derived from the auctioning of items that had been looted during the New Zealand Wars. Captain Hempton, former paymaster to the colonial forces, received the proceeds and these were invested by trustees. With the fund reserved for no particular purpose, the two senior New Zealand Constabulary Force officers in Taranaki, Lieutenant-Colonel John Mackintosh Roberts (1840–1928) and Major Walter Edward Gudgeon (1841–1920), suggested a memorial.

Roberts’ military career was closely associated with that of Gustavus Ferdinand von Tempsky. He was a subaltern under Tempsky in the second company of Forest Rangers formed in November 1863 and, from 1868, a sub-inspector (captain) in Tempsky’s No. 5 Division Armed Constabulary. When Tempsky was killed at Te Ngutu o te Manu on 7 September 1868, Roberts assumed command of No. 5 Division.

The Manaia monument, also known as Von Tempsky’s Monument, was unveiled at 10 a.m. on Easter Monday, 27 April 1886. In the absence of the Minister of Defence, the Hon. John Ballance, the ceremony was performed by Roberts. There was no military display as the volunteers were in camp at Whanganui. Among the veterans present was an Ōhawe farmer, James Livingston. Called on to speak, he said simply, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I saw these men shot down beside me, and I cannot say another word’.

Major Harry Atkinson, a former (and future) Premier who had been a senior colonial officer during the Taranaki War, made a speech a few days before the unveiling. His comments provide an insight into the importance of such memorials for veterans and local communities. Though a ‘colonial work’, the Manaia memorial ‘elevate[d] the human condition’. It was ‘a monument to our children’, who, Atkinson hoped, would ‘gather strength from the memory of those noble men who fell in defence of law and order and for their Queen and country’.

Additional images

Inscription

East face inscription:

This monument / to the memory / of the / officers and men of the / Armed Constabulary / and of the Patea Field Force / who were killed during the operations / in Patea and Ngatapa / in year 1868–69 / is erected by the officers and men / of the / A.C. Field Force.

North face inscription:

Constables

Privates

Settlers

West face inscription:

Turuturu-Mokai
Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu
Te Ruaruru
Okutuku [Okotuku] Ngatapa
Karaka Flat and Otauto [Otautu]

South face inscription:

Major von Tempsky
[Major] Hunter
Capt Ross
[Captain] Brown
[Captain] Buck
[Captain] Palmer
Lieut Hastings
[Lieutenant] Hunter
Sergeants[:]
Cahill
McFadden
Kirwan
Maxwell
Heteraka
Menzies
Corporals[:]
Blake
Russell

Further information

• ‘The Monument’, Hawera & Normanby Star, 27 December 1884
• ‘Manaia’, Hawera & Normanby Star, 28 November 1885
• Extract from ‘News and Notes’, Hawera & Normanby Star, 16 March 1886
• ‘The Manaia Monument’, Hawera & Normanby Star, 24 April 1886
• ‘The Unveiling of the Manaia Monument’, Wanganui Herald, 28 April 1886
• Extract from ‘News and Notes’, Hawera & Normanby Star, 15 April 1886
• G.L. Baker, ‘Livingston, James 1840–1915’, Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, updated 22 June 2007
• James Belich, ‘The turn of the tide’, in The New Zealand Wars and the Victorian interpretation of racial conflict, Penguin, Auckland, 1998, pp. 258–88
• David Green, ‘Gudgeon, Walter Edward (1841–1920)’, Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, updated 22 June 2007
• Kete New Plymouth, Manaia War Memorials
• N.A.C. McMillan, ‘Tempsky, Gustavus Ferdinand von (1828–1868)’, Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, updated 22 June 2007
• W.T. Parham, ‘Roberts, John Mackintosh (1840–1928)’, Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, updated 22 June 2007