1835 Report

This report re-examines the evidence concerning Te Aro before and during the 1835 departure of Ngāti Mutunga for Wharekauri/Rēkohu. It brings together the primary witness statements identified by Alan Ward and Penny Ehrhardt and, for later corroboration, Angela Ballara’s translation of Wellington Native Land Court Minute Book 1H. The central question is whether Te Aro interests arose only from a general Matiu pānui made as Ngāti Mutunga departed, or whether identifiable interests at Te Aro had already been created by earlier tuku, invitations, occupation and kin-based arrangements. The evidence supports the latter: the Matiu arrangements were important, but they operated over an already differentiated landscape of rights and relationships. The later 1H evidence does not itself prove the terms of the 1835 arrangements; its value is in demonstrating continuity of the Te Aro community and the same network of named people.

2.1 Penny Ehrhardt — Ehrhardt’s 1992 Waitangi Tribunal report, Te Whanganui-a-Tara: Customary Tenure 1750–1850, has a dedicated section titled “Ngāti Mutunga’s gift”. She describes the departure as being accompanied by the handing over of Ngāti Mutunga interests and expressly notes that Taranaki and Ngāti Ruanui were already living between the Te Aro and Waitangi streams on the invitation of Ngātata-i-te-rangi.

Ehrhardt is particularly valuable because she identifies the different versions of what happened at Matiu and gives specific Native Land Court references for Mohi Ngāponga and Hēmi Pārai. She records that Mohi said there was no single formal disposition, while Hēmi Pārai described a specific allocation at Ngāūranga between Matangi’s people and the Te Aro people.

2.2 Alan Ward — Ward’s 1998 Wai 145 overview revisits the same primary material in greater detail and reproduces several witness statements at length. Ward considers the evidence sufficient to establish that a formal pānui or public agreement occurred at Matiu, but he also stresses that some rights pre-dated the pānui and that different witnesses described different pathways of succession. Ward is especially useful for the Patukawenga–Moturoa strand, the wording attributed to Mahau and Te Puni, and Te Manihera Te Toru’s long 1868 account of Mohi Ngāponga and Hēmi Pārai coming to Te Aro before the departure.

2.3 Angela Ballara and Wellington Native Land Court Minute Book 1H — Ballara’s 1998 Wai 145 J006 report is a translation commissioned by the Waitangi Tribunal of Māori verbatim evidence in Wellington Native Land Court Minute Book 1H. The evidence in 1H is later than the events of 1835 and must not be treated as a substitute for the earlier 1C and Spain Commission testimony. Its significance for this report is corroborative: it shows the continuing identification of Te Aro as a lived community and preserves a later witness’s association with the same network of people who appear in the earlier Te Aro evidence.

This statement by Ihikirere Te Waikapoariki is not evidence of the precise content of the 1835 tuku. It is important because Mohi and Hēmi Pārai are central to the pre-departure Te Aro evidence, while Marangai is independently identified within the later Te Aro leadership network. The 1H testimony therefore provides a later evidential check on continuity rather than an origin story for title.

3.1 Ngātata-i-te-rangi and the Te Aro invitation — Both Ward and Ehrhardt place Taranaki and Ngāti Ruanui at Te Aro before the 1835 migration. Ehrhardt states that they lived between the Te Aro and Waitangi streams on Ngātata-i-te-rangi’s invitation. Ward likewise describes Ngāti Haumia and Ngāti Tupaia as having moved to Te Aro and the Waitangi swamp at Ngātata-i-te-rangi’s invitation. This matters because it means the Te Aro interest of those communities did not begin with the final departure of Ngāti Mutunga. Their occupation already had a recognised customary basis.

3.2 Te Manihera Te Toru: Te Aro and Paekawakawa given before departure — Te Manihera Te Toru’s 1868 Native Land Court evidence provides the clearest chronological statement. He said Mohi Ngāponga came first to Kumutoto and Te Aro, then fetched the rest of the party, including Hēmi Pārai.

This is powerful evidence of a pre-departure tuku or authorised occupation. It also provides a direct bridge between Ngātata/Pōmare and the people later identified with Ngāti Haumia at Te Aro.

3.3 Patukawenga and earlier gifts — Ehrhardt records that, following fighting in Heretaunga, Patukawenga of Ngāti Mutunga made Waiwhetū tapu for Ngamotu, describing this as part of a sequence of gifts of land and resources. Wi Hape Pakao later said that the claims of Ngāti Tawhirikura, Ngāti Te Whiti and Te Matehou were “through this”.

Ward develops this further. He says Spain Commission evidence from Te Puni and Moturoa suggests Patukawenga’s invitation extended to cultivation at Te Aro, Pipitea and Tiakiwai, and records Moturoa’s claim that part of Te Aro belonged to Patukawenga and part to Pōmare.

4.1 Ehrhardt: multiple versions, not one uniform account — Ehrhardt explicitly warns that there were “several versions” of what happened at the meeting on Matiu concerning disposal of Ngāti Mutunga lands. This is an important methodological point: the source material should not be flattened into a single conveyancing narrative.

4.2 Mohi Ngāponga — Ehrhardt states that Mohi Ngāponga told the Native Land Court that there was no formal disposition made of the land. Ward also records Mohi’s more specific version concerning Ngāūranga:

Ward interprets Mohi’s evidence as consistent with Mohi asserting Te Aro rights for himself. That interpretation fits the earlier evidence that Mohi and Hēmi’s people were at Te Aro before the departure.

4.3 Hēmi Pārai — Ehrhardt preserves one of the most important primary statements for the Te Aro side of the question. Hēmi Pārai of Ngāti Haumia told the Native Land Court that Ngātata, Pōmare and Poki said:

This evidence describes a specific division or clarification of interests at Ngāūranga. It is not phrased as a blanket gift of all land to a single recipient. Ward later stresses the same point: some rights around the harbour were already occupied and required clarification rather than fresh creation.

4.4 Mahau — Ward quotes Mahau being asked directly at the Spain Commission whether the departing Ngāti Mutunga chiefs gave their lands to anyone. Mahau named Ngātata, Koteriki, Te Poki and Pōmare/Mare and said the land was given to Wharepouri.

Mahau later broadened the formulation to “Warepouri and us”, but distinguished Patukawenga, saying Patukawenga went away privately on the first vessel and did not give his Raurimu land to Moturoa. This shows that the witness himself differentiated between collective and individual interests.

4.5 Te Puni and Koteriki’s pānui — Te Puni told the Spain Commission that Koteriki uttered the pānui and recited the places it covered. Importantly, Te Aro was expressly named, together with Kumutoto, Pipitea, Omarukaikuru, Hataitai, Paekawakawa and other locations around the harbour and Hutt Valley.

This is strong evidence that Te Aro featured in the Matiu announcement. But its legal-customary effect still has to be understood alongside the pre-existing Te Aro interests attested by Te Manihera, Mohi and Hēmi Pārai.

4.6 Te Ropiha Moturoa on the Matiu purpose — Ward records Moturoa as saying that when Pōmare returned to Matiu between the first and second voyages, the departing people consented that Wharepouri should have their land. Moturoa also explained the strategic reason for returning to occupy the harbour:

This gives the Matiu arrangement a political and strategic context: filling the vacuum created by the departure and preventing rival occupation.

5.1 Moturoa’s claim through Patukawenga — The Patukawenga evidence is a separate and important strand. Ward reports that Moturoa said the greater part of the relevant land belonged to Patukawenga and that Moturoa did not derive his occupation from Wharepouri after 1835. Instead he traced his rights through Matohia and Patukawenga.

This is direct primary testimony of a Patukawenga-derived Te Aro interest, separate from the general Matiu pānui narrative.

5.2 Patukawenga leaves Ngake — Moturoa later testified in Barker’s claim that Patukawenga left his son Ngake with him when departing. Moturoa treated that act as carrying continuing authority, particularly at Pipitea.

Ward cautions that Moturoa had an interest in tracing his rights through Patukawenga rather than through Wharepouri. That is a proper evidential caution, but it does not eliminate the testimony.

6.1 Ehrhardt’s account of the Te Aro community — Ehrhardt records that after the departure, Ngāti Ruanui remained at Te Aro alongside Ngāti Haumia and Ngāti Tupaia. She names the principal chiefs as Toko, Puihi, Pukahu and Marangi of Ngāti Ruanui, and Ngāponga, Tamati Weremu and Pārai of Taranaki. She also records two Ngāti Mutunga residents. Ehrhardt further notes that Mohi Ngāponga claimed Te Aro people had a share at Pito-one and Heretaunga, while Mahau and Te Puni asserted that Te Aro belonged to Ngāti Te Whiti and Ngāti Tawhirikura chiefs. Crucially, she notes that Mahau admitted his anger at a Taranaki curse influenced his adverse characterisation of the Te Aro people.

Source: Ehrhardt, pp.27–28 (PDF pp.29–30), citing OLC 906 evidence of Wi Tako, Mohi Ngāponga, Te Puni and Mahau.

6.2 Wi Tako and the internal division of Te Aro — Ward records Wi Tako’s 1842 evidence that the Ngāti Tupaia and Ngāti Haumia communities occupied different “ends” of the Te Aro settlement. Hori Ngāpaka gave corresponding evidence in 1868. This supports a recognised internal division within Te Aro rather than a single undifferentiated occupation.

Minute Book 1H provides a later evidential check on the reconstruction above. Ballara explains that the recurring expression “my home is at” may equally be translated as “my village/settlement is at” or “I live at”, making the residential language in the translated evidence particularly useful when identifying continuing communities.

Source: Ballara, Wai 145 J006, translator’s note to Wellington 1H, translation PDF p.3.

At minute-book p.348, Ihikirere Te Waikapoariki stated that he lived at Te Aro and said that he had heard of Te Kepa Ngāpapa’s death from Mohi, Hēmi Pārai, Hakaraia and Marangai. This is a compact but significant piece of evidence because Mohi and Hēmi are central actors in the pre-departure Te Aro narrative, while Marangai belongs to the leadership network independently identified at Te Aro.

The statement should be used carefully. It dates from the later nineteenth-century Native Land Court record and concerns knowledge of a death after the Parihaka meeting of 1870. It therefore cannot prove what was said or transferred at Matiu in 1835. Its probative value is continuity: a witness identifying his home as Te Aro places Mohi, Hēmi Pārai, Hakaraia and Marangai within his remembered Te Aro social world. The same names and community relationships remain visible decades after the events described in the 1C and Spain Commission evidence.

This later corroboration strengthens the report’s three-stage evidential structure: first, authorised occupation and localised interests existed before the Wharekauri departure; secondly, the Matiu meeting operated as an important process of transfer, confirmation or reorganisation over that existing landscape; and thirdly, later Native Land Court evidence shows continuity of the Te Aro community and its principal people. The stages should not be collapsed into one another.

1. Te Aro was not an empty or undifferentiated space awaiting allocation on the departure of Ngāti Mutunga. Taranaki and Ngāti Ruanui groups were already living there before the 1835 migration.

2. Te Manihera’s evidence is explicit that Te Aro and Paekawakawa were given to the Mohi Ngāponga/Hēmi Pārai party before any Ngāti Mutunga left.

3. Ehrhardt’s reconstruction independently supports a pre-departure invitation by Ngātata-i-te-rangi to Taranaki and Ngāti Ruanui between the Te Aro and Waitangi streams.

4. Hēmi Pārai’s evidence describes a specific allocation at Ngāūranga between Matangi’s people and Pārai, Pakuahi and Mohi, showing that departure arrangements could clarify local boundaries rather than create every right anew.

5. There was nevertheless substantial primary evidence for a formal Matiu pānui or public agreement associated with the departure. Te Puni expressly named Te Aro in the pānui.

6. Mohi Ngāponga’s evidence materially qualifies the notion of a single blanket transfer. Ehrhardt says he denied a formal disposition; Ward records him limiting the land left to Wharepouri and Matangi to Ngāūranga while maintaining Te Aro interests.

7. Patukawenga is a distinct source of customary authority. Moturoa directly stated that Patukawenga gave him Tiakiwai, Pipitea and Te Aro.

8. The evidence of Ngake being left behind by Patukawenga shows that departure did not necessarily equate to abandonment of every individual or kin-based interest.

9. Wi Tako’s evidence about different “ends” of Te Aro, together with Ehrhardt’s identification of principal Ngāti Ruanui and Taranaki chiefs, supports a structured internal pattern of occupation at Te Aro.

10. Ballara’s translation of 1H provides later corroboration of continuity. Ihikirere Te Waikapoariki identified himself as living at Te Aro and named Mohi, Hēmi Pārai, Hakaraia and Marangai within his remembered network. This does not prove the terms of the 1835 tuku, but it materially supports continuity of the Te Aro community.

Taken together, Ward, Ehrhardt and the translated primary evidence support a more nuanced conclusion than a simple statement that “Ngāti Mutunga gifted Te Aro to Te Āti Awa when they left for Wharekauri”. The evidence shows several overlapping pathways of customary interest.

First, Ngāti Haumia/Taranaki and Ngāti Tupaia/Ngāti Ruanui were already established at Te Aro before the migration, under an invitation or tuku associated with Ngātata-i-te-rangi/Pōmare. Te Manihera’s evidence that Te Aro and Paekawakawa were given to Mohi and Hemi’s party before any Ngāti Mutunga left is particularly strong.

Second, Patukawenga exercised a distinct source of authority. Moturoa’s testimony that Patukawenga gave him Tiakiwai, Pipitea and Te Aro cannot be reduced to the later Matiu pānui. The act of leaving Ngake behind also indicates a possible mechanism for continuity of Patukawenga-linked interests.

Third, the Matiu meeting was real and important. Mahau, Te Puni and Moturoa provide evidence of a public transfer or endorsement, and Te Puni expressly includes Te Aro in Koteriki’s pānui. But Ehrhardt and Ward both preserve evidence showing that not every witness understood the event as one blanket disposition. Mohi Ngāponga’s account and Hēmi Pārai’s localised allocation at Ngāūranga are especially important qualifications.

Fourth, the later Native Land Court record provides an important check on this reconstruction. Ballara’s translation of Wellington Minute Book 1H preserves evidence from Ihikirere Te Waikapoariki identifying himself with Te Aro and referring to Mohi, Hēmi Pārai, Hakaraia and Marangai within the same remembered social world. This evidence is later than the events of 1835 and should not be used to manufacture an earlier title. Its significance is continuity. The people appearing in the earlier accounts of Te Aro remained identifiable as a Te Aro community in the later Native Land Court evidence.

The most defensible historical interpretation is therefore that the 1835 Matiu pānui operated within an existing network of tuku, occupation, kinship and local authority. It endorsed and reorganised succession to areas being vacated by Ngāti Mutunga, but it did not necessarily erase or recreate from scratch the pre-existing customary interests at Te Aro. The evidential sequence is best understood as pre-existing authorised occupation, followed by 1835 confirmation or reorganisation, followed by later documentary continuity.