Why we need to open up about past Māori and Pākehā conflict
From the New Zealand Listener , 25 May 2019 by Sally Blundell Calls are growing for us to take a more honest look at our past, particularly the wars over land and power that shaped the country. It began with a single musket shot, fired perhaps by accident, in Wairau, near Nelson, in 1843. It ended with desultory gunfire in a steep and sodden gorge south of Waikaremoana in 1873. Bookended by these two inglorious events, the New Zealand Wars claimed the lives of an estimated 2250 M ā ori and 560 British and colonial troops. Records are far from complete, but, including the wounded, the number of casualties could be more than 6000. The result was the transfer of nearly 1.5 million hectares of land into European hands, most commonly through the 1863 New Zealand Settlements Act. They changed the social, economic and political landscape forever. Still, says Wellington historian Vincent O’Malley, we barely talk about it. Commemorations are few, many of the wa