I Shall Not Die: Titokowaru's War, 1868-1869

"You were made a Pakeha, and the name of England was given to you for your tribe. I was made a Maori, and New Zealand was the name given to me. You forgot that there was a space fixed between us of great extent - the sea. You, forgetting that, jumped over from that place to this. I did not jump over from this place to that ...Move off from my places to your own places in the midst of the sea." Titokowaru.

Straddling the Maori and European worlds of the 1860s, Titokowaruwas one of New Zealand’s greatest leaders. A brilliant strategist, he used every device to save the Taranaki people from European invasion. When peaceful negotiation failed, he embarked on a stunning military campaign against government forces. His victories were many, before the battle he lost. Although he was ‘forgotten by the Pakeha as a child forgets a nightmare’, his vision was one that would endure.

Titokowaru was born into the Ngati Ruanuitribe of South Taranaki in 1823. Trained as a leader by his people, he was converted to Christianity in 1843, taking the name Joseph Orton. For nearly 20 years a pacifist and Methodist teacher, he eventually became disillusioned with Christianity, and joined the bitter fighting of the period -protesting against continual land loss and the erosion of his people’s rights. Titokowaru returned to pacifism under the leadership of Te Ua Haumene, whose mantle he inherited on the death of the Pai Marire prophet. Through 1866 Titokowa rulead a hikoi of peace, trying to heal the wounds of war in South Taranaki. The mission failing, Titokowaru’s war broke out, on 9 June 1868. A brilliant strategist, Titokowaru nearly succeeded in repelling the colonial forces. At the last moment, however, his supporters failed him… in a mystery that has never been solved. As James Belich suggests, it was perhaps the old traditions of his people that undermined Titokowaru’s feats of leadership in wars that were to shape the country’s history. For he was truly a man of two worlds, negotiating both with an extraordinary dexterity.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 Titokowaru's Peace -- Chapter 2 The Year of the Daughters -- Chapter 3 'I Shall Not Die' -- Chapter 4 The Patea Field Force -- Chapter 5 The Death of Kane -- Chapter 6 McDonnell's Revenge -- Chapter 7 The Beak -- Chapter 8 The Little Tyrant -- Chapter 9 The Battle of Moturoa -- Chapter 10 Handley's Woolshed -- Chapter 11 The Brink -- Chapter 12 Tauranga Ika -- Chapter 13 The Lion at Bay -- Chapter 14 The Hunt -- Epilogue: The Last Battle.

Author Biography

James Belich, ONZM, FRSNZ, has written several histories shaping the way we see New Zealand today. The recipient of many honours and awards, he is Research Professor of History at Victoria University of Wellington. His bestselling publications include Replenishing the Earth: The Settler Revolution and the Rise of the Angloworld, 1780-1930 (Oxford University Press, 2009) and Penguin's two-volume history of New Zealand, Making Peoples (1996) and Paradise Reforged (2001).