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Within a month the circulating debentures were withdrawn, the pre-emptive right of the Crown over native lands resumed, the sale of fire-arms to natives prohibited, and negotiations with Heké and his fellow insurgent chief, Kawiti, sternly broken off. The Governor set to work to end the war.
I thought I was the person who should have been nervous, because I was in his country almost alone. I liked him, and really all the old Maori chiefs were fine fellows shrewd, dignified, with a high sense of honour. Heke made me his heir when he died, to the neglect of his wife, but of course I gave her everything. This Heke was the son-in-law of Hongi, a Napoleonic figure in Maori annals.
The British destroyed the palisades, and carried off the stores of potatoes and other provisions which they found inside. Governor Grey.# Fitzroy was preparing to chase Heke and Kawiti into their fastnesses, when he was recalled. The English Government thought he had not acted wisely in some ways and they blamed him for disobeying their instructions.
Fitzroy published a proclamation offering £100 for his capture, and Heke replied by offering £100 for the head of Fitzroy. The Governor now caused a new flagstaff to be set up, all sheathed with iron at the bottom, and with a strong wooden house attached to it, in which a score of soldiers were always to keep guard.
Fitzroy said he would redress some wrongs the natives said they suffered, and having obtained from Heke ten muskets by way of fine and having again set up the flagstaff he returned to Auckland. But before the year was ended Heke approached the town once more with 100 armed men. He insulted it from the hills, cut down the flagstaff again, and then withdrew to the forests.
The Maoris, now no longer under cover, were no match for the soldiers, and they fled, leaving behind them all the provisions that were to have kept them for a whole season. This discouraged them, and Heke and Kawiti saw their men scatter out and join themselves to the quieter tribes for the sake of food. They therefore wrote to Grey asking peace, and promising to give no further trouble.
In the winter of 1844, Honé Heké, son-in-law of the great Hongi, presuming on the weakness of the Government, swaggered into Kororáreka, plundered some of the houses, and cut down a flagstaff on the hill over the town on which the English flag was flying.
A chief named Waka-Nene with his men kept Heke in check, while Fitzroy sent to Sydney and received 160 soldiers with two cannon. These landed at the Bay of Islands, but Waka-Nene begged the Governor not to hurry into hostilities. He arranged for a friendly meeting. Fitzroy met nine principal chiefs, who apologised and made Heke send also a written apology.
But, on the other hand, the Maoris had learnt a lesson. They could not fight against English bayonets in the open, but while taking aim from behind palisades they were safe. Therefore they began in different places to strengthen their fortresses, and Honi Heke added new defences to his pah of Oheawai, which stood in the forest nineteen miles from the coast.
While this work was going on, a small detachment of soldiers occupying a blockhouse on the flagstaff hill was surprised by Heke and his party, who killed four men, and drove away the remainder, and levelled the flagstaff to the ground.
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