In the vestibule of St Bride's Church. Mauku, there hangs a framed yellowing typewritten account of fragments relating to the area's early history, including a reference to the Wheeler brothers John and Allen from the diary of the noted Prussian adventurer and soldier Gustavus Von Tempsky.
It was the maiden fight of the Forest Rangers and the Mauku Forest Rifles, and the guerilla veteran Von Tempsky in his journal gave high praise to the settler-soldiers. In the height of the skirmish he found time to admire the sang froid of the Mauku men: “There are some cool hands amongst those Mauku Rifles. There are big Wheeler and little Wheeler . . . watching the Maoris like cats; they have holes through their coats, but none through their skins as yet." Their commander Lieutenant Lusk he described as “a man of consummate judgement about Maori warfare.”
(The Mellsop Reunion programme includes a visit to St Brides churchyard as part of the Saturday bus tour, and a Sunday afternoon service in the church to honour past generations.)
To understand what happened on this maiden fight which resulted in 'bullet holes in their coats', we once again rely on the foremost historian of the early period, James Cowan, for a colourful account of the events that began early on the morning of September 8, related in his volume of The New Zealand Wars: A History of the Maori Campaigns and Pioneering Period: Volume 1 (1845 - 64)
Cowan reports that a small body of colonial troops, consisting of about thirty-five of the Forest Rangers, under Lieutenant Jackson and Ensigns Von Tempsky and J. C. Hay, and fifteen of the Mauku Company of Forest Rifles, under Lieutenant Lusk, started out from the Mauku stockade on a bush-scouting expedition in search of Maoris.
They began by reconnoitring the forest and the bush-clearings in the direction of Patumahoe and Pukekohe. They reached the farms of Lusk and H. Hill, between Patumahoe and Pukekohe Hill, and found that the "Maori marauders" had been there.
"Lusk's house had been pillaged. On the edge of what was known as the “Big Clearing,” belonging to Mr. Hill, the Maori had shot a bullock. The force, hearing the shots, divided, and twenty, under Jackson, Lusk, and Von Tempsky, scouted about the fringes of the paddock, keeping under cover of the bush. They received a sudden volley at a range of a few yards, and replied briskly. The natives were sheltered behind masses of fallen trees and undergrowth interlaced with supplejack. The other party of Rangers skirmished up on Jackson's left and joined their comrades. At last the Maori fire grew slacker, and the Rangers and Mauku Rifles charged into the bush, but their opponents had disappeared. An encampment was found with about a dozen rough huts."
Cowan reports that "only fleeting glimpses of the Maori had been obtained during the skirmishing, and any killed or wounded were carried off the field. It was reported afterwards that five had been killed. The European force suffered no casualties, although "several of the men had received bullets through cap or clothes."
The St Brides account provides one further detail which was not found in the Von Tempsky record presented by Cowan, and that was the "Big Wheeler" was Allen, and "Little Wheeler" was John.
Māori referred to the flamboyant and apparently fearless Von Tempsky as Manu-rau – a hundred birds – because of his ability to rush from one place to another like a flock of birds. Perhaps it was significant, then, that he died at Te Ngutu-o-te-Manu – ‘the Beak of the Bird’.
Von Tempsky's wide range of talents made him one of nineteeth century New Zealand's most colorful characters and something of a folk hero. Of noble birth from a family with a long military history, he had dash and elan but was also a "tireless self-publicist, avid for glory and admiration."
He'd originally trained in the military in Berlin, but grew bored and went gold mining in California. Bendigo and Coromandel before being offered British citizenship by Governor Grey and taken into the Forest Rangers, an irregular unit which the authorities believed could match the skills of the Maori in bush fighting.
(The New Zealand Dictionary of Biography notes British regular soldiers "had shown little aptitude for this type of warfare and were at a disadvantage.")
When he wasn't soldiering von Tempsky was a more than competent journalist, and an excellent amateur water colourist. His fine singing voice, good looks and charm made him a hostess's favourite when he visited his family in Auckland. (His wife and three children followed him to New Zealand and his daughter lived the rest of her life here.)
In an eerie twist of fate, he died on September 7 1868 - one day short of exactly five years from the date of that first Patumahoe skirmish with the Mauku Rifles. His body was never recovered and he was burned on a funeral pyre along with other Maori slain by the Maori defenders.
Epilogue
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