Te Mahanga of Ngāpuhi

3.4.1 Te Mahanga and Maatara. He Whakaputanga me te Tiriti The Declaration and the Treaty

In their growing discovery of european society, Bay of islands Māori were by now beginning to look further afield than Sydney . The first Māori appears to have reached London in April 1806 (that is, slightly ahead of the unwilling Teina and Maki) . The previous September, the whaling ship Ferret (the same vessel that had brought Maatara to Sydney in 1804) had called at Te Puna en route to england with a cargo of whale oil . one of its passengers was John Savage, a military surgeon in new South Wales, who used the month or two he spent in the Bay of islands as the basis for his book, Some Account of New Zealand, published in 1807. While at Te Puna, Savage fielded several requests from Māori to accompany him back to england, and in the end he chose a young man named Te Mahanga to go with him.104 During his month-long stay in London, Te Mahanga was amazed by what he saw, such as the tall buildings, the coaches, and the items for sale . He was introduced to Savage’s patron, the wealthy aristocrat earl Fitzwilliam, who gave him an array of tools to take home with him . Te Mahanga sailed again on 13 June 1806 on the Ferret, which eventually returned him to the Bay of islands around March 1807. While Te Mahanga appears to have been a man of reasonable status at the Bay,106 we think o’Malley and Hutton were right to describe him as ‘no Te Pahi’, and to characterise his trip as ‘more in the nature of a private adventure than diplomatic mission’ .107 in later years, Te Mahanga claimed to have met King George and Queen Charlotte, but this seems most unlikely, since Savage did not record any such encounter in his book .108 Ormond Wilson noted that Te Mahanga ‘enjoyed boasting’, and reasoned that it was earl Fitzwilliam’s ‘imposing presence and the furnishings of his house (including a bust of the noble lord himself) which became transmuted in [his] mind from nobility to royalty’ .109 But if Te Mahanga’s journey was ‘little more than a sideshow in the broader story of northland cultural contacts’,110 that could not be said of the experience of other Māori who left new Zealand for england around the same time . in the middle of 1806, Maatara again set off from the Bay of islands at Te Pahi’s behest, this time bound for London on the whaler Richard and Mary . The ship arrived in Port Jackson on 16 July 1806 and left again on 8 September, reaching Gravesend on 17 April 1807 .111 in London, Maatara met Sir Joseph Banks, who wrote that Maatara had come to ‘see the King and obtain from his Majesty and the english nation axes, iron and musquets in order that they may be enabled to build houses and live as english men do’ .112 According to the merchant Alexander Berry, who – after Maatara’s return to new South Wales from england in late 1808 – brought him back to the Bay of islands on the City of Edinburgh, Maatara had ‘been treated in england with every attention, and even introduced to the royal family’ .113 if this is correct and we discount Te Mahanga’s claim, then Maatara was the first Māori to meet British royalty . it seems he did return with presents, although Marsden reported that these had all been stolen from him by the time he arrived home .114

• 104. Savage called Te Mahanga ‘Moyhanger’ and most historians have referred to him as ‘Moehanga’ (see, for example, Shawcross, ‘Maoris of the Bay of Islands’, fol 155 ; Ormond Wilson, Kororareka and Other Essays (Dunedin : John McIndoe, 1990), p 16 ; doc A11, p 81). However, Salmond reported that his descendants, such as Hori Parata, knew him as Te Mahanga : Between Worlds, pp 343, 551. Aldridge also said the use of ‘Moehanga’ was an error : doc B10, p 42.
• 105. Salmond, Between Worlds, pp 343–347, 529 ; Wilson, Kororareka, p 16. Note that on p 347 Salmond wrote that the Ferret got back to Port Jackson in December 1806 ‘and Mahanga made his way back to New Zealand’, but in her timeline of whaling ship movements on p 529 she wrote that the Ferret touched at Sydney to land dispatches on 17 February 1807 before leaving again and dropping Te Mahanga back in the Bay of Islands ‘c. March’.
• 106. Savage said Te Mahanga was ‘connected with families of the first consideration in these parts’ and an 1827 account described him as an uncle of the Ngāti Manu leader at Kororāreka, Te Whareumu : John Savage, Some Account of New Zealand : Particularly the Bay of Islands, and Surrounding Country, with a Description of the Religion and Government, Language, Arts, Manufactures, Manners and Customs of the Natives, &c &c. (1807 ; repr Christchurch : Capper Press, 1973), p 38 ; Salmond, Between Worlds, pp 347–348

He Whenua Rangatira A Mana Maori History of the Early–Mid Nineteenth Century by Manuka Henare

Perhaps the first Māori of Nu Tīreni to visit London was the high-ranking Ngāpuhi Moehanga (also known as Te Mahanga) of Kororāreka, who travelled with Dr John Savage in 1805. He stayed with Earl Fitzwilliams, Savage’s patron, and was able to observe aspects of London life but was not introduced to the King. On his return to Nu Tīreni, he became a postman delivering letters to sea captains when they were in the harbour. His ability to speak English enabled him to adopt this new occupation. Moehanga regaled listeners, Māori or Pākehā, about his visit, making observations of the Royal family, the London water supply system, horses, carriages, house furnishings, roads and agriculture. According to Marsden, Moehanga was listened to attentively.29 [Cited in Elder 1932: 202; cf. Colenso 1868: 66, MS 76; cf. Wilson 1990: 29.]

New Zealand History

Moehanga of Ngāpuhi became the first recorded Māori visitor to England when the whaler Ferret berthed in London. Moehanga (Te Mahanga) had boarded the Ferret when it visited the Bay of Islands late in 1805. While Māori had travelled as far as Tahiti and Australia in the late 18th century, Moehanga was the first to reach the northern hemisphere. He took a keen interest in the sights and people of London, which had a population of more than a million. He met Earl Fitzwilliam and also (he claimed subsequently) King George III and Queen Charlotte, who apparently gave him tools and money. Te Mahanga sailed on the Ferret when it left for Port Jackson (Sydney) in June. After spending the summer in Sydney, he returned to his home in the Bay of Islands in March 1807. Te Mahanga was still living in the Bay of Islands in 1827, when he was described as the uncle of Te Whareumu, the Ngāti Manu leader at Kororāreka (now Russell). Source: 'Moehanga becomes first Māori to visit England', URL: https://nzhistory.govt.nz/moehanga-becomes-first-maori-visit-england, (Ministry for Culture and Heritage), updated 5-Nov-2020.

Te Ara

In 1806 a Ngāpuhi man, Moehanga, was the first Māori to visit England, where he met King George III. Hongi Hika, the Ngāpuhi chief, was among a group that arrived in England in 1820. He sought an audience with King George IV, worked on a Māori grammar in Cambridge, and obtained muskets in Sydney on his return trip. Source: Carl Walrond, 'Māori overseas - 18th- and 19th-century travellers', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/maori-overseas/page-1 (accessed 30 April 2024).