northern and Hauraki groups in the purchase area, even though, it seems, the rights of such groups were generally known. Indeed, within a month after the receipt for £1000 was signed in Auckland, the exclusive right of the Tauranga Moana chiefs to sell Katikati- Te Puna was challenged by other groups, including some from the Hauraki district. Four letters were sent to the government, one each from Nepia Te Ngarara and Taraia, and two from Te Kou o Rehua Tawera, on behalf of Ngati Tamatera, Tawera/Ngati Pukenga, and Waitaha.³² Although Ngai Te Rangi had a valid claim to the area through take raupatu, the writers of these letters were adamant that the take of the Hauraki groups had not been extinguished by the Ngai Te Rangi conquest of the area.

As a consequence of these letters, Clarke and Mackay arbitrated at two meetings that were arranged to hear the claims from a limited number of representatives from Ngati Tamatera, Ngai Te Rangi and Tawera in December 1864. As Stokes has observed, the restrictions placed on attendance in the official invitation ‘suggest that it was not considered necessary to have representatives of the Hauraki tribes, Ngati Paoa and Ngati Maru, present, nor any others such as Pirirakau, Ngati Tokotoko, Ngati Hinerangi and so on who did not recognise any Ngai Te Rangi right to offer the Katikati-Te Puna land to the Crown’.³³ Thus, the Crown again failed to properly consider the complex nature of the district’s geo-politics.

One of the advertised meetings took place from 12 December to 17 December. Te Moananui appeared on behalf of Ngati Tamatera and Hohepa Hikutaia and Te Harawira on behalf of Ngai Te Rangi. The disputed areas were identified in a map drawn by Te Moananui, and extensive minutes were taken.³⁴ From the evidence given, it was acknowledged that both Ngai Te Rangi and Ngati Tamatera ‘exercised certain rights of ownership’ in the area. Mackay forwarded the documents generated by the meeting to the Native Minister in January 1865, including the decision of the arbitrators: that the Katikati block ‘be surveyed and valued, and that the amount of the purchase money be equally divided’.³⁵

³² For details see Stokes, The Allocation of Reserves, vol. 1, pp. 32-3.

³³ Stokes, The Allocation of Reserves, vol. 1, p. 35.

³⁴ Stokes, Te Raupatu, vol. 2, p. 88.

³⁵ ‘Decision of the Arbitrators’, December 1864, AJHR 1867, p. 7.