AUCKLAND, Sunday: On Frriday 17 May 1833, the first official British Resident inaugurated in NZ, James Busby, came ashore at the Pahia Mission Station for the first formal meeting between Maori chiefs and the representative of a great power.
The Herald on Sunday looked back: “Hundreds of Maori greeted Busby and his retinue of Navy officers with a vigorous haka.” (Now that would’ve been something to see! – Ed).
The Herald on Sunday: “Hundreds of Maori greeted Busby and his retinue of Navy officers with a vigorous haka.”
The Treaty of Waitangi was signed on Thursday 6 February 1840.
Busby’s duties, as outlined in instructions from Governor Richard Bourke of New South Wales, were to protect the more orderly British settlers and traders and prevent ‘outrages’ by the less orderly Europeans against Maori.
Busby helped draft the Treaty of Waitangi.
- The photo was taken by NZ artist James Ingram MacDonald.
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