Boyd massacre

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Enlevement du Boyd par les Nouveaux Zealandais , Louis Auguste Sainson , 1839
The Burning of the Boyd, Walter Wright , 1908
The Blowing Up of the Boyd, Louis John Steele , 1889

As Boyd -Massaker ( english Boyd Massacre ) in New Zealand killing the crew of the cargo ship is Boyd in Whangaroa Harbor as a revenge of Māori designated in 1809, when only four sailors the massacre survived. The act of revenge was preceded by the use of force and discipline against Te Ara , a young Māori chief in the area who was a passenger on the ship and was flogged for an alleged refusal to work or an allegation of theft.

background

The Boyd was a 395-ton brigantine 106  feet long and 30 feet wide. The convict ship sailed from Australia's Sydney Cove to Whangaroa on the east coast of the Northland region in New Zealand in October 1809 to load spars made from kauri wood . The ship was under the command of Captain John Thompson and had a crew of around 70 seamen, including convicts who had completed their deportation sentences and four or five New Zealanders who wanted to return to their homeland. Among the latter was Te Ara , the crew known by the name George , the son of a chief of Whangaroa . Te Ara had worked as a seaman on various ships for several years, as well as participated in a seal hunt expedition on islands in the Southern Ocean .

On board the Boyd , he was expected to work on the passage. According to some reports, Te Ara is said to have refused to work on the ship either because he was ill or because of his status as the son of a chief. Another account describes that the ship's cook accidentally threw some tin spoons overboard and now accused Te Ara of stealing them in order not to be whipped himself. Alexander Berry wrote in a letter about the event: “The captain was in too much of a hurry to blame a minor theft.” In any case, the captain refused the accused food and had him tied on a windlass and whipped. This treatment led Te Ara to seek revenge. He regained the captain's trust and convinced him to go to Whangaroa Harbor as it was the best place to get the wood he wanted.

In Whangaroa , Te Ara reported the abuse to his tribe and showed the marks of the whip on his back. According to Māori customs , a plan was made to seek revenge. Whipping was a common punishment for minor crimes under British law. A British man could be hanged for stealing goods worth as little as 5 shillings. In Māori culture , a chief was privileged and would not bow to the authority of an outsider. Corporal punishment of a chief's son was therefore - even if legal under British law - a loss of reputation or " mana ", and for the Māori this was bound to result in violent retribution.

The murders

Three days after the Boyd's arrival , the Māori invited Captain Thompson to follow their canoes to find suitable kauri trees. Thompson , his first officer, and three others followed the canoes to the mouth of the Kaeo River . The rest of the crew stayed on board with the passengers and prepared to return to England.

When the boats were out of sight of the Boyd , the Māori attacked, killing everyone with clubs and axes. The Māori stripped the dead and a group of them disguised themselves as Europeans. Another group took the bodies to their Pā (village) because they were about to be eaten.

At dusk, the disguised Māori took the ship's longboat towards Boyd . At the beginning of the night you docked at the ship and were greeted by the crew. Other Māori waited in their canoes for the signal to attack. A ship's officer was killed first, then the Māori climbed on deck and killed the crew except for five survivors who had fled over the rigging into the mast and from where they had to watch the bodies being dismembered. Some of the passengers were also called on deck and killed as well.

The next morning, the survivors of the crew saw a large canoe with Chief Te Pahi from the Bay of Islands pull into the natural harbor. He had come to trade with the Māori of Whangaroa . Te Pahi picked up the Boyd survivors and dropped them on the coast. Te Pahi observed that the pursuers killed all but one of the refugees.

Only five Europeans were spared in the massacre: Ann Morley and her baby, who were seeking shelter in a cabin, the cabin boy Thomas Davis (or Davison ), who was hiding in the hold, the second mate and the two-year-old Betsy Broughton . The latter was picked up by a local chief who stuck a feather in her hair and held it for three weeks until she was rescued. The second mate was later killed and eaten because he was no longer useful for making fish hooks.

Destruction of the Boyd

The Māori of Whangaroa dragged the Boyd towards their village until it ran aground near Motu Wai ( Red Island ). They looted the ship; Flour, cured meat and bottles of wine and other things were thrown overboard because the main interest was in the large load of powder and muskets.

About 20 Māori smashed barrels of gunpowder and tried to make the captured muskets functional. Their chief Piopio produced sparks with a flint , which suddenly ignited the powder. A massive explosion killed him and nine of his tribesmen on the spot. The fire that broke out by the explosion was fed by the whale oil on board. The Boyd burned out in a very short time and was declared taboo by the Māori because of the death of her relatives .

Rescue mission

When news of the massacre reached the European settlements, Captain Alexander Berry went on a rescue mission on the City of Edinburgh , rescuing the four survivors, Ann Morley with her baby, Thomas Davis and Betsy Broughton .

City of Edinburgh crew found piles of human bones on the bank with many signs of cannibalism. Captain Berry captured two of the Māori chiefs responsible for the massacre . First he took her hostage for exchange against the survivors. Berry then threatened to take them with him to Europe, where they would have to answer for their crimes if they did not surrender the Boyd 's papers . After receiving the papers, he released them on condition that they be demoted in rank and kept as slaves; which he probably didn't really believe that his conditions would be met. Those so spared proved to be grateful, and so Berry probably avoided further bloodshed, which would have been inevitable if the chiefs had been executed.

The four survivors drove with Berry's ship towards the Cape of Good Hope , where the ship was so damaged in a storm that they had to call for repairs to Lima in Peru and Mrs. Morley died there. Davis traveled to England with Archduke Charles and later worked for Berry in New South Wales . He drowned in 1822 while exploring the approach to the Shoalhaven River with Berry . Betsy Broughton and Mrs. Morley's child were brought to Rio de Janeiro by Captain Berry , from where they returned to Sydney in May 1812 aboard the Atalanta . Betsy Broughton later married Charles Throsby , a nephew of the explorer Charles Throsby, and died in 1891.

aftermath

On March 26, 1810, sailors from five whaling ships took revenge for the massacre of the Boyd's crew . Their target was the Pā Māori chief Te Pahi , who was on an island and had apparently tried to rescue the survivors from aboard the Boyd , but was mistaken for Te Puhi , one of the leaders of the massacre. The sailors killed around 60 residents of the village and destroyed their homes. Te Pahi escaped injured but died weeks later of wounds sustained in clashes with his tribesmen and members of tribes in the Whangaroa area .

News of the Boyd massacre reached Australia and Europe . This delayed planned visits by missionaries until 1814. A leaflet spread across Europe advising against visiting "this accursed coast of New Zealand" or you risked being eaten by cannibals.

Literature and Illustrations

Details of the massacre have been presented in several non-fiction books, including The Burning of the 'Boyd' - A Saga of Culture Clash by Wade Doak from 1984, or it has been the subject of children's books such as B. Diana Menefy's The Shadow of the Boyd from 2010 or Ian Macdonald's The Boyd Massacre from 2005. Ian Macdonald claimed to be a descendant of Betsey Broughton .

The massacre was also echoed in paintings. The Boyd explosion was painted in a painting by Louis Auguste Sainson entitled “ Enlevement du Boyd par les Nouveaux Zealandais ” in 1839, Louis John Steele presented his painting “ The Blowing Up of the Boyd ” in 1889 and Walter Wright in 1908 in his work " The Burning of the Boyd " depicted the destruction of the ship.

literature

  • Judith Sidney Hornabrook : “Boyd”, Massacre of . In: Alexander Hare McLintock (Ed.): An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand . Wellington 1966 ( online [accessed December 17, 2015]).
  • Robert McNab : From Tasman To Marsden . A History of Northern New Zealand from 1642 to 1818 . J. Wilkie & Company , Dunedin 1914, Chapter X. The Massacre of the Boyd, 1809 and 1810 , pp. 125–137 (English, online [accessed December 17, 2015]).
  • Robert McNab : From Tasman To Marsden . A History of Northern New Zealand from 1642 to 1818 . J. Wilkie & Company , Dunedin 1914, Chapter XI. After the Massacre, 1810 to 1814 , pp. 138–153 (English, online [accessed December 17, 2015]).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d A frontier of chaos? - The Boyd incident . In: New Zealand History . Ministry for Culture & Heritage , March 11, 2014, accessed December 17, 2015 .
  2. ↑ a b Anthony G. Flude : The Boyd massacre - a tragic story of carnage, looting and burningt . Ministry for Culture & Heritage , 2001, accessed on August 28, 2019 (English, original website no longer available).
  3. ↑ a b The Boyd . In: The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser . Sydney May 8, 1832, p.  4 (English, online [accessed February 16, 2018]).
  4. ^ Augustus Earle : A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827 . Whitecombe & Tombs Ltd , Christchurch 1909, Chapter XI - The Massacre of the "Boyd" (English, online ( Project Gutenberg ) [TXT; 250  kB ; accessed on December 17, 2015] draftsman on the ship “ The Beagle ”).
  5. ^ William Henry Giles Kingston : Shipwrecks and Disasters at Sea . George Routledge and Sons , London 1837, p.  34 (English, online [accessed February 16, 2018]).
  6. ^ McNab : From Tasman To Marsden . 1914, Chapter X. The Massacre of the Boyd, 1809 and 1810 , pp.  125-137 .
  7. ^ McNab : From Tasman To Marsden . 1914, Chapter XI. After the Massacre, 1810 to 1814 , pp.  138-153 .
  8. ↑ Alexander Berry : Particulars of a late visit to New Zealand, and of the measures taken for rescuing some of English captives there . In: The Edinburgh Magazine . London April 1819, p.  304 (English).
  9. ↑ Meg Swords : Alexander Berry and Elizabeth Wollstonecraft . North Shore Historical Society , North Shore, Australia 1978, ISBN 978-0-85587-128-4 , pp.  9 (English).
  10. ^ Ship News . In: The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser . Sydney May 8, 1832, p.  2 (English, online [accessed February 16, 2018]).
  11. ^ Frank Hurley : Betsy Broughton . In: Trove . National Library of Australia , accessed February 16, 2018 (English, compiled between 1910 and 1962).
  12. ↑ Angela Ballara : Te Pahi . In: Dictionary of New Zealand Biography 1870-1900 . Volume II . Bridget Williams Books , Wellington 1990 (English, online [accessed February 17, 2018]).
  13. ^ William Williams : Christianity Among The New Zealanders . Gary Williams , accessed February 16, 2018 .