Gold deposits obey certain rules, which knowledgeable prospectors are aware of. Gold is the heaviest metal on the earth and finds its way to the bottom of softer material. But, occasionally, just occasionally, there is a quirk of nature. Sometimes a nugget exceeds all others in size and weight. Sometimes it is so large that over a period of time it sinks down even further into the dense thick clay.
Danny’s shovel hit a hard object with a clunk.
‘Somethin’ here,’ he cried.
Abe went down on his knees and began clawing again, using his sailor’s strength to work around the rock. He cleared and cleaned a single knob on the boulder, an ovoid about the size of a goose egg. Danny kneeled down with him, a candle in his hand. Together they shined it on the stone. The flame reflected a yellowish hue.
Abe could hardly get the word out. ‘G-g-gold!’ he shrieked. ‘We struck gold. We’re rich, boys, rich!’ He continued to scrape away the clay from the monster beneath.
‘No, no,’ replied a worried Danny, ‘it can’t be gold – it’s too big. It’s as big as the bosun’s head – bigger, even. No gold, this.’
‘I tell you we’ve struck rich,’ yelled Abe, angry with his partner. ‘This is a nugget. A damn giant nugget. Look – see.’
Up on the surface, Striker was running backwards and forwards, only stopping to look down into the hole every two seconds.
‘Is it really gold, lads? Are we rich, boys? Is it a nugget for sure, Abe? We’ve only been here not more than four hours. How can it be? Others have spent months! Shall I come down there and assist?’
‘Don’t be daft, man,’ cried Abe. ‘How would we get it out? Here, we’ve cleared it now. Try to lift it, Danny-boy. If you can lift it, it’s not gold, for it’s only as big as an iron bucket. Lift it, and I’ll allow it’s not gold – but lift it, man, and I’ll kill you, for I’m anxious to be rich.’
Danny could not move the thing. It was indeed a nugget. Now the elderly Irishman let out a shriek of joy that pierced the ears of distant men, who came running in the darkness, waving their lamps. Suddenly the whole region was afire with the word. Riches had been found. A nugget the size of a bullock’s head. The earth had disgorged its old wealth and paupers were suddenly elevated to the status of kings.
Only one man for ten miles around was not excited. The man who had sold the earth’s bounty for a strip of canvas. All he could do was bury his face in his hands, and curse the fact that his deal had been made in a crowded saloon with witnesses all around, into whose faces he had smirked and winked, being such a clever fellow as to outwit some stupid sailors.
Oh, that Lady Luck, she was both princess and whore.
Two
1860, New Zealand
Captain Jack Crossman and three soldiers of the 88th Connaught Rangers were among the landing party. They were accompanying a naval party of some 60 bluejackets. Captain Cracroft, the commander of the bluejackets, was bringing his men ashore as reinforcements to assist in the defence of New Plymouth, which it was feared was about to be attacked by Maoris. However, once there was sand under their feet, firing could be heard away from the town. Cracroft decided to divert his men in that direction. For Crossman it was a rude welcome to the recently acquired colony known as New Zealand: he and his men had been thrust immediately into fresh conflict.
‘Captain Cracroft,’ said Jack, ‘do you need us?’
Jack and his men were laden with their kit, unloaded from the Niger, the ship that had brought them to New Plymouth.
‘We need all the men we can get,’ replied the naval officer, who looked a little harassed. ‘Are you willing, Captain?’
‘No, we an’t,’ said Private Wynter, a one-eyed pale individual, from behind his commanding officer. ‘I’ve still got the sea sickness on me. I an’t a well body.’
Sergeant King, his NCO, snapped, ‘Keep your silence, Wynter, or I’ll bring it on you myself.’
Jack nodded at Cracroft. ‘We’re with you, of course. It sounds like quite a battle up there . . .’ He cut his sentence short as a lieutenant-colonel leading a company of soldiers emerged hurrying from a woodland area ahead of them. The firing could still be heard, so the battle was not over, yet here were soldiers heading in the opposite direction. Captain Cracroft hailed the colonel.
‘Where are you going?’
The other officer looked anxious and seemed upset.
‘I have to return to New Plymouth by dark. My orders.’
‘But isn’t there fighting up there?’
The lieutenant-colonel looked uncomfortable as he urged his officers and men, most of whom appeared disgusted with their commander, onward towards the town.
‘Yes, the Taranaki Rifles and militia are attacking the Kaipopo pa – but I have to get on. Colonel Gold’s orders, not mine.’ He looked anxiously at the darkening sky. ‘Not mine,’ he repeated. Then, seemingly as an afterthought, the lieutenant-colonel added, ‘I have sent some men to assist.’ Then he hurried away, waving his small force on with his sword.
‘A bunch of civilians,’ snorted a midshipman standing alongside Cracroft, ‘and he’s leaving them to it?’
‘Let’s get on,’ ordered the naval captain, ‘before we can’t see our hands in front of our faces.’
Wynter started whining again. ‘What about our kit, sir?’ he said, addressing Jack. ‘If we leave it here, it’ll get stolen for certain. You know what these darkies are like.’
Corporal Gwilliams growled, ‘Not everyone’s got your morals, Wynter. Some folk respect private property, darkies or not.’
Sergeant King said, ‘Pile it up at the base of that palm tree . . .’
‘This ain’t no palm, Sarge, this here’s a fern,’ corrected Gwilliams, dumping his kit. ‘Ancient plant, the fern. Older’n history.’
‘Thank you for that botany lesson, Corporal. Just heft your Enfield on your shoulder and we’ll be on our way,’ King said, with a touch of asperity in his tone. ‘Come on, catch up with the officer, you two. Move your backsides. And don’t give me one of your looks, Wynter, or I’ll knock it through to the back of your head.’
Sergeant King believed discipline had to come from his fists, which were indeed heavy and hammer-like objects. normal means of correction were too slow for him. His small command of two spies and saboteurs was always on the move, often in enemy territory. To place a man under arrest was not feasible when in enemy country and needed consideration of rules and laws, and required paperwork. This method was far too slow and indeed impossible when one was crawling through the bush, surrounded by insurgents. Physical threats were swifter and more effective. Sometimes King actually needed to carry them out, taking his man out of sight of the officer and flattening him with fists that had been formed in the forge of his father’s blacksmith shop. Gwilliams had been thumped soundly. So had Wynter, more than once. Gwilliams had learned quickly, but Wynter was one of those men who forgot his pain in a very short time. Moreover he seemed to be able to absorb punishment like a sponge takes in water, and still ask for more.
As the column marched through the wooded slopes, a young midshipman, not much more than twelve or thirteen years of age, came running to the four soldiers. He was clutching three cutlasses.
‘Beg pardon, sir,’ he said breathlessly to Jack. ‘Captain’s compliments an’ says you might need these.’ He stared for a few moments at Jack’s left wrist, suddenly realizing he was offering the cutlass to an arm without a hand on the end. ‘Sorry, sir,’ he said, blushing. ‘Didn’t see.’
Jack smiled at the boy who seemed in a high state of excitement, told him not to fret, and ordered King to take the cutlasses. Sergeant King handed the broad-bladed weapons around. Gwilliams swished his through the air, slicing the atmosphere with satisfaction.
Wynter looked at his broad-bladed cutlass in horror. ‘Whaddo I want this for?’
Sergeant King replied, ‘Obviously we’re expecting close-quarter fighting.’
‘Can’t I use me bayonet? I an’t never used one
of these things.’
‘Stick it in your belt then,’ came King’s reply.
A short time later, the firing became louder as the column reached the front line. Sprawled on the ground and under cover were the British militia, firing at a man-made hill ahead of them. It was Jack’s first sight of a pa, an earth-and-timber fort built by the Maoris. There were rifle pits dug in and around the tiered earthworks, and a wicker palisade around the whole. It reminded Jack vaguely of Maiden Castle, an Iron-Age hill fort in Dorset. The pa looked formidable. Jack had attacked and overrun fortified positions in the Crimea and such attacks were often very costly. He wondered if a frontal assault was going to be ordered here, since progress could not be made by simply exchanging fire. His stomach tied in a knot at the thought. Jack was no coward, but dodging bullets as thick as a swarm of bees, while running over open ground was one of the most terrifying experiences in warfare.
Suddenly a huge man appeared above the palisade, his brown body gleaming with sweat. His long black hair flowed in the wind as he raised a muscled arm and shook his fist at the militia. Jack found his spyglass with his good hand and flicked it open. Putting it to his eye he observed a magnificent specimen of a handsome warrior with a tattooed face, arms and shoulders, muscles standing out like iron ridges from his body. The warrior stuck out his tongue the length of his chin and then yelled: ‘Come on, pakeha. What are you waiting for? Come and fight like men or go home to your wives.’
Dozens of shots rang out as the militia and navy sought to rid the skyline of this open target. But they were unsuccessful. The Maori had ducked down again, laughing as he did so.
Sergeant King said to a sailor next to him, ‘Was that the chief?’
The sailor shrugged and replied, ‘Might have been.’
‘But he was so big – and strong-looking.’
‘Brother,’ said the sailor, ‘they all look like that.’
‘Shit,’ muttered Gwilliams, ‘we got ourselves a war then.’
‘’Ow many of ’em is in there?’ asked Wynter of a Taranaki Volunteer, who was lying on his back, reloading his rifle.
‘’Bout five hundred.’
‘Five hundred bleeders the size of that last one?’ exclaimed Wynter. ‘Why, we’re all dead men then.’
The exchange of fire continued until the light began to fade and the landscape was drifting into gloaming. Captain Cracroft gave the order to prepare for a frontal assault. Jack drew his sword. King and Gwilliams gripped their cutlasses. At the last minute, Wynter also decided the blade was better than his rifle and bayonet. On a given signal they rose up out of the grasses and from behind trees, charging over the open space between relative safety and the Kaipopo pa. Men went down under a fusillade from the rifle pits ahead. This was the last Maori hail of shotgun and rifle fire, answered by those on the run before they tossed away their firearms. Now it was sword, club and hand-axe.
The air was full of wild yells and battle cries. In the half-light the Maoris fought vigorously, hacking at the pakeha with the untutored skill of a warrior nation to whom warfare was almost a sport. Sailors and militia waded in with cutlass and rifle butt. Maori strategy was usually to cut and run once the enemy were within the walls. This they did now, slipping away into the falling darkness. The engagement was sharp and decisive, and was over within minutes. One naval man, coxswain from the Niger and first into the pa, pulled down the Maori flags.
The dead were counted as the darkness descended. Almost fifty Maori bodies were found, though only a fourth of those had gone down in the frontal attack. There were fourteen dead amongst the volunteers, militia and the navy. When the column marched back to New Plymouth, Jack learned of the animosity between colonists and the military. The colonists despised the Maori, while the soldiers knew they were fighting against a brave, resourceful and intelligent enemy. The Church had taken sides and fought for the rights of the Maori. The governor, one Thomas Gore Browne (or ‘Angry-belly’ to the Maoris), a seemingly indecisive man, was caught between the factions.
It was the age-old problem of land. The colonists were hungry for it. They wanted to purchase land: lots and lots of it. Understandably many of the Maori were reluctant to sell their heritage. Under the Treaty of Waitangi land could only be acquired by British colonists if they purchased it from its owners or from the government. But ownership was often a misty and vague thing: sometimes land might be owned by one Maori, sometimes by a family, sometimes by a whole tribe. He who sold it might be only a part owner; even no owner at all. Even folklore had been known to come into it. One Maori maintained that a particular parcel of land had been first owned by his ancestor: a lizard that had lived in a cave above the plot.
This particular fight had been over a stretch of fertile land known as Waitara, down in the bottom left-hand corner of North Island. It had supposedly been bought from a sub-chief of the tribe that owned it, but the head chief disputed the sale. Jack learned that these purchases were often subjected to great arguments which led to outright war. Wiremu Kingi, the Maori leader involved in this dispute, had been declared a rebel, but many clergy and soldiers felt the governor was being unjust.
Jack and his men were billeted with the 65th Foot, where he had learned much of this from a lieutenant of that regiment: Brian Burns, who hailed from Kilmarnock in Ayrshire. As they sipped whisky in the mess, Burns filled in a little of New Zealand’s recent history for Jack.
‘We’ve been here since the late seventeen hundreds,’ said Burns. ‘The Maori have been here longer, of course, by about five hundred years. No real fuss when we first arrived. No guns. Just bits of paper. The Maori accepted us, but of course there were only a few colonists then. In 1840 the Maori and us signed the Treaty of Waitangi, which gave us sovereignty over all New Zealand. That’s when the bother started. The two languages of the treaty didn’t quite match up. Not surprising, of course – different languages never do. So the Maori interpretation is at variance with our own. Not wildly different, but enough to cause trouble when it comes to who rules whom, or the purchase of land.’
‘Why did they bother? I mean, why did the Maoris sign in the first place?’
‘Och, there was some talk of the French invading, so the Maori chiefs handed over the protection of the islands to us.’
‘But they never did. The French, I mean.’
Burns took a swallow before replying. ‘No, but it was a genuine fear, the French were indeed ready to invade. Since then we’ve had five or six governors, I can’t remember exactly, but the best was George Grey. Unfortunately Browne isn’t fashioned of the same material. Are you a Scot, Captain?’
The last question caught Jack by surprise. He was indeed a Scot, or half of one. His father was a Scottish baronet who had seduced an English maid and then turned her out once the child had been born. That child was christened Alexander Kirk. When young Alex discovered his father’s deception, he left home in high dudgeon and joined the army under the assumed name of Jack Crossman, which so far as the military was concerned he still bore. Since that time his father had been reduced to a mindless idiot by senile dementia and his older half-brother James had assumed control of the estates. James was a good man, far better than their father, and he was something of a hero to Jack.
‘Yes, I am. Half, anyway.’
‘I thought I detected something of an accent.’
‘It’s been ironed out. I was sent to school in England, then the army – you know. It’s never been very broad.’
‘No need for apologies – accent never made the man. Now where was I – aye, the governor. He tries his best, of course, but he has no vision.’
‘Tell me,’ asked Jack, ‘why did the Maori retreat tonight? You would have thought they would fight to keep their fort. It must have taken a lot of work to build it.’
Burns laughed. ‘They can fling up those things in a matter of days. Brilliant engineers, the Maori. It was bewildering at first, the way they simply melted away from their pas. But that’s the way they f
ight, the way they’ve always fought. First it was tribal warfare, but now they’ve got us to battle against. They’ve modified the pas of course – added rifle pits – but essentially they’re the same forts they used before we came on the scene. Bloody difficult to penetrate with ordnance. You can rain cannonballs on them and they just absorb them. It’s nearly always a frontal attack because they always have the sides and rear blocked. Earthworks like the pa are impenetrable.’
‘Aren’t frontal attacks a bit expensive in manpower?’
Again Burns laughed. ‘We get slaughtered. Today we were lucky. I guess the Maori got a bit confused in the twilight. But others have not gone so well, Captain. There’s been a few mistakes here and there – a few arrogant commanders who have been put in their place. Ah, here’s Williamson. Colleague and friend. Stacy, Captain Jack Crossman, of the 88th. Jack, Captain Stacy Williamson of the 12th.’
Williamson, a heavy-browed man, shook Jack’s hand and then sat down in a vacant chair, heavily. In fact he exuded heaviness all over. He was big-limbed and bodied, with a large head and thick broad shoulders. An Aberdeen Angus bull of a man, except that when he spoke it was not from north of the border. It was pure country Suffolk.
‘The hand?’ asked Williamson, signalling one of the mess waiters with three fingers. ‘India?’
‘How did you know I came from India?’ asked Jack.
‘Oh, word travels. I heard there were 88th coming. Irish map-makers I was told.’
Jack’s team were indeed map-makers, especially the redoubtable Sergeant King, but they were also something else.
Kiwi Wars Page 2