Native News.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XI, Issue 1689, 20 April 1886, Page 4

Native News.

INTERTRIBAL DISPUTES. TRAGEDY NEAR WAIPAWA. A PAH BURNT. FOUR NATIVES BURNT ALIVE. (UNITED PRESS ASSOCIATION) Gisborne, Tuesday. Reports are to hand from Waipawa of a most horrible affair having occurred at Waipiro. The Waipiro Block was adjudicated upon some six months ago by the Land Court, and the chief Nihoniho was declared to have no in tercet in it He was strongly opposed to the decision and applied for a new trial which was just about to take place. He also at once erected a pah containing many whares in which some 100 natives were living. An intensely strong feeling consequently existed between the tresspassers and natives who were declared by the Court to be the owners, and several conflicts have taken place. On Wednesday or Thursday night last the whole pah is reported to have been burned, and three men and one woman were burnt to death. It is believed the hostile natives fired the pah. Mr Ballance and Major Ropata were expected to ar rive at Waipiro yesterday and would make enquiry into the affair. The foregoing is only based on Maori reports. Later. Further reports from the Waipiro district show that the previous report was exaggerated. The pah has been burnt by opposing natives, but no lives were lost in the fire, and the report that four lives were lost there came from the fact that two natives were burnt to death in an accidental fire near there a few days previous. Some are said to have been injured in the burning of the pah, and there were several narrow escapes. The felling between the opposing natives is said to be most bitter. The sergeant of police has gone up. It is about 100 miles from here and near the East Cape.