HISTORIC SPOT.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIII, Issue 28, 30 December 1932, Page 6

HISTORIC SPOT.

FOXTON'S EARLY DAYS RECALLED.

(From Our Own Correspondent) _ T . , FOXTON. Dec. 29. Within a month or so an historical spot in Fox ton will be obliterated, it is a large sandhill on Mr M. E. Perreau’s propertv between Duncan Street and the railway line, at present being levelled preparatory to the erection on the site of a factor}'. The hill forms the most poignant link with the past locally, for it constituted a reminder to the older residents of Foxton of the troublous times of the ’eighties when Foxton was threatened with extermination at the hands of unfriendly natives. In 1868 the warlike Te Rauparaha and his warriors were located fifty miles south ot Foxton and there was continuous ’unrest between the and Maoris in the north, due to the warlike activities of Titikowaru, while Te Kooti was causing trouble on the East Coast. It was reported that these two warriors were to join forces at Foxton and march on Wellington. Foxton was in a serious predicament, as had the Maoris liked they could have annihilated the whole of the pakeha population at any time. The residents, however, bamded themselves together, joined the militia, were armed and drilled, and generally prepared to defend their lives and homes in ease of a rising. For months on epd they went about their various activities not knowing at what moment the rising would take place. When the report was received that Titikowaru and Te Kooti had decided to meet at Foxton, the local militia comprised 120 men drawn from all parts of the district, under the late Mr John Kebbell, of Levin, as captain. A stockade was forthwith erected on the hill and preparations made for the safe housing in it of all the women and children of the district, while the men defended their homes. Fortunately, however, the trouble passed off and the settlers gradually went back to their farms. The late Mr John Kebbell was for many years a keen for the setting aside of the hill as a reserve to memorialise this historio event in Foxton’s early history. Ho went as far as approaching the Government on the 6ubjeot and offered £2O towards the purchase of the land. Some years ago a committee was set up in Foxton to further the project but the proposal was never consummated.