Voices from the New Zealand Wars/He Reo nō ngā Pakanga o Aotearoa

Voices from the New Zealand Wars/He Reo nō ngā Pakanga o Aotearoa will be published by Bridget Williams Books in October 2021 and is available to preorder now. The following description comes from the book's webpage.  

The New Zealand Wars of the mid-nineteenth century profoundly shaped the course and direction of our nation's history. This book takes us to the heart of these conflicts with a series of first-hand accounts from Māori and Pākehā who either fought in or witnessed the wars that ravaged New Zealand between 1845 and 1872. From Heni Te Kiri Karamu's narrative of her remarkable exploits as a wāhine toa, through to Gustavus Ferdinand von Tempsky's writing of his time in the Forest Rangers and beyond, we learn about the wars at a human level. 

 



The often fragmentary, sometimes hastily written accounts that make up Voices from the New Zealand Wars vividly evoke the extreme emotions – fear, horror, pity and courage – experienced during the most turbulent time in our country's history. Each account is expertly introduced and contextualised, so that the historical record speaks to us vividly through many voices. 

Voices from the New Zealand Wars represents another ground-breaking contribution from historian Vincent O'Malley. As Mihingarangi Forbes has written: 'I believe Vincent O'Malley's research will be the single most important historical body of work produced in my lifetime.'  

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