Spectrum 119. Te wā o te parekura - The year of the pestilence.

Rights Information
Year
1974
Reference
23858
Media type
Audio
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Rights Information
Year
1974
Reference
23858
Media type
Audio
Duration
00:29:13
Credits
RNZ Collection
Harsant, Florence, Interviewee
Owen, Alwyn (b.1926), Interviewer
Delaney, David, Announcer

Florence Harsant lives in Hahei, south of Whitianga on the East Coromandel Coast and is known to her Māori friends as Te Mārie. From here she recalls her childhood and how she came to witness the smallpox epidemic of 1913 amongst the Māori of Northland.

At the age of twelve her family moved to Waitahanui where her father taught at a Māori school. Initially neither she or her family could speak te reo Māori and the local Māori couldn’t speak English, however after being completely immersed in Māori life for several years Florence says she became quite proficient.

After spending a couple of years working amongst the Māori at the Church of England Māori Mission house at [Whakawerawera] Florence left to look after her sick mother. The family then moved to Ōtumatia, Kaipara Harbour where in her early twenties she was approached by Reverend Tuhi and joined the Women’s Christian Temperance Union.

Florence explains how she was appointed to travel into Northland in 1913 to assist in Māori communities suffering the influence of alcohol. She describes the settlements, food sources and Missionary services. Florence talks about the reaction of a publican towards her, how Māori would exchange their pay checks for bar drinks and how she made the wives of these men aware of what was happening.

Florence tells of how she saw the small pox spread through the north via a popular Mormon elder who had been in the company of many northland Māori during his sickness. The spread of the disease devastated northern Māori communities and once she arrived in Whangarei she reported what she’d seen to the Health Department who were able to send out support and inoculations.

A narrator reads extracts form the Health Department reports, 1913. Florence describes how a pākehā store owner kept his Māori customers at a distance from the shop whilst serving them. Florence notes a general lack of compassion amongst the Europeans towards the Māori, fuelled by the fear of catching the disease. Statistics of the epidemic read by the narrator.

Florence tells how the Māori women were receptive to the Temperance movement and formed their unions whereas the men were not keen to uphold the pledge. She describes an instance where after unknowingly eating oysters, considered to be tapu and which caused convulsions, the services of a Tohunga were called upon.

After returning to Whangarei for a second inoculation Florence became very sick, not welcome back home in the Kaipara Harbour she convalesced at the home of a Māori minister in the Waikato.
Florence never returned to northland and according to the Health Department no fresh cases of small pox were recorded after the end April 1914.

Florence explains as part of her Temperance work, she taught Māori women child welfare. Whilst she feels she achieved a lot through this work, she acknowledges the great insight into and respect for Māori culture that she missed once living back with her own people. Once recovered Florence became a school teacher at her father’s school until she married.