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Nikorehe’s Post
Uretara Island.
Image: BOPRC
Explore > People > Colonisers & 'rebels' > Nikorehe's post
The largest of the harbour’s islands is Uretara Island. Historically, the island’s strategic position in the centre of the harbour made it an important asset for whoever had control. Its two large pā, Paripari and Karamea, supported up to 500 people.
By the mid-1830s European traders began setting up trading stores in the Bay of Plenty. In the late 1830s the earliest known long-term European resident in the district, the trader Albert John Nicholas (known to Māori as Nikorehe), arrived at Ōhiwa and established a small shipbuilding yard on Uretara Island. This was the first European shipbuilding venture south of Hokianga and the Bay of Islands. Nicholas and two brothers named Waddy built a 19-ton cutter, the Nimrod, in 1842.
Nicholas also opened a store on Uretara and offered European goods to Māori from throughout the district. Tūhoe people came from the Urewera to Waimana to prepare flax-fibre to sell to the trader.
Albert John did not stay long at Ōhiwa. Following his arrival in New Zealand from New South Wales in 1838 he had married the daughter of Ngāti Hauā chief Te Waharoa near Thames. Like many of the early settlers Nikorehe became a ‘Pākehā Māori’. Albert John Nicholas died at 75 years of age in 1888 at Thames.
A well-known early Ōpōtiki settler, Thomas Black, grazed cattle on the island till 1856. In 1862, a dispute over rights to the island arose between Ngāti Awa and Whakatōhea. Then, in 1866, all the land in and around the harbour was confiscated by the Crown.
In 1905, Frank Ducker obtained a 99-year lease of Uretara Island from the Crown for just one shilling per year. His son, Leo Ducker, wrote in his memoir:
Our early income on the Island was from grazing cattle belonging to farmers from Opotiki, supplemented by butter and eggs which were produced by our 100 ducks. We also had a market for cockles in Auckland and that meant that 3 sacks full had to be gathered the day before the Ngatiawa sailed for Auckland, so they would arrive at the fish market in a fresh condition.
I can state it was a real chore. No matter what the weather, the cockles had to be gathered, sometimes at first light in the morning to catch the boat. If the ship was in at the wharf our cockles would be winched aboard by ship's gear which was a big help. Otherwise they had to be manhandled which was quite a task.
A sack of cockles is no lightweight. I was very young, just 6 years old and had to help my Papa and 3 brothers to gather cockles in cold mud and sometimes when very windy. Me blubbering all the time and I must add with a runny nose, which could not be wiped by dirty muddy hands. I simply loathed it and I must state, so did my brothers. (Leo Ducker, Early Days of Ohiwa, 1994)
Today Uretara is a scenic reserve. To tāngata whenua the island is wāhi tapu (sacred place). Kōiwi tāngata (human remains) are known to be buried there. Urupā (resting places) and wāhi tapu are of deep significance to Māori.