Talk:Völkner incident

Execution
The phrasing around the execution of Völkner is very white-centric. Like Arthur Wakefield before him, Völkner wasn't murdered - he was executed by the people who actually belong to the land, in Völkner's case, after a trial. Similarly the idea that this is a sad or unfortunate story is extra-white.Jameskjx (talk) 03:57, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

Untitled
There is an inaccuracy in regard to what the crown did with the land they confiscated as a result of the incident. It says that the land was sold but that’s not the full story. Large portions of it were also gifted by the military to soldiers, in lots of 50 Acres per land parcel. Soldiers received very little actual wages, other than rations and land. My reference is that the diary of my relative, a soldier, says he received a 50 Acre land parcel, then he set about to buy land parcels from other soldiers. So he ended up with quite a lot of land that had been confiscated. Five generations later none of us are sure what happened to it. It’s not in the family and we have no great estates, only what we have earned ourselves in our own lifetimes. So it’s not very clear what happened to the land, but there is enough support in my families historic records to prove that the military were using this confiscated land to pay their soldiers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.210.166.237 (talk) 18:06, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Untitled
Just a comment on why I have made an update to this entry. I continually see, in various places (invariably non-authoritative or non-specialist sources) statements to the effect that Völkner was not involved in passing on intelligence to the authorities. I have placed an explicit reference in my update to one of the authoritative sources that he was in fact doing so; hopefully, the dissemination of this via Wikipedia will reduce the frequency of false ‘history’ around this subject. I have also removed some of the stuff about the Pakeha population being unduly alarmed. No doubt some were; but the fact that a slapstick farce on incidents connected with Volkner's death ran for 2 weeks on the Auckland stage soon after indicates that at least some were more sanguine ... —The preceding unsigned comment was added by MisterCDE (talk • contribs) 15/05/2006. Yes, I think you are right that Volkner did send information to the govt about the activities of Maori rebels. He was bound to do this as it was unlawful and all Maori were bound by NZ law.But a key point is how did local Maori find out about this? The answer is that a Catholic missionary, wanting to spike his rivals religious guns, told the Maori a higly fanciful version.It is note worthy that the goverment spoke to the Catholic authorities and the missionary was immediatly moved to Australia but rumours were spread in the area that he had been killed by govt forces.This underlines the latent hostility between the 2 groups of missonaries and the lengths the Catholic church missionaies would go to capture Maori souls. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.153.154.179 (talk) 02:03, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Image
There's a really good image at NZ History which looks old and out of copyright, and would be great to illustrate this article with, but the Turnbull Library has a note on it asking for permission to re-use. Does anyone know how that works with the GFDL? --Tirana 04:58, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Volkner Incident or Völkner Incident
Craitman17 has recently moved this page from Volkner Incident to Völkner Incident, and similarly changed the spelling within the article. Is this really what we should do? Personally, while I agree the umlaut should be used when referring to Carl Sylvius Völkner by name, I don't believe it is commonly used when referring to the Volkner Incident (or the Volkner Rocks) so I don't think we should use it in these contexts. But I'd be interested to hear what others think. -- Avenue (talk) 02:30, 3 March 2009 (UTC)


 * After looking around further, I've found two documents online that use the umlaut ( and ), so perhaps it's not as uncommon as I thought. -- Avenue (talk) 13:32, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Volkner incident
Volkner was a protestant and was in competition with a catholic missionary. This is what is at the heart of the reason why previously very friendly Maori suddenly became violent. The arrival of the violent hauhau cult in the area is the second reason. This cult was very violent and definitely not christian .The hauhau leader who carried out the murder and eye eating was later convicted and hung for murder. The hauhau were far worse rebels than the kingites who had been defeated in 1863-4.Hauhau went back to the brutality that was part and parcel of traditional Maori battle tikanga in pre christian times. Their actions were very similar to those of many hapu during the musket war period. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.58.190.90 (talk) 03:37, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Was this event historically known as the "Volkner Incident"? That sounds to me very much like a modern PC euphemism. I would have thought "Volkner Murder" would have been the traditional - and less biased- title.203.184.41.226 (talk) 03:47, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

Cause
The congregation had lapsed [oddly described as having "moved on"] from Christianity to Hau Hauism. That much is certain.

However, was Völkner's death "caused by his willingness to act as an agent of Governor Sir George Grey"? Volkner may have been writing to the Governor, but that is not a motive for murder, and nor were the Hau Hau even aware of his correspondence. Isn't their radicalism - anti-pakeha and pro-cannibalism - sufficient motive and cause?203.184.41.226 (talk) 03:52, 24 January 2013 (UTC) The article as is,is inaccurate and misleading. Part or much of the blame for Volkner's murder lies at the feet of the rival Roman Catholic missionary who was attempting to undermine the position of the protestant minister Volkner. This was as easy as linking the protestant church to the government. It must be remembered that the 1863 war in the Waikato was started by local Maori in Te Awamutu trying to kill the magistrate Gorst and other settlers and then burning down the Protestant backed Maori trade school.The government reaction was to carry their attack against rebel Maori into the Waikato. Going further back it was the Catholic Bishop Pompelier who incited Maori in the north not to sign the Treaty of Waitangi. Volkner had a duty as a loyal New Zealander to report what was going on. The law then is fundamentally the same as now-citizens have a duty to report crime or suspected crime. In those days when the telegraph was in its infancy, letter writing was the main way that citizens kept in touch with each other. Police simply didnt exist in that part of New Zealand so people wrote to authority figures when they saw an issue. Before the beheading and canabalism Hau hau spread the rumour that the French Catholic missionary Reignier who had baptised the eye eater, had been killed by the government.In fact he had been recalled to Australia by the Catholics due to his meddling. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.62.226.243 (talk) 21:30, 2 April 2013 (UTC)