White Feathers, page 5
The haka ended with a final, deafening shout and a massive leap into the air, followed by tumultuous applause and cheering from the onlookers. Panting from exertion and wiping trickles of sweat from his face, Joseph approached Ihaka, intending a half-hearted admonishment, but the triumphant look on his friend’s face stole the words from his mouth.
‘See!’ demanded Ihaka, ‘they know what we made of now! They have to send us warriors to the fighting, ’cos we the best!’
Joseph turned to Wi, who was never far from Ihaka, and shook his head benignly.
There was nothing he could say.
The contingent’s blood lust remained high for several days and, in retrospect, Joseph would always wonder whether the haka that had so galvanised them had also contributed to the appalling shambles of Good Friday.
It all started when his company was on leave in Cairo with others of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force and a large party of Australian troops. Like many other soldiers caught up in the event, Joseph was unaware at the time of what had initially sparked the riot. Some reckoned that the debacle had in no way come as a shock, others were surprised that it hadn’t happened earlier. After all, relations between the Allied forces and their Egyptian hosts had been strained for some time, both at Zeitoun Camp and in Cairo itself.
Every soldier had been approached at least twice by the persistent and apparently deaf native men and boys peddling cigarettes, oranges and rude photographs whenever and wherever they saw an opportunity. The oranges were thirst-quenching but the harsh cigarettes immediately cancelled out any relief provided by the fruit, and the photographs were offensive to some, titillating to others, but eventually boring to all, especially when the real thing could be obtained for very little financial outlay, if a man wasn’t too choosy about where he laid his hat.
The situation was even worse when the troops ventured into the city. A soldier could hardly take five steps down a street without being accosted by crowds of natives offering all manner of goods for sale, from muslins and silks to Sudanese beads, peanuts, sex, souvenirs, ‘authentic’ artefacts and other strange bits and pieces. When one of the more naive young privates in Joseph’s section purchased an exorbitantly priced scrap of textile said to have been wrapped around the actual mummified body of Rameses III, Joseph, sick of his men being rooked, lost his temper and told the soldier to return the disgusting piece of rag and get his money back. It stank too much to be that ancient and no doubt harboured all sorts of dreaded diseases. The private did as he was told but, unable to find the hawker who had sold him the ‘artefact’, thumped the nearest Egyptian with wares for sale and helped himself to the money he felt he was owed. The fracas that followed resulted in the lieutenant in charge of Joseph’s platoon, a popular officer named Ropata McPherson, advising him to discourage his men from going into the city in future. Joseph, however, believed they were entitled to learn to look after themselves, though after Good Friday he wished he’d taken heed.
But the New Zealanders and Australians themselves were more often than not guilty of arrogant and opportunistic behaviour. Running out of cafés before paying was a favourite, abusing the natives was another, but the biggest cause of resentment, on both sides, was the troops’ attitude towards the Egyptian women. Prostitution thrived in Cairo, and although whores were usually easy to spot, many of the men still apparently had trouble distinguishing between the females who were for sale and those who were not, resulting in many outraged complaints to the authorities about respectable Egyptian women being, at best, insulted, and at worst assaulted. On the other side of the coin, many of the prostitutes were riddled with venereal disease, and had very little compunction about passing it on to their customers. The afflicted troops then blamed the women for their painful predicament and subsequent spells in hospital. All these pressures, together with the pent-up frustration of waiting to go into battle, fuelled the events of the 2nd of April.
Early on the evening of Good Friday, having just finished a moderately satisfying but atrociously overpriced café meal, Joseph, Jack, Ihaka and Wi were walking off their dinner and inspecting the stalls in the colourful Wazzir, a district known for its brothels. Suddenly they were forced to dodge a hail of items being hurled from a third-storey window. First came a flutter of women’s clothing accompanied by loud screeching, which caused some laughter on the street below, but when this was followed by a very solid chest of drawers and then a piano, Joseph and his mates wisely took cover under the protection of a balcony. A crowd soon gathered and Australian and New Zealand soldiers began to appear as if from nowhere and contribute enthusiastically to the destruction; predictably, Joseph was unable to restrain Ihaka and he quickly disappeared into the mêlée. Brothel after brothel was entered and ransacked, the debris piled up outside and then set alight, and troops crowded into the bars and helped themselves to bottles, which they drank dry then threw indiscriminately into the throng. When fires broke out in several houses and the fire brigade arrived, the hose was slashed and the nozzle snatched up and used to smash windows.
Shortly after that the Red Caps, the universally unpopular military police, arrived and Joseph decided it was time to leave, but not before he witnessed a phalanx of out-of-control troops turn on the MPs and launch into them with fists and make-do weapons. The grossly outnumbered police opened fire. Joseph heard later that one of the four soldiers wounded was a New Zealander.
Zeitoun Camp was in an uproar when Joseph arrived back, alone because he had lost contact with Wi and Jack. He rounded up the men in his section to find that three were missing: Ihaka and Privates Joe Witana and Hone Reti, whose father Joseph had sailed with on the schooner Whiri, and whom he had spied hurling furniture around the Wazzir with the best of them.
At midnight the lost trio drifted in, all bearing bruises and ripped uniforms and reeking of alcohol. Joseph lined them up in front of their tent and railed at them while the rest of the section slunk away, grateful they’d had the good sense to keep out of the fracas. After being yelled at for a good thirty minutes, the miscreants were dismissed with the threat that if they ever became involved in a similar situation again they would be shipped home immediately in abject disgrace.
All leave into Cairo was cancelled, the troops were confined to Zeitoun Camp for the remainder of their stay and relations between the New Zealanders and the Australians, camped fifteen miles away, cooled markedly as each blamed the other for starting the riot.
The shameful affair of the Wazzir seemed to mark a downturn in the Maori Contingent’s spirits. As it seemed more and more likely they would be sent to Malta for garrison duty, their grumbles grew to a loud protestation that eventually manifested itself in an impassioned public plea from Major Te Rangi Hiroa for his people to be permitted to go to the Dardanelles with the main force. He also warned that any Maori taua, or war party, would be ashamed to go home without having even confronted the enemy and that such a prospect would have a dire effect on morale. But the decision had been made: the Maori Contingent was to go to Malta.
Once on the island they marched across a scrubby and dreary plain to a camp with the unpronounceable name of Ghain Tuffiah. There, they dug endless holes, took part in mock exercises and underwent interminable foot inspections, and Joseph thought of Erin McRae and her huge, luminous eyes far more frequently than he could ever have imagined. The men listened with mounting frustration to the news of the Gallipoli landing on the 25th of April and were awed into silence at the numbers of wounded evacuated from the Dardanelles and arriving at the hospitals on Malta. But then word was received that the Maori Contingent would be needed at Gallipoli after all.
CHAPTER FOUR
As he hung over the ship’s rail Joseph commented idly to Jack that the steep hills ahead of them reminded him a little of those in the Hawke’s Bay. It was the 1st of July and their troopship had anchored in Mudros Harbour, the main port of the spectacular Greek island of Lemnos. There was no response and he glanced up to see Jack waving cheerfully to a group of sailors on a British warship cruising slowly past, its gentle passage forming small waves that whispered and sighed across the sapphire water.
‘Who are you?’ one of the sailors called.
‘We’re the Maoris!’ Jack bellowed back.
The sailors looked at each other and shrugged, then another responded, ‘Oh, the Maoris! Three cheers for the Maoris!’ He and his mates cheered loudly and enthusiastically, and grinned hugely as the New Zealanders came back with, ‘Three cheers for the Jacky tars!’
The men were kept on board ship until they transferred to a steamer the following day, where they waited until they finally set sail for the Gallipoli Peninsula at five o’clock in the afternoon.
Few of the men slept easily that night, if at all. Joseph calmed himself by rereading a long and gossipy letter from his mother, written at the end of March, which had arrived before the contingent left Malta.
My Dearest Joseph,
I hope this finds you well. At the time of writing we were unsure of your destination but Andrew said to write something and post it off any way in the hope that it will catch up with you wherever you are.
I have a fair amount of news so I hope you’re well settled with a cup of tea! Lucy has had her baby, a very healthy boy she has named Duncan Robert. Both are well, although I believe Lucy is feeling a little depressed about James not being here with her for the birth. Jeannie is fussing like mad over the baby, which is good because it’s giving Lucy plenty of time to get back on her feet, so I expect she’ll be feeling right as rain again in no time. Duncan doesn’t look like anyone yet, although Lucy insists he’s the spitting image of his father.
I suppose you haven’t bumped into James at all? Andrew says I shouldn’t be so silly — the two of you are bound to be in different places — but we’ve been reading in the papers lately that the New Zealanders are being sent to the Dardanelles because of the Turks, so I thought your paths might cross. We’ve had several postcards from James, from Egypt, so I’m assuming that’s where you are too.
The most shocking news I have for you is that Keely and Erin have both volunteered for nursing service over seas. I must say I was rather upset when they turned up a month or so ago and told us, and so were Jeannie and Lachie, but there really isn’t much we can do. Andrew has been affected the most, I think, because he had such high hopes of Keely settling down. He only let her go nursing in the hope that she would get sick of it, give up halfway through and find herself a suitable husband instead! As of course you know I had a little trouble settling myself, when I was her age, so I can understand a little of what they feel but Andrew is incapable of seeing it from their point of view. Poor Andrew — it’s been bad enough James going off, and you, but Keely as well! He went into a decline for several days but I think he’s resigned himself to it now, although he certainly isn’t happy about it.
I suppose we’re lucky they didn’t just hare off to England to offer themselves for service over there, which so many of our nurses have been doing lately. They’re due to sail out some time early next month, and we think they’ll be going to England. At the moment they’re in Wellington sorting out their uniforms, which sound positively dire — grey wool with scarlet trim and brass army buttons, ugly boots and a rather silly hat — and doing extra training and what have you. They telephone once a week with the latest news, but we’ll be going down to see them off, of course. But Keely says she’s written to you about it, and so has Erin, so you might already know all of this.
The other bit of news concerns Thomas, who was here last month and said he saw you in Wellington just before you left. He had a long talk with Andrew and me about the war. He says he doesn’t believe in war, that it’s barbaric and futile and a shocking waste of human life. I must say I agree with him, and so does Andrew, but I’m afraid, given the Government’s view and the enthusiasm most people seem to have for the war, he’s chosen a very hard row to hoe, especially if conscription is introduced, as some doom-mongers are predicting. He plans to finish his law degree at Otago, which will be towards the end of this year, but isn’t sure what he’ll do after that. He has a vague idea about setting up a law practice for returned servicemen, because he thinks some will need a hand when they come home, but I doubt that will be enough to keep him out of the services if the war does drag on. It’s not that he’s frightened of going into battle, I don’t think, but you know how he’s always been with his ideals and his beliefs. Once he gets an idea into his head it’s very hard to dissuade him from following it up, and there is apparently quite a strong movement within the universities against the war. Well, we’ll just have to wait and see how it goes for him, I suppose. If, as they are saying, it will all be over by Christmas, it probably won’t matter any way.
That announcement didn’t really surprise us much, but Thomas’s other news did. He has a young lady now, a girl called Catherine Ferris, the sister of one of his university friends. You could have knocked us over with a feather when he told us, he’s always been so shy and reserved! But he’s a lovely, kind person and he deserves someone nice. He said he hadn’t mentioned it to the family because he wanted to be sure of Catherine’s feelings towards him (and, I suspect, because he didn’t want Keely rushing down there poking her nose in), but it’s my guess that there could well be another Murdoch family wedding this year. Fingers crossed!
Ian is fine, although Andrew is worried he might get carried away with the idea of volunteering for the army. To ‘head him off at the pass’, so to speak, he’s been involving Ian in all sorts of things to do with the station. When he isn’t sweating over the books (and I have to be honest here, darling, he doesn’t seem to have inherited my head for figures, or his father’s) or chasing lambs up hill and down dale, he’s gallivanting about the countryside with some girl or other to the various farewell dances and functions everybody seems to be having for the men who are off over seas. But I’m not taking any of it too seriously — he’s far too young to settle down and he knows it. I just hope he doesn’t do anything unwise which means he might have to settle down, like James has. But Lucy is a lovely girl, and she loves and misses James desperately. And he obviously loves her, if the number of letters she’s received from him are anything to go by.
Your father is well — I saw him a couple of weeks ago in town. Have you heard from him yet? He said he’s sent you two letters. In case you haven’t received them, your brother Haimona has joined the Merchant Navy, but Kepa doesn’t know where his ship is at the moment. Huriana is still teaching and, to your father’s absolute delight, finally expecting a child, so I expect she won’t be working for much longer. I’m glad that something has cheered him up — he has seemed rather depressed since you left. Parehuia is fine, although if I were her, and you’ll have to forgive me for being catty but it’s true, I’d cut down on the amount of cakes and potatoes I was consuming — the last time I saw her she was looking really quite porky! But still magnificent, of course.
The heat here has finally broken, and we’re all looking forward to a cooler autumn, although I expect we could be very busy if a lot of the young men are still away at shearing time later in the year. We’re all fundraising again. Almost all of the women I know are knitting like mad, and when we’re not doing that we’re packing parcels to send over seas.
Which reminds me, I had a letter from Riria Adams the other day telling me how involved she’s become with the Maori Soldiers’ Fund in Auckland, which quite surprised me, I must admit, after the dreadful struggle she had getting over poor John’s death in South Africa. But she says she’s getting a lot of satisfaction from her work. Both her boys, Simon and David — you remember them, don’t you? — have enlisted. David went first, as a lieutenant with the Main Body, but Simon is training at Narrow Neck with the Second Maori Contingent.
I must finish up now — we’re off to see a patriotic carnival in town, the fourth in as many months! I asked Andrew to come with me, but as I spied him sneaking off up the hill on his horse an hour ago I suspect it will be just Lucy and me. And Lachie, who will be driving us in the motor. Andrew has been teaching me to drive lately, but has decreed that I am not to take the motor out onto the road until I can get through the front gates without banging into one or other of them, which is a little cheeky coming from a man who killed a poor defenceless sheep the other day!
I’ll write regularly and hope that my letters find you. Take care, my dear. I know you think I’m a silly, fussy old mother sometimes, but my children are worth more to me than anything else in the world.
All my love, Mam
Joseph smiled as he folded the letter and slipped it back into his kit. The bit about his stepmother Parehuia made him laugh but the news about Thomas disturbed him. He admired his brother for taking a stand on something in which he truly believed, but he suspected Thomas might be aligning himself with a dangerously small minority.
And he had received a letter from Keely, full of news about her impending embarkation, and a parcel from Erin containing a letter and a pair of rather misshapen and holey socks. She might be an excellent nurse with gorgeous eyes, but she couldn’t knit to save herself. He’d been a little surprised at how disappointed he was by the rather impersonal nature of her letter: it was full of chatterings about getting ready to go over seas but little else. He’d been sure he had detected something more than just friendship in her face when they’d met at Newtown Park.
Stretching out in his cramped bunk, he put aside thoughts of home and concentrated instead on what awaited the contingent on the Gallipoli Peninsula tomorrow. The troops had all heard numerous stories of the disaster that had befallen the New Zealand and Australian Division after they had landed at Anzac Cove, on April the 25th. It was now common, though unofficial, knowledge that the troops had been dropped at the wrong landing site, that they should have been landed at a beach several miles further south. And the defending Turks, assumed to be present in the area in very small numbers and displaying only a dubious fighting ability, had proved a formidable enemy. The resulting casualties had been horrendous.
