Days of future past

trouble’’ as ‘‘...a history that has been revised by Rome in Rome’s interest’’, comparing the resulting deception to that of a murderer covering up a crime.

A few months later, in another piece of correspondence published a week after Christmas on the nominal theme of religious tolerance, McGregor declared ‘‘this is a Protestant country’’ and bemoaned tax concessions given the Catholic church, including the practice of giving nuns free passage on public transport.

McGregor’s business practices were equally contentious.

In November 1922, at a bankruptcy hearing, it was established that he had helped a World War I veteran buy a farm with next to no capital, guaranteeing a bank loan.

The fact that the farm in question was purchased off McGregor’s own brother and that the price paid was considered vastly above market value cast this seeming altruism in a different light.

Earlier that same year McGregor’s arrogance came to national attention when the NZ Truth published a poem in his honour.

It read: ‘‘The sun would not rise in Hamilton town; If Ewen McGregor as much as did frown; The cows won’t give milk and the hens cannot lay; Without his permission — and least so they say’’. Another Te Kuiti story with connections across the Waikato is evident in the three headstones in Old Te Kuiti Cemetery for four members of the Davenport family.

They were murdered in October 1934 at or near their Rangitoto farmhouse and their assailant, Henare Hona, was eventually traced to a farm near Morrinsville.

Constable Thomas Heeps, who went to arrest Hona, was shot by him at his new employer’s house.

The sixth tragedy in the saga was Hona’s subsequent suicide.

Heeps and Hona died at Waikato Hospital.

Hona worked for the Davenports’ neighbour, Major Herbert Westmacott.

On October 10, Hona was behaving oddly and his workmates thought he meant to kill himself. Instead, Hona headed off to the Davenports’ farm – why they were the targets of his upset was not established.

Hona told the Davenports that Edward was being attacked at the slip on the road; German Davenport gave Hona a .22 shotgun and he and Albert, also armed, rushed off.

German phoned the police, but when he failed to answer a return call later that night, three constables from Te Kuiti set off to the farm.

They found Edward seriously wounded near the slip.

After daybreak, farm workers found Albert’s body in a whare four miles away, a gunshot wound in his head.

The farmhouse was found burnt to the ground, with the remains of German and Alice Davenport inside.

Edward died in hospital two days later.

A massive manhunt for Hona was launched, in impossible conditions: thick bush, continuous rain and inaccessibility.

And pointless, as Hona had caught a train to Auckland – with fresh clothes he went dancing and made his way to Morrinsville.

Hona’s girlfriend had just dumped him and a note to her showed the depth of his despair: ‘‘To my everlasting love. From this morning to this lonely hour I

LYN WILLIAMS