FUNERAL OF SIR PETER BUCK / TE RANGI HIROA

Te Rangi Hiroa (Dr Peter Buck) died in hospital in Hawaii, 1st December 1951 and was cremated. There was a delay of over a year before the Minister of Native Affairs, the Hon. E.B. Corbett, finally brought his ashes home to New Zealand.
“The funeral journey from Wellington produced a remarkable outpouring of affection and respect, the greatest and most prolonged, in the beautiful, early-mission church ‘Rangiatea’ at Ōtaki, and tangi at Wanganui and Waitara. His ashes then rested in the little meeting house Mahi Tamariki, at Urenui, where he had played as a child. The cortege grew as it travelled along.
Finally, as he wished, on the afternoon of Sunday, 8 August 1953, as the sun was setting out to sea, his ashes were brought to Ōkoki. The Bishop of Aotearoa, Bishop Pānapa and seven other Māori priests of the Anglican Church including Wi Te Tau Huata, conducted the burial service, in the immediate presence of a small official party. Below the hill, 6000 people gathered in the fields. The service was in Māori with Māori hymns and an ex-soldier’s chorus singing the lament. ‘Pass On, Friend - All is Well’. The Governor General, with the official party, descended the hill to unveil the memorial. A symbolic canoe prow points north-west towards Te Reinga, whence the spirits of the dead take off for Hawaiki”.