March 19, 2024 - The History of New Zealand through a Libertarian Anarchist lens. Please enjoy the ideas and let me know what you think.

1840: Who Was Our First Governor? The Answer May Startle You…

January 15, 2019

By AHNZ

Today in history: Sovereignty over New Zealand passes to New South Wales. For the first time in history, these islands were united under a single ruler; Our Governor was Major Sir George Gipps as of 14 January, 1840.

New Zealand Annexed by New South Wales

A proclamation by Gipps extended the boundaries of New South Wales (of which he was Governor,) Australia, to include New Zealand. On the same day, Gipps appointed William Hoboson to be his Lieutenant-Governor responsible for New Zealand.

“While Hobson is usually considered the first Governor of New Zealand, Sir George Gipps was the first governor over New Zealand..”- Wikipedia

This ‘over’ and ‘of’ distinction is some some kinda brain-blank revisionist Statist History device mumbo-jumbo. You will read this, if it comes up at all, to bolster the idea that William Hobson was New Zealand’s first Governor¹ and The Treaty of Waitangi our founding document. Go deeper and it actually turns out that New Zealand was founded legally and internationally by Letters Paitent sent over with Hobson which Gipps acted on 179 years ago yesterday.

I’m not suggesting we should change the National Day of New Zealand from Waitangi Day (6 Feb) back to New Zealand Day again and set it to January 14th. Libertarians and Anarchists would agree that we don’t need The State telling us to take a day off or how to pay our respects; Anniversaries should be for the people to freely observe (or not to) rather than shoved down our throats by politicians!

The message here in remembering the true first Governor is to remember the past and where New Zealand really came from. To think it all started with Hobson and The Treaty is to skip over a great deal of essential facts about New Zealand and the identity of her people.

Specifically, New Zealand was up and running and organised and legal without “official” control for a long time before being taken over by outsiders. Gipps and Hobson were both acolytes of Lord Auckland and, as mentioned before², a plan was hatched to grab a nice Anarchist Colonial Libertarian country and take it over as a tax revenue stream for controlling elites!

1 Hobson was not our first Governor any more than George Washington was the first President of the United States. Washington was at least the 8th. Am I freaking you out?

2 The William Hobson Gang (Jan 1840-Sep 1842) 

Image ref. canterbury-archaeology.org.uk

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Like    Comment     Share
Anarchist History of New Zealand: A change of rulers is the joy of fools.