An End of Honour

Titokowaru– is warrior, priest and a man of two worlds, charged with defending his people’s ancestral lands from incursion by the very settlers whose faith, manners and customs he has adopted in the spirit of co-existence.
Haunted by self-doubt and tormented by the weight of expectation, one of the most striking New Zealanders in our history vacillates between peace and war as he tries to find honour in the inevitable.

John Selby Hunter– is a Civil War cavalryman shaped by a Virginian upbringing in the principles of duty and honour.  When those very principles lead him to New Zealand, the charismatic Governor George Grey persuades him that his talents can play a major part in the shaping of New Zealand’s destiny. 

However, as that part unfolds, Hunter becomes aware that expedience and honour are uneasy bedfellows.

This story is as true to the real events of these years as the majority of the characters and the attitudes they express. ‘Imperialism’, ‘manifest destiny’, ‘colonialism’ and ‘the white man’s burden’ appear in these pages to inform conversations, decisions and actions.
Along the way there is—or may be—an answer to the longstanding mystery of why New Zealand’s best-ever general, Riwha Titokowaru, turned his back on final victory and walked away into the oblivion from which only Professor James Belich’s scholarship has recently resurrected him.
‘An End of Honour’ moves from the Musket Wars battlefields of Taranaki to the campaigns of the American mid-West and back again to the Land Wars via the society of colonial Auckland. 

It’s the story of two highly-principled men who see beyond division, race and greed to find unity in the thought that, if one has no honour, one has nothing.