Photo: Auckland University Press
Former career diplomat, Derek Leask, was drawn into the stories of the New Zealand Wars when he started to explore the lives of his great and great-great grandfathers, who were early settlers.
Now he has used maps, sketches and prints to illustrate how the fighting unfolded in the mid nineteenth century in an atlas.
Derek Leask speaks to Kathryn about his decade's long research that reveals a complex series of misunderstandings, skirmishes and negotiations, battles and wars that shaped the lives of Māori and Pākehā in Aotearoa .
Atlas of the New Zealand Wars: Vol One -1834 to 1864 - Early Engagements to the Second Taranaki War is published by Auckland University Press.
