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Parihaka prisoners memorial
This simple stone memorial acknowledges the Māori prisoners taken from Parihaka and held at Mt Cook barracks as Taranaki jails filled with dozens of ploughmen from the village in 1879. The Crown stationed troops in this area as early as 1841, and the encampment had grown to include a number of buildings and a jail surrounded by palisades. It was therefore an obvious choice when the Crown began to intern significant numbers of Taranaki Māori.
After being used as a military barracks the site was home to a hideous jail which loomed menacingly over the landscape. The Dominion Museum building, now part of Massey University, replaced it in the early twentieth century.
The monument stands on university grounds between Wellington High School and Pukeahu/the National War Memorial.
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