Geoff Parker: The Littlewood Treaty - The Missing English Draft? Or A Back-translation?

A response to Barrie Davis's interpretation of the Littlewood document

Barrie Davis has recently written about the Littlewood document. His argument is difficult to pin down, but he ultimately appears to regard it not as the original final English draft prepared for translation into Māori, but as an English back-translation produced in connection with the Māori translation on 4 February 1840.

It is an interesting argument, but I am left with several questions.

But first what is not disputed?

There appears to be little dispute that the handwriting has been identified as Busby's, it is dated 4 February 1840, is written on paper carrying an 1833 W. Tucker watermark, and also carries the name/signature of William Hobson, Lieutenant Governor

It was discovered in the Littlewood family papers in 1989.

The document is also remarkably close to the Māori Treaty. Indeed, the principal textual difference highlighted by its supporters is that the Littlewood version does not contain the word “Māori” in Article 3, which is in the Māori text.

Bruce Moon argued that this was because the word was added later when the Williams brothers translated the English document into Māori. Mike Butler has made essentially the same argument. (See links below)

So what happened between 4–6 February 1840?

The established account is that Hobson and his advisers prepared an English draft, which was given to Henry Williams for translation into Māori.

Colenso's account of the Waitangi meeting records that on February 5th 1840:

Hobson read the Treaty in English, and the Rev. H. Williams read “the translation of the same” to the Māori chiefs.

That seems reasonably straightforward.

But Davis introduces a different interpretation. He argues that the Littlewood document is a back-translation from the Māori text, and constructs a chronology in which Busby produced the English document AFTER the Māori translation had been prepared.

That raises some obvious questions.

Question 1: Where is the evidence for the back-translation?

If Littlewood is a back-translation, what contemporary evidence establishes that it was produced from the Māori text rather than being the English draft from which the Māori text was translated?”

The document itself is dated 4 February 1840.

If that date is wrong, what is the evidence that it is wrong?

And if it was actually written after the Treaty was signed, why would Busby date it two days earlier?

Question 2: Why the 1833 paper?

The paper on which the Littlewood document is written carries an 1833 watermark. It has also been associated with paper used by James Clendon, the United States Consul.

That obviously does not prove that the document was written on 4 February.

But it does tell us that we are dealing with paper that existed in 1840, not a later reproduction.

So if Littlewood is a later back-translation, we need to know when it was written, where, and for what purpose.

Question 3: What does “the translation of the same” mean?

Colenso's description of the Waitangi meeting says Hobson read the Treaty in English and Williams then read “the translation of the same” in Māori.

Davis, however, says:

“What matters ... is the Treaty in Maori which was read to the chiefs by Williams on 5 February, together with the oral explanation given by Hobson and translated by Williams.”

Was there a separate oral explanation by Hobson which Williams translated? Or, as Colenso records, did Hobson read the English Treaty, followed by Williams reading “the translation of the same” in Māori?

If Davis is relying on a different contemporary source for this account, what is it?

Question 4: What about the word “Māori”?

There is another curious feature.

The English Littlewood document says in Article 3 that the rights and privileges of British subjects would be granted to the people of New Zealand.

The Māori version contains:

“nga tangata maori katoa o Nu Tirani”

— the Māori people of New Zealand.

Bruce Moon argued that the word “Māori” was added by Williams during the translation because existing British subjects already possessed British rights.

If that is correct, it is significant.

It would mean:

English text → Māori translation → inclusion of “Māori”

rather than:

Māori text → English back-translation → omission of “Māori”.

The difference may look small, but it goes directly to the question of which language came first.

Further both Claudia Orange and Donald Loveridge argue that the Littlewood document is a back-translation from the Māori text. But if that is so, why does Littlewood omit the word “Māori” where the Māori text expressly contains it?

This occurs not only in Article 3, but also in the wording of the preamble.

A later back-translation provides an interesting comparison. In 1869, T.E. Young produced an official English translation of the Māori Treaty. Where the Māori text referred to Māori people, Young used “native” or “natives” rather than simply “people of New Zealand”.

That raises a straightforward question: if Littlewood was translated from the Māori text, why does its English wording omit “Māori” altogether?

Conversely, if the English Littlewood document existed first, the difference is easier to understand: the Māori translation could have introduced the more specific term “Māori” to distinguish the Māori population from Europeans and other British subjects.

This does not prove that Littlewood was the English draft. But it is surely something that needs to be explained before confidently describing it as a back-translation.

Question 5: Why would Busby's English draft need to be back-translated?

Busby was the person involved in preparing the English draft of the Treaty for Hobson. He was not a fluent Māori speaker, so the obvious sequence is that the Treaty was drafted in English and Henry Williams and his son Edward then translated it into Māori.

If the Littlewood document is instead a “back-translation”, as Davis proposes, there must have been a second stage in which the Māori version was translated back into English.

Where is the contemporary evidence for that second translation?

Davis proposes that Busby, Williams and others were working between the two languages on 4 February and that Busby produced an English version of what the Māori translation meant.

But that appears to be a reconstruction of events, rather than documentary evidence that such a back-translation actually took place.

Update: There is, however, another piece of contemporary evidence which raises an important question.

On 20 February 1840, US Consul James Clendon sent an English translation of the Māori Treaty to the American Government. He specifically stated that he would apply to Hobson for an official copy and translation.

This raises a further question about what happened to the original English draft:

If the Government subsequently supplied Clendon with the requested English version, was it a back-translation from Māori — or was it the surviving English draft prepared on 4 February?

If it was the latter, it could provide a possible explanation for how the missing English draft came into Clendon's possession and, ultimately, how a document with this wording could have survived outside the official records.

This is something that deserves considerably more investigation.

And if Busby was responsible for preparing the English draft in the first place, why would the document in his handwriting, dated 4 February, and closely corresponding to the Māori Treaty, be assumed to be a translation from Māori rather than the English draft from which the Māori Treaty was produced?

There is no good reason to suppose that Busby composed the Treaty in Māori. The documented drafting process was an English one, with the Māori translation undertaken by Henry and Edward Williams.

And another important point, is that the document did not first appear in 1989.

There is evidence of essentially the same English wording in material associated with James Clendon in February 1840, and a closely corresponding text was transcribed by Captain Charles Wilkes on 3 April 1840.

A particularly interesting piece of evidence is the English text recorded by Commodore Charles Wilkes on 3 April 1840. It contains the unusual spelling “Sovreignty”, the spelling “ceided”, and an Article 2 correction in which “chiefs” is crossed out and replaced by “Queen”. These features correspond closely with the Littlewood text.

If the Wilkes document can be independently established as a transcription of an English document held by James Clendon, rather than simply another back-translation of the Māori text, it could provide important evidence about the provenance of Littlewood.

And then there is Fletcher

Ned Fletcher's The English Text of the Treaty of Waitangi is a substantial study of the English Treaty texts. Yet, as Mike Butler previously pointed out, Fletcher does not discuss the Littlewood document in his book, despite discussing the missing final English draft.

That omission is certainly something worth asking about.

It does not prove Fletcher is wrong.

The relevant question is much simpler:

If the Littlewood document was known to exist and was written by Busby, why was it not dealt with in a study specifically devoted to the English text of the Treaty?

Davis himself acknowledges that Fletcher's book does not discuss Littlewood, while Fletcher does discuss the missing English draft and other English Treaty texts.

And if the answer is that there is insufficient evidence to establish it as the final draft, then what evidence would be sufficient?

Why does any of this matter?

Davis concludes his article: “Why This Matters — It doesn’t.”

That is a strange conclusion from someone who appears to have spent many hours researching and writing a lengthy document about something that ‘doesn’t matter’?

However I am not convinced that it ‘doesn’t matter’.

Updated: If the Busby February 4, 1840, document had been accepted as the missing final draft, all issues to do with treaty interpretation could have been solved decades ago. It would replace the current official English text in all official documents and displays, there would be no need for a tribunal to determine the meaning and effect of the treaty, no need for treaty principles, no treaty principles mantra to beat up the government, and the Kawharu treaty backtranslation from which flows the Maori sovereignty ideology would be sidelined.

So yes, in my books it is a big deal.

And that is why I think the question should remain open.

Was Littlewood a back-translation—or have we been looking for the missing English draft when it has been sitting in the archives since 1840?

This is not a new debate. A number of articles have previously examined the Littlewood document, Fletcher's work and the competing interpretations of the Treaty texts, including:

Mike Butler, “The Ned Fletcher Treaty book”

Mike Butler: Time to display Littlewood treaty?

Bruce Moon, “The so-called ‘Littlewood treaty’ is vitally important!”

Roger Childs, “Sorry Ned, wrong Treaty!”

Roger Childs, “‘Honour the Treaty!’ But which one?”

The Littlewood Treaty - Treaty for Dummies

The End Of The Golden Gravy Train? - Ian Wishart.

Martin Doutre's Response To Dr. Donald Loveridge's Article

The debate deserves to continue—not by deciding in advance which version of history we prefer, but by asking what the surviving 1840 evidence actually tells us.

Geoff Parker is a passionate advocate for equal rights and a colour blind society.