Updated 18 April 2025

This site commenced in 2015 as a collaboration between those who shared a common interest to develop an online repository of information and analysis around our tūpuna/ancestors, Richard (Dicky) Barrett and his wife Wakaiwa Rāwinia (Te Āti Awa) and their children; the numerous Honeyfield siblings who emigrated from North Dorset, England in the 1850’s, and the lives of their descendants in Aotearoa/New Zealand.

My aim has been to include as much as we can about our whakapapa, hapū and our iwi, Te Āti Awa.

Much of the material covers people and events in New Zealand of historical significance, including:

• hundreds of years of Māori history in Taranaki and else where in Aotearoa prior to colonisation through to the so-called ‘Musket Wars’ between northern iwi and Taranaki iwi and subsequent migrations south to the Kapiti coast, Wellington and Marlborough Sounds
• Te Whānau o Wakaiwa: Nga Tūpuna me nga hononga hapū
• Barrett’s role in establishing a trans-Tasman trading station in Ngamotu / New Plymouth in 1828; his subsequent role as mentor / teacher with Māori kinship groups
• pioneering European traders and whalers who, with their families, lived with and fought alongside their Māori kin
• Barrett’s role in Māori land sales as an agent to the New Zealand Company in Wellington and Taranaki and his influence in chosing the location of the New Plymouth settlement.
• Subsequent land sales to the Crown in the settlement of New Plymouth and surrounding areas, including Tataraimaka
• land wars between Māori and the Crown
• the Honeyfield sibling / Morgan brothers migrations to Taranaki in the 1850’s, including the history of the Honeyfield’s in North Dorset
• the pioneering lives of the Honeyfield / Morgan family over the course of the 19th century
• tracking the lives of Barrett / Honeyfield decedents over six generations in Aotearoa / New Zealand.

As more material becomes available and with ongoing research, the various postings will be revised on a regular basis, and new postings will go up.

The following people – all descendants of Honeyfields – have contributed material to the site:

Robin Beaty

Anne Hodgson

Kevin Honeyfield

John Honeyfield

Julie Adele Johns

Ron McLean

Andrew Morgan

Paul Roberts (Author/Editor)

Andrew Morgan has developed a Morgan Family Heritage Blog. John and William Morgan accompanied their first cousin’s, the Honeyfield siblings, in their migration from North Dorset, England in the 1850’s.

Anne Hodgson provided a great deal of information from her 40 years of research.

Ron McLean’s Master’s thesis on Dicky Barrett provided a substantial evidence base for five of the postings on this site.

Kevin Honeyfield’s speaking notes on a bus tour held as part of the 2015 Honeyfield family reunion provided very useful anecdotes and information.

Kevin Honeyfield collated/wrote much of the material in the documents prepared for the Honeyfield 150 celebrations.

Paul Roberts has supplemented the material with additional research, particularly on tūpuna Māori, and has authored all of the postings on the site. Paul is also responsible for developing and administering this website.

Paul’s pepeha (introduction) is: