The Forest Rangers’ entry into Te Awamutu that evening must have been a grotesquely picturesque spectacle. Von Tempsky wrote:
“An advanced guard under myself surrounded the stretcher of the chief Paul, whom we had picked up on the way back according to promise. This was serious and respectable, but the main body of the two companies that followed, borne down with the most promiscuous loot ever gathered, were a sight fit for the pencil of Hogarth. There were men representing a walking museum of fowls strung and hung all over their persons. There were men having the carcases of pigs strapped to their bodies; one even carried a live young sow, baby-wise in his arms, restraining its desperate struggles and screams by the strength of a powerful arm. There were men mounted on Maori horses, one of them my half-caste Sergeant Southee, decorated with feathers used at the Maori war dance. The whole two companies bristled with Maori spears, tomahawks, double-barrel guns, and so forth. I myself had a magnificent long-handled tomahawk, given to me by one of my men, who picked it up on the battlefield. I gave it to General Cameron. [[52]]
“I have since heard that our entry into Te Awamutu created not only admiration but envy, loot being such a scarce article in this war that even Commodore Wiseman could not help saying to a friend of mine, ‘Those rascally Rangers have got all the loot.’ In former days the Naval Brigade generally got ahead of the soldiers in that business, but now the agility of the Rangers had put the long-armed Jack Tar into the shade.
“In dismissing my men that evening, I could not but testify to their gallant conduct, particularly No. 1 Company, under Lieutenant Westrupp, who had followed me when I went a considerable pace, and when my own men, being in high fern, could not keep up with me. General Cameron, in acknowledging the good behaviour of the men, had another ration of rum served out to them that night, so that at the camp-fire our battles were fought over again with even more gusto and less risk.”
Another old-timer, an ex-Ranger in the Waikato, thus described to the present writer that triumphal march back from Rangiaowhia:
“We had found great stores of potatoes, pigs, and fowls lying ready to be carted to the big pa at Paterangi. The stuff was stacked here and there along the middle of the village between the two churches. When we marched back to Te Awamutu that night one of our fellows, Johnny Reddy, was leading, or rather driving, a pig by a rope. As we came near the mission station gate at Te Awamutu we saw General Cameron standing there with Bishop Selwyn. Reddy called out, ‘Make way for the Maori prisoner!’ The General ordered, ‘Arrest that man!’ But Johnny dropped his rope, left the pig, and bolted. All the same, he had a fair whack of that porker for his supper.”
The Royal Navy men, as a veteran recalls, did not come home from the battle quite empty-handed, for when they hauled their six-pounder field-piece in that evening it was loaded with Maori pigs and potatoes.
The day’s casualties numbered two soldiers killed, one of the Defence Force Cavalry mortally wounded, and fifteen others wounded, including Ensign Doveton, of the 50th. The Maoris lost about a score killed, beside many wounded, some of whom were captured and treated in the field hospital at Te Awamutu.