My whakapapa, and a mihi with my grandmother. My genealogy, and a conversation with my grandmother

In advance of Armistice Day, I am publishing this short piece which I wrote in late 2016 when I was a widow of one year and my grief was raw. At the time, it seemed the most natural thing in the world for me to have a conversation with my paternal grandmother, and for part of this to be te reo Māori, the language of the tangata whenua, the first people of New Zealand. 

My grandmother was a Highland Scot who grew up speaking Gaelic at home; I am a pākeha, a New Zealand-born European, with little fluency in te reo; and so I needed help – acknowledgements are at the end – but the English language version is my own. I have prefaced the mihi with my whakapapa (genealogy) and a summary of my grandmother’s service as a nurse in London during World War I.


Margaret MacKenzie Herbert died in 1937, and so she was the grandmother my sisters, Gayle and Deborah, my brother, Paul, and I never met; and neither our first cousins, Su Scognamiglio  Andree and Richard Andree.

My whakapapa:

Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā tatou kātoa 

Ko Ann Barrie ahau

Greetings to all of you who are reading these words.

My name is Ann Barrie

I am a proud New Zealander.

I am a tangata tauiwi ki Aotearoa, and I will begin by giving my whakapapa pākeha.

I was born Ann Herbert in Christchurch. My mother, Agnes Poulter, was born in Dunedin, and my father, Charles MacKenzie Herbert, was born in Cromwell, Central Otago. On my mother’s line, I am a fourth generation New Zealander. On my father’s line I am two to three generations. All of my ancestors who immigrated to Aotearoa New Zealand arrived in Port Chalmers, Otago, in the 1860s and 1870 – all of them except my grandmother Margaret.

Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā tatou kātoa.

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Margaret MacKenzie WWI nurse:

Margaret MacKenzie, was born in Jeantown, parish of Lochcarron, the youngest of four children. During World War I, she nursed wounded soldiers in the London area, and she later worked with the Royal Belgian Red Cross helping refugees in London – she was honoured for this work by Prince Leopold of the Belgians. In August 1919, she married Sergeant Charles John Herbert from Heriot, West Otago; and one month later, they set sail for New Zealand on the Corinthic. This ship carried 404 soldiers, 358 wives and 78 children; and when they arrived in Auckland there was a huge crowd to greet them. My grandfather took his new wife south to Dunedin, and then to Cromwell, Central Otago, where he resumed his work with the Public Works Department. 

I began writing Margaret’s story in 2009, but it was put aside when first my father, then my mother, and then my husband died.

Margaret MacKenzie, b. Lochcarron, Scotland, wearing the uniform of the Royal Belgian Red Cross, London 1918. Photo: Herbert family collection

Peggy MacKenzie, 16, with her two older sisters, Lizzie, far left, and Chrissie, far right, and two Glasgow relatives, 1909.  Photo: Herbert family collection

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Margaret MacKenzie and Sergeant Charles John Herbert at Queens Park, Glasgow, on their wedding day, August 1919.  Photo: Herbert family collection.

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A mihi with my grandmother:

Greetings, Grandmother, from your oldest grandchild.

On the eve of my 70^th birthday, I reach out my hand to you.

I am a widow now, still in mourning for my husband William Glen Barrie. His story must be told first, but then it will be your turn. I have waited too long

Greetings, greetings, greetings.

E taku tau, taku kuia

Ka toro atu taku ringa ki a koe i te ata o taku ekenga ki te whitu tekau tau

Ahakoa kua pouaruhia, e koingo tonu ana mō taku hoa rangatira a William Glen Barrie.

Kua roa ahau e tatari ana ki te whakapuaki, ki te tuhi i ngā kōrero mōna. Nō reira mō muri mai ko ngā kōrero mōhou.

Ngā mihi nui ki a koe

ngā te Mātāmua o ō Mokopuna.

For the translation of my kupu (words) into te reo Māori I thank my son Charles Barrie and his Kaiako, Gaylene Taitapanui, Ngāi Tūhoe ki te Waimana.

Ann Herbert Barrie

November, 2016

Blog by Ann Barrie, November 2018