Formerly a follower of Te Ua Haumēne, he was also a priest and prophet of his Pai Mārire political and religious movement, reviving ancient rites of cannibalism and propitiation of Māori gods with a heart torn from the first enemy slain in a battle.

"[1] The immediate cause of the war was the confiscation of vast areas of Māori land in Taranaki by the Government under the powers of the punitive New Zealand Settlements Act 1863.

Members of his hapu removed survey equipment and destroyed fences and huts, then began harassing South Taranaki settlers with minor thefts of stock and property to persuade them to leave.

[1][3] On 9 June 1868,[5] Ngāti Ruanui warriors escalated their campaign, shooting and tomahawking three settlers felling and sawing timber on the east side of the Waingongoro River, between Hāwera and Manaia.

In a move Belich claims was designed to provoke McDonnell and lure him to a battle at a place of Tītokowaru's choosing, 60 warriors from the Ngaruahine hapu, along with Imperial Army deserter Charles Kane, launched a pre-dawn raid on the dilapidated Turuturu-Mokai Redoubt, 2.5 km north of Hāwera and 5 km from the main army camp at Waihi Redoubt, killing 10 and wounding six of the 25 Armed Constabulary garrisoned there.

[6]: 189  The hearts of two of the Constabulary soldiers were cut from their bodies by Māori warriors, prompting McDonnell to make the dramatic gesture of kissing the blade of his sword and vowing, "I shall have revenge for this.

Shots fired at the occupants of outlying huts warned Tītokowaru of the direction of McDonnell's approach, giving the chief time to organise his defence.

[1][8][page needed] McDonnell hesitated, torn between advancing with further losses or retreating, watching as the inexperienced volunteer recruits from the Wellington Rangers and Rifles either bunched together and froze or panicked and fled.

Tītokowaru's small attacking force was quickly reinforced by warriors from neighboring villages and McDonnell's retreat to Waihi came under relentless fire from Māori who followed them almost to the Waingongoro, inflicting further casualties.

In the minds of the Pākeha public, von Tempsky was a dashing hero of the New Zealand wars, whose fearlessness and ability to survive near-misses gave him an aura of invincibility.

In early October his force marched south and built a pā at Otoia, just northeast of Patea and busied themselves with repairing weapons, gathering food and ammunition and planting crops.

[1] On 6 November Whitmore's force was boosted by the arrival of 100 men of a newly raised company of the Armed Constabulary, No.6 Division, commanded by Captain J. M. Roberts, who had fought at Te Ngutu.

"[1] In the wake of the Moturoa defeat, Whitmore moved his base further south to Nukumaru, forming an entrenched camp ready to defend Wanganui's outlying settlements with a force of 350.

Tītokowaru responded by following him, establishing an elaborate fortification for his 400 warriors[1] at the Māori village of Tauranga-ika close to the Europeans' military base and just 29 km, or a day's march, from Wanganui.

Whitmore convinced Haultain that it would be easier to concentrate first on defeating Te Kooti before returning with a stronger, more disciplined force to successfully act against Tītokowaru.

[1] Tītokowaru used those five weeks to demonstrate his hold on the Wanganui hinterland, burning farms and abandoned military posts and driving off stock, but also laboring over the fortifications at Tauranga-ika until it became one of the most formidable modern pā ever built.

Inspecting it later, Whitmore wrote in his report of 3 February 1869, "No troops in the world could have hewn their way through a double row of strong palisades, backed by rifle pits, and flanked by two-storeyed erections, such as was constructed in this fortification, defended by excellent shots and desperate men.

A week later he set off with 800 Armed Constabulary and Wanganui and Kai-Iwi Mounted Corps, as well as 200 kupapa under Major Kepa, clinging to the coast to avoid the danger of bush ambushes.

[4]: 285–294 Whitmore professed no regret that Tauranga-ika had been taken without resistance: "My object was to gain possession of the district and if I could do this without loss and without putting too heavy a strain on my raw troops they would be encouraged.

Straggling warriors were shot and prisoners were decapitated as European troops and kūpapa competed in the race for blood money, collecting sacks of human heads.

[13] Whitmore suffered several casualties from a rearguard defence near the Waitotara River, but caught up with them on 13 March at Otautu, north of Patea, when six colonial soldiers were killed and 12 wounded in an attempted assault on the Māori camp.

[1] Eleven days later a group of Tītokowaru's followers, by now starving and subsisting on foraged food including fungus and grubs,[4]: 285–294  surrendered in a swamp hideout at Ngaere, near modern-day Eltham, while their chief evaded soldiers and settled at Kawau Pa in the Upper Waitara Valley.

[1] Although Tītokowaru had fought the entire war without direct assistance from the Māori King Movement, it is possible the Kingites had attempted to intervene in February 1869 with an attack on the Pukearuhe Redoubt in Taranaki's far north—in which the settlers Lieutenant Gascoigne, his wife, and their four children were killed alongside Rev.

John Whiteley after being deceived with an opportunity for trade[4]: 304–310  —and again in March when a force of Kingite warriors massed at Mokau, reportedly preparing to invade Taranaki.