Tataraimaka Cemetery

Tataraimaka Cemetery is visible from Lower Timaru Road; the headstones are close to the road with no vegetation or structures obscuring them. The land form is initially flat and then descends steeply behind the burial area into a stream gully, rising up again on the western side of the cemetery land. The gully and western area are covered in native bush. The cemetery is surrounded by farmland.

In 1968, the County Engineer noted that very little interest in the maintenance of graves is shown by the relatives of the deceased and that Council workmen undertake a general clearing of rank growth once a year. In between these visits bracken, fern and other grows up to a height of two or three feet, making an untidy appearance when viewed from the road. The discontinuity and irregularity in the lines of the graves and the presence of fences, and the topping slabs of various dimensions makes clearing work difficult and costly. A recommendation was made to prepare a plan showing the exact location of all existing headstones, which will then be removed intact and the whole area bulldozed clear. The area will then be turfed and the headstones replaced over the respective graves in straightened lines and supported by a continuous concrete base, some three feet wide set flush at ground level. The area will be mowed regularly.

A chapel was originally located at the site, fronting onto Timaru Road midway along the eastern boundary. This is shown on Survey Office Plan 1723, dated 15 September 1901.The chapel was built soon after the settler’s reoccupied their land at the end of the Land Wars, the first reference to the chapel being April 1873. Local timber was cut for the chapel and stored on site at the cemetery until commandeered by the Government at the outbreak of the Second Taranaki War in 1863, being then used for a blockhouse. The Government later provided enough kauri timber to build a community chapel.