The Dictionary of Australasian Biography/Haultain, Hon. Colonel Theodore Minet
Haultain, Hon. Colonel Theodore Minet, M.L.C., New Zealand, who is of Dutch extraction, was born in May 1817, at Stony Stratford, England, and after a coarse at Sandhurst entered the army in 1834. He served ten years in India, being at Ferozepore and Maharajpore in 1842-3. In 1849, while Staff-officer of Pensioners, he went out to New Zealand in charge of the 8th division of the New Zealand Fencibles. In 1856 he retired from the army, settling at Mangare, and in 1859 he was elected to the House of Representatives. In the following year he was employed by the Government to organise the Auckland Militia, and was appointed lieut.-colonel of the 1st battalion. In 1863 he was given command of the 2nd Waikato Regiment in the Waikato war, and was present at the taking of Orakau. For his services he was promoted to be colonel, and made colonel-commandant of the four Waikato regiments. In 1865 he resigned his post, having been elected to the House to represent Franklin. When the Weld Ministry was defeated, Mr. Stafford formed a cabinet, and Colonel Haultain acted as a member of the Executive Council from Oct. 16th, 1865, to June 28th, 1869, and Minister for Colonial Defence from Oct 31st, 1865, to June 28th, 1869. During his period of office occurred the Hauhau wars, and the affairs of Te Kooti and Titokowaru, and he personally conducted the Whakamarama campaign. In 1869 Colonel Haultain retired from public life, but in 1871 he drew up a report on the working of the Native Lands Act, and in 1872 was entrusted with the payment of imperial pensions, and was made Trust Commissioner under the Native Lands Fraud Prevention Act. He was subsequently sheriff, and is a trustee and governor of St. John's College, Auckland, and a governor of Auckland College. In June 1885 he was the colony's representative in Sydney to welcome back the New South Wales Soudan contingent.