Thomas Kendall | |
|---|---|
 From left, the chiefs Waikato and Hongi Hika with Kendall | |
| Born | 13 December 1778 North Thoresby, Lincolnshire, England |
| Died | 6 August 1832 (aged 53) Off Sydney, New South Wales, when the cutter Brisbane sank with all hands |
| Nationality | British |
| Occupation | Missionary |
Thomas Kendall (13 December 1778 – 6 August 1832) was a schoolmaster, an early missionary to Māori people in New Zealand, and a recorder of the Māori language. An evangelical Anglican, he and his family were in the first group of missionaries to New Zealand, accompanied to the Bay of Islands by Samuel Marsden in December 1814 and settling there. He wrote the first book in Māori, published in 1815. By 1821 he felt it necessary to accede to local Māori demands for guns in order to ensure their continued protection of the mission, and the Church Missionary Society dismissed him in 1822 for gun dealing. Marsden visited New Zealand to dismiss him in person in 1823, after learning that he had committed adultery with a Māori woman. Kendall left New Zealand in 1825 and died in a ship sinking in Australia in 1832.