Update regarding John Smith’s buttock wound

We had assumed we would probably never know the story behind John Smith’s buttock wound, described in Max’s blog of March 2017, ‘John Smith’ being the archetype of a person you are unlikely to ever be able to find the correct match for in the historical record. However Michael Fitzgerald, one of our advisory board members, happened upon the story while browsing PapersPast recently. It is quite the story, though the motivations of the shooter still remain unclear.
​
New Zealand Spectator and Cook’s Strait Guardian, 12 October 1864, p.4