Later that year, Māori plundered the Puckey family's house as utu in response for William's 11-year-old sister Elizabeth playfully telling the daughter of the great chief Hongi that she would “cut your father's head off, and cook it in the iron pot,” according to Butler's diary. “When the natives broke in, one of them caught hold of him by the hair of his head, and said he would cut off his head if he spoke a word. As soon as he was loosed, in he ran to his father, trembling in every limb.”