VENTNOR 113936 in Westport NZ 1901-2.jpg
Photo courtesy Auckland Library,NZ

INFOLINK

'The 20 month old steamship Ventnor,Capt.H.G.Ferry, left Wellington on October 26th,1902 for Hong Kong with a most unusual cargo,having on board 499 coffins containing the exhumed bodies of Chinamen,mainly gold miners who had died in New Zealand.The Chong Shing Tong Society of China was responsible for collecting the bodies ,some of which had rested in New Zealand for 20 years,and arranging their conveyance to China. Nine elderly Chinese were carried to act as ' body attendants'.
The ship also carried 5,357 tons of coal.Her crew numbered 31.

At 12.40 a.m. on the 27th October in fine weather and a smooth sea and her engines making full speed of 10 knots the Ventnor ran onto a reef to the south of Cape Egmont.The engines were at once reversed and she backed off the rocks and away ,but with increasing difficulty .Eventually the pumps gave out and she filled and sank by the bows at 9 p.m. on the 28th.
The boats,of which there were four were launched without mishap and pulled away,taking the light on Hokianga Heads ten miles distant as their guide.Two boats reached Omapere Beach,and one was picked up by a passing ship.The fourth boat containing the captain,two officers and thirteen men ,a total of 16 persons,was washed up in a smashed condition to the N of Hukatere on November 11th,its occupants having perished.'


[ A memorial to 499 Chinese gold miners whose remains were lost at sea when the SS Ventnor sank off Hokianga Harbour in 1902 — and the west coast Māori who recovered the bones and buried them alongside their own people — was dedicated in Opononi in 2009