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Xinhua

The mystery surrounding a century-old tragedy linking Guangdong province and New Zealand has been solved with the discovery of the wreck of a steamer that sank off the far north of New Zealand in 1902.
The wreck found 21km off the Hokianga Harbour has been identified as the SS Ventnor, which was carrying the remains of 499 Chinese gold miners back to their homeland to be buried.
Authorities in China and New Zealand had been notified and the find had been gazetted by Heritage New Zealand, meaning no items could be removed from the wreck without permission, John Albert, chairman of the Ventnor Project Group, said.
The wreck was found in about 150 metres of water after a three-year search, he said.
"Finding the SS Ventnor highlights the significant ties between China and New Zealand," Albert said.
"It is important historically in terms of the early Chinese contribution to New Zealand and culturally in terms of the shared attitudes towards human remains.
"Since the time of the shipwreck, remains have drifted to shore. These have been interred and their graves cared for by local Maori."
President Xi Jinping was in New Zealand yesterday for a one-day visit.
John Klaracich, an elder of the Hokianga iwi tribe extended an invitation to Chinese leaders to visit Hokianga the next time they were in New Zealand.
"We would like to give representatives of China the opportunity to personally visit the graves of their countrymen on land and at sea, and pay respects to those pioneers who had not only helped to build our country materially, but brought their rich and ancient culture to our land as well," Klaracich said.
The SS Ventnor was a British ship, chartered in 1902 by the Cheong Sing Tong, a charity organisation led by Dunedin businessman Choie Sew Hoy, to transport the exhumed remains of Chinese men who had died in New Zealand back to their homeland for reburial.
The men, mostly from the Guangdong area, had travelled to New Zealand to work on the goldfields and the towns that sprung up around them.
The SS Ventnor picked up the remains mostly in lead-lined coffins in Dunedin, Greymouth and Wellington. On October 27, 1902, it struck a reef on the Taranaki coast off the west of the North Island, and sank the next day with the loss of 13 lives.


Shipwreck discovery off New Zealand ends mystery of Guangdong miners

A painting of the SS Ventnor going down off the Hokianga Heads in New Zealand in 1902. Photo: SCMP

A painting of the SS Ventnor going down off the Hokianga Heads in New Zealand in 1902.Photo: SCMP

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World

Vessel that sank in 1902 on its way to Guangdong was carrying the remains of 499 Chinese miners


The mystery surrounding a century-old tragedy linking Guangdong province and New Zealand has been solved with the discovery of the wreck of a steamer that sank off the far north of New Zealand in 1902.
