E Faahi Tapu he Vagahau Niue 2015 
Niue Language Week 2015

This week is Niue language week and Auckland Libraries has a series of events on regionwide.

Showing the King and Queen of Niue with the  New Zealand Premier, Richard Seddon and Mrs Seddon Auckland Weekly News, 5 October 1900 Heritage Images Online, Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, AWNS-19001005-3-3

Here at Central Auckland Research Centre we're proud to be the caretakers of the microfilm copies of the Niue High Court Registrar records.

The original manuscripts were very badly damaged during Cyclone Heta in January 2004.

Fortunately, the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) had microfilmed the precious records in the 1990s or the majority would have been lost. They were kind enough to gift a set of films to the Niuean government and also to Auckland Library (as Auckland has the largest population of Niueans in the world).

Since then, we've had many Niueans in our Research Centre happily researching their family heritage.

Examples of the major records we hold here are:

Birth registration records for Niue 1900-1997 (3 NIU BDM)

• Microfilm of original manuscript in the custody of the Department of Justice, Tufukia Alofi, Niue.
• Birth records for Niue.

Birth indexes (3 NIU BDM)

• Microfilm of original manuscript in the custody of the Department of Justice, Tufukia Alofi, Niue.
• Includes names, birth dates, and names of parents.  Arranged alphabetically by given name and includes an index number that refers to the appropriate birth record.
• Villages: Alofi, Avatele, Fatiau, Hakupu, Hikutavake, Lakepa, Liku, Makefu, Mutalau, Namukulu, Tamakautonga, Toi, Tuapa, and Vaiea.

Death and still birth registration records 1899-1997 (3 NIU BDM)

• Microfilm of original manuscript in the custody of the Department of Justice, Tufukia Alofi, Niue.
• Death and still birth records for Niue.

Death indexes (3 NIU BDM)

• Microfilm of original manuscript in the custody of the Department of Justice, Tufukia Alofi, Niue.
• Includes names, birth dates, and names of parents of individuals who died or emigrated from Niue.  Arranged alphabetically by surname and includes an index number that refers to the appropriate death record.
• Villages: Alofi, Avatele, Fatiau, Hakupu, Hikutavake, Lakepa, Liku, Makefu, Mutalau, Namukulu, Tamakautonga, Toi, Tuapa, and Vaiea.

Marriage registrations  (3 NIU BDM)

• Microfilm of original manuscript in the custody of the Department of Justice, Tufukia Alofi, Niue.
• Marriage records for Niue.

Various genealogies (3 NIU FAM)

• Microfilm of original manuscript in the custody of the Department of Justice, Tufukia Alofi, Niue.
• Includes genealogies of persons in Niue.  These were created at the request of people interested in tracing their ancestry or by people seeking to establish claims to citizenship or land ownership through inheritance.  Records contain copies of letters of request and conclusions of research in the form of family trees.

Genealogies of Niue women  (3 NIU FAM)

• Microfilm of original manuscript in the custody of the Department of Justice, Tufukia Alofi, Niue.
• Maternal genealogies arranged by village for use in determining property rights some of which inherited through maternal lines of descent.
• Villages: Alofi, Avatele, Fatiau, Hakupu, Hikutavake, Lakepa, Liku, Makefu, Mutalau, Namukulu, Tamakautonga, Toi, Tuapa, and Vaiea.

Emigration from Niue (3 NIU IMM)

• Microfilm of original manuscript in the custody of the Department of Justice, Tufukia Alofi, Niue.
• Index of individuals who emigrated from Niue arranged by village.  Includes date of birth, name of parents, place of birth, date of emigration, place of emigration to, and if appropriate, date of return to Niue.
• Villages: Alofi, Avatele, Fatiau, Hakupu, Hikutavake, Lakepa, Liku, Makefu, Mutalau, Namukulu, Tamakautonga, Toi, Tuapa, and Vaiea.

European immigration to Niue (3 NIU IMM)

• Microfilm of original manuscript in the custody of the Department of Justice, Tufukia Alofi, Niue.
• Index of europeans who immigrated to Niue, or who took up residence there. Includes names of their parents, place and date of birth, date immigrated, and if appropriate, date departed Niue or date of death.

O’Neill’s Point Cemetery, Bayswater, Auckland

From 1915, a number of recruits from the Pacific trained at Narrow Neck Camp in Devonport before being shipped to the battlefront. The Third Maori Contingent included 50 from the Cook Islands along with 153 Niueans, Tahitians, 15 Fijians, Gilbert and Ellis Islanders (now Kiribati) and Western Samoans. However, of the Niueans only 140 completed their training at Narrow Neck Camp and were sent to Egypt – 12 were discharged back to Niue due to illness and one, Private Vilipate, died at Narrow Neck Camp on 25 December 1915 and was buried in the O'Neill’s Point Cemetery. The Third Contingent sailed on 5 February 1916.

Showing exterior view of church at O'Neills Point Cemetery, surrounded by gravestones   Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 4-6273 Heritage Images

Two more Niuean soldiers and one Cook Island soldier were buried in that cemetery during the training of more Contingents in 1916. A returning Cook Island solider, Sergeant Beni Banaba was buried there as well in 1917, having served in Egypt and Palestine.

The influenza epidemic of late 1918 hit Narrow Neck Camp particularly hard, and at one stage in early October 1918 there were 226 cases of influenza at the Camp. Ultimately 21 either died in the Camp or in the nearby Barracks and all but one were buried in the O'Neill’s Point Cemetery, including three from Kiribati, one from Fiji and one from the Cook Islands.

In 1919, another Fijian soldier and two Cook Island soldiers were buried in O’Neill’s Point Cemetery, from Auckland Hospital. They were returning home in the troopships.

Visiting O'Neill’s Point Cemetery today, you can see the well-tended and orderly graves of Pasifika soldiers buried there, most with New Zealand Expeditionary or Defence Force emblems on their graves.

David Verran