By Katalina Siasau
Film maker and art journalist, Timothy Stone is looking for evidence left by 19th century pirates who visited Tonga in 1829. Stone is currently in Tonga on a quest to find out what happened to a small jolly boat that was left on Niuatoputapu or Tafahi and last photographed in 1970. He is also looking for locals who may be able to help identify the origins of two objects, a straw hat and a carved pipe.
As part of a planned exhibition in Australia, Stone has spent the last nine weeks retracing a journey taken by escaped Tasmanian convicts aboard the Cyprus Brig, an Australian supply ship, in 1829. After stealing the vessel that was transporting them, a criminal act that saw them labelled as pirates, the convicts sailed to New Zealand, Tonga and Japan, before they scuttled the Cyprus off the coast of China and returned to England.
Between September and November 1829, the pirates arrived in Tonga, and Stone believes spent several weeks at Tongatapu, masquerading as an American whaler before sailing to Niuatoputapu where seven or eight men left the vessel. Stone said at least two of them lived there for two years and one lived on an island in the Vava’u Group.
One convict, James Camm, was apprehended at Tongatapu in 1831, another man, Robert Macguire, was recaptured on Niuatoputapu in 1832. But as for others, they were never heard of again.
However, Stone hopes to find the small boat shown in a Tim Riddle photograph in the 1970s on Tafahi. Or at least, someone who may remember the boat.
Looking similar to a whale boat, Stone’s research found that the boat was very unlikely to originate from Tonga. He has also gone to the UK and discovered that the boat did not come from there either.
"If I could find that boat, that's like... evidence," Stone said.
When the Cyprus arrived in Japan a Samurai artist drew a picture of the brig, and also illustrations of two objects that Stone believes may have come from Tonga or nearby Fiji. One object was a straw hat with unusual weaving and the other carved pipe with a feather stem. The illustrations were found in a Japanese manuscript and are proof that the pirates sailed to Japan.
The unusual weaving style on the hat led Stone to believe it was being produced to sell for westerners, "so it was being produced for whaling ships, merchants, royal navy."
"The whole objective is to find the boat, their connection, and identify these objects and the craft behind them particularly the weaving."
Stone started his journey in the UK doing research for three weeks, then went to Japan for two weeks, then Hong Kong and China for a week, then came to New Zealand, and now concluding his research in Tonga.
Stone is on a Winston Churchill Fellowship, and his research is part of a major planned exhibition in Sydney and Hobart in 2029-2030.
He arrived in Nuku'alofa on Monday, 27 January and will be spending eight days doing research in Tonga.
Initially, he planned to fly out to Niuatoputapu but unfortunately could not due to technical issues with the plane. He would like to speak to older people from Tafahi or the Niuas who may remember the jolly boat, or to anyone who might be an expert in weaving, who might identify the weaving depicted in the drawing of the hat.
