Awanui (St. Joseph's) Church cemetery

Pos S  32°  2.724'
E 173° 15.354'
Awanui is a crossroads township in a great many ways. Today it has the junction of the two main highways, one running down the east coast and the other south through Kaitaia and over the Mangamukas Ranges.

In the past is was a vital coastal port; today's meandering river was yesterday's main highway for the only way to travel south was via coastal shipping, and ports like Awanui and Mangonui and Whangaroa were important places. In the case of Awanui steamers and smaller sailing vessels navigated the winding waterway out into Kaimauma Harbour and thence out to sea.

It has also been a common point for social interaction between Maori and Pakeha who learned to help each other in strangeness of a colonial outpost of a barely understood empire. Later a third element was added as Dalmatians came to dig kauri gum (amber) from the swamps and afterwards stayed to build and work the land even as their homeland disintegrated...


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This page was constructed after the on-line database was created and there was little point in duplicating material which is changing daily in any case. Click on the MOP link and log in. Choose HEADSTONES then fill in the target box with the surname of interest OR enter any cemetery name to show a list of ALL the records for that cemetery. Once in a given record the headstone picture or pictures can be downloaded.

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