Post by nzbc on May 14, 2019 22:26:19 GMT 12
by Kirsten Wong
This is the story of a poor unfortunate.
A middle-aged Chinese man thought to have leprosy was sent to live on an island in the middle of Wellington Harbour. No, not Matiu or Somes Island but its tiny northwest neighbour, Mokopuna.
You can see it driving round the bays. A large cone-shaped rock partly covered in low-lying scrub. There is apparently a cleft in a rocky wall off a sloping beach of gravel. It was in this cleft that Kim Lee, a 56-year-old fruiterer from Newtown lived, and after a short three months, died. Not much is known about his life, except that he was living in Adelaide Road and, at the time of his death in 1904, had been in New Zealand 18 years.
According to stories, the Health Department who'd removed him to Mokopuna, employed the local lighthouse keeper to keep him supplied with food. On fine days he'd row out with supplies. In rough weather he sent out rice, hot soup and fruit on a flying fox.
Why this extraordinary treatment? The question is partly answered by conditions of the time. At this time there was no known cure for leprosy although some people did seem to have recovered from it. Perhaps even more than now leprosy was viewed with a sort of social horror. Not only was it incurable but it was also physically ugly and contagious (although it could only be caught through prolonged exposure).
At the time, the most likely people stricken with it were Maori and a few Chinese. In fact the disease seems to have been pre-colonial. But even by the standards of the century Kim Lee's treatment appears unusual. He was unfortunate enough to live in a time when anti-Chinese feeling was on the rise. Mainly due to the fact that Chinese were moving away from the goldfields and into the cities where they were more visible.
A common stereotype was that Chinese were natural carriers of disease. Perhaps this preconditioning made doctors leap to the conclusion of leprosy. Ironically, it now seems Kim Lee may not have suffered from leprosy at all. An examination of records suggest symptoms more consistent with tuberculosis or an auto-immune disease. In any event, Kim Lee appears to be the only person to have been interred on Mokopuna. If you can imagine the desolation you can assume his passing came as a relief.
Gwynne Nicol, in Ann Paterson's Stories of York Bat (1983) notes the last remnants of Kim Lee's life were recorded by Elsdon Best when he visited the site a few years later. There were remains of some furniture made of packing cases and a mug on a shelf in the cave.
flatrock.org.nz/topics/prisons/the_leper_of_somes_island.htm
This is the story of a poor unfortunate.
A middle-aged Chinese man thought to have leprosy was sent to live on an island in the middle of Wellington Harbour. No, not Matiu or Somes Island but its tiny northwest neighbour, Mokopuna.
You can see it driving round the bays. A large cone-shaped rock partly covered in low-lying scrub. There is apparently a cleft in a rocky wall off a sloping beach of gravel. It was in this cleft that Kim Lee, a 56-year-old fruiterer from Newtown lived, and after a short three months, died. Not much is known about his life, except that he was living in Adelaide Road and, at the time of his death in 1904, had been in New Zealand 18 years.
According to stories, the Health Department who'd removed him to Mokopuna, employed the local lighthouse keeper to keep him supplied with food. On fine days he'd row out with supplies. In rough weather he sent out rice, hot soup and fruit on a flying fox.
Why this extraordinary treatment? The question is partly answered by conditions of the time. At this time there was no known cure for leprosy although some people did seem to have recovered from it. Perhaps even more than now leprosy was viewed with a sort of social horror. Not only was it incurable but it was also physically ugly and contagious (although it could only be caught through prolonged exposure).
At the time, the most likely people stricken with it were Maori and a few Chinese. In fact the disease seems to have been pre-colonial. But even by the standards of the century Kim Lee's treatment appears unusual. He was unfortunate enough to live in a time when anti-Chinese feeling was on the rise. Mainly due to the fact that Chinese were moving away from the goldfields and into the cities where they were more visible.
A common stereotype was that Chinese were natural carriers of disease. Perhaps this preconditioning made doctors leap to the conclusion of leprosy. Ironically, it now seems Kim Lee may not have suffered from leprosy at all. An examination of records suggest symptoms more consistent with tuberculosis or an auto-immune disease. In any event, Kim Lee appears to be the only person to have been interred on Mokopuna. If you can imagine the desolation you can assume his passing came as a relief.
Gwynne Nicol, in Ann Paterson's Stories of York Bat (1983) notes the last remnants of Kim Lee's life were recorded by Elsdon Best when he visited the site a few years later. There were remains of some furniture made of packing cases and a mug on a shelf in the cave.
flatrock.org.nz/topics/prisons/the_leper_of_somes_island.htm