Whatever Happened to Otaheitan Jem

ABSTRACTA diaspora of Polynesian travellers on foreign ships began with the foreign discoverers. Jem, a young Tahitian boy, lived in Sydney for some years before shifting to New Zealand. There he married and became a Māori chief. He helped Revd Samuel Marsden in 1814 and later joined a private ship on a disastrous expedition to get sandalwood from the New Hebrides in 1829–30. About 350 Rotumans, 120 Tongans, 500 Hawaiians and various others, including some Māori, died, mostly from fevers caught at Erromanga. Jem survived and was reported in Tonga in 1832, but whatever happened thereafter?