Queen Emma

Death breaks a link with Queen Emma

Death came peacefully, through heart trouble, on July 7 at her beloved Toboroi planta tion at Kieta, of Mrs. Frances Kroening, and snapped a link— perhaps the last—with the famous Queen Emma. She was 74, highly-respected by all, and part of an island legend which had its gracious beginnings in the slower, romantic days when planters and Islanders mingled in an easy partnership over which there were no political shadows.

She was bom—Frances Hiley—in the Mortlock Group, 140 miles east of Kieta. Her father, an Englishman of good family, was one of Queen Emma’s personable young men at Gunamtambu. He married one of Emma’s pretty young Samoan girls— a relative—and, so the story goes, Emma started the young couple off by giving them the Mortlocks as a wedding present.

There Frances was born and there she spent her early years, knowing all the native youngsters who, in some cases, have grown old with her.

Frances went to school in Australia —to the Presbyterian Ladies’ College —for some years to finish her educa tion.

After that, she went to Yorkshire, England, to stay with her father’s relatives, a definitely “county” family with interests in the wool trade and entered into the life of the landed gentry with its hunting and its social round.

While Frances was still in her •eens, her father died. The famous fleinrich Rudolph Whalen, who had nought out Queen Emma’s interests n New Britain and in New Guinea )ecame her guardian and, as Frances ias said he was always indulgent ind open-handed where she was con erned. ■ Oj l e L, return from England, she ived at Gunamtambu, which was a ocial centre, and there she enjoyed of those spacious days 1 the South Seas.

It is on record that Frances Hiley 'as an extremely pretty and accom lished girl, much sought after by all

the young blades. Gordon a good judge of a woman—used to say—meditatively, through puffs of cigarette smoke “Well, Frances Hiley was easily the prettiest girl in ♦ eV u Guinea, the belle of Gunamtambu at any festivities . Gordon was ar °und these parts at the time, coming I °t u ln , iyiL , , in her teens she became engaged to Dr. BrU n o Kroening, a medical Srnmi newly-formed Kieta government station in Bougainville, ™ amed at . Gunamtambu R„rti ,? ve “ awa V by flnwpri W fr! himself - Champagne This would be in 1913. Celebratlons - When war came in 1914, Frances accompanied her husband to Germany, as all German officials were repatriated to Germany under the peace terms laid down at the surrender of German New Guinea to the Australians. She was born a Bntish subject but she was also loyal to ber busband. inio lth w the en ding of the war in 1918, Mrs. Kroening returned to Toberoi and Dr. Kroening followed.

With the exception of the time of the Japanese occupation, she lived at Toberoi for the rest of her life.

Four children survive her Bruno who lives in the New Ireland District’

Helmut, who lives in Sydney, Mrs.’

Irmgard Joyes, living in Brisbane, and Mrs. Beatrix Tandy, of Canberra.

There are several grandchildren Mr. 1 . .’ , cW 8 a ys ? lai ? t < ained a Islands^d la hf neni? ‘w Mort l Ock . ad .*‘s P e °P le \ He P mother, tend’/ dS d af a r u er firSt A US bands death and became Mrs.

Calder, developed Toberoi plantation about 1920. She died in the Mort locks in the middle 1930 s as the result of a dynamite accident when “shooting fish”, and the islanders then looked to Mrs. Kroening for advice and help whenever they visited Kieta.

They revered her almost like their patron saint for she was the descen dant of the first European who had lived on their atoll group. She was born among them and had become part of the islands’ legend surround ing the arrival of her parents and the part they played in building up the sickly remnants of the islands people stron B an d independent com- There was a large crowd at the service in the big Roman Catholic Church at Tubiana, Kieta, on July 10 including the family, the District Commissioner, several government officials, many friends and many natives who had known Mrs. Kroen ing for years. About 40 Mortlock natives, who are working on the holi day resort project on Arovo Island, also crowded into the church. . They insisted that their rightful job was that of pall bearers and as such they closely attended the coffin in its entry into the church and from t! ? e cbu F ch . to the airport where they P laced it m the plane for the final ] our ney to Sydney, where Mrs. Kroen irl 8 was crema ted after another ser , . service at tbe Tubiana church was a very moving one. It was con ducted b y the Rev - Fat ber O’Sullivan (Father Dick) ’ a well-known pioneer pnest in Bougainville and a very old friend of ,he Kroen.ng family_ FRED ARCHER, in Rabaul.