Kōrero: Shipwrecks

Pictured are two of the lifeboats of the Niagara just before the passengers were successfully picked up. On 19 June 1940 the 13,000-ton liner Niagara was sailing from Auckland to Vancouver when it hit a German-laid mine off Bream Head. All 136 passengers and 203 crew made it to the lifeboats. But the 590 bars of gold and half the New Zealand Army’s small-arms ammunition sank with the ship.