A New Zealander who worked in Samoa in the wake of the Mau Movement recalls some of the character's from my book Black Saturday.

When I was a 13-year-old boy in 1930, there had been plenty of news about O F Nelson and the Mau rebellion in the newspapers and it was only a matter of 10 years later, when I transferred from the Christchurch Public Hospital pharmacy to the Apia Government Hospital (AGH), that I was at the scene myself, when the fa'alavelave was still very much in the minds of the older New Zealand Administration officers who had many stories to tell of the events of that time.

I also thought you might be interested in my recollections of some your characters whom I knew during my time in Samoa (1940 - 1952):

Arthur Braisby: I was initially astonished to read of his background and inexperience as a police officer but not too surprised when I recalled the allegations that used to circulate amongst the indentured Chinese regarding his supplying them with opium.

Arthur aka "Tinsmith" Williams: A respected member of the community, a Past Master of Lodge Calliope and a past officer of Grand Masonic Lodge NZ. As a widower late in life, he once persuaded Aggie Grey to find him a young nubile Samoan girl to marry. His burial in Magiagi cemetery was memorable for the fact that although Arthur was a short man, the PWD had not blasted a big enough plot out of the rock. The solution was to saw a bit off one end of the coffin. One of his drinking cobbers who had been celebrating Arthur's life too well, added to this bit of excitement by falling into the grave.

P L M Morgan: had blotted his copybook some time previous to my arrival - I don't remember how - and became an unshaven recluse.

O F Nelson: I only saw him once after his return to Samoa in 1947, when he came to the AGH in his flag-flying, chaffeured-driven car, with a bottle of whisky - as always - beside him on the rear seat. He was a big man weighing some 20 stone with a heart to match, as I later discovered. Apparently, he was an avid reader of Edgar Allan Poe and as a result, had a phobia about being buried alive. He therefore stipulated in his will that when he was declared dead, his heart was to be cut out and buried with him. On his death, therefore, I had a call from his nephew, Frank C F Nelson - a close friend of mine - asking me if I would embalm the organ which had already been removed by a Samoan Medical Practitioner. Frank duly arrived at the dispensary with the heart in a bucket but after I had made up the embalming fluid, I found that the basketball-sized heart was slightly too large for the plastic lolly container which Frank had also brought with him from his store on the beachfront. As I squeezed it down on one side of the jar, the other side would squirt up through the liquid, a problem only solved when I asked Frank to hold one side down while I forced it down on the other and jammed the lid on quickly. It was an unforgettable occasion.