Lost Watut

[Mesulam Aisoli]

John, and all,

Our new "Watut" is situated opposite ( about 100 meters south) of Manggai
High School Ground, of Manggai Village, about 45 kilometers south east of
Kavieng town. I will help try to look around for your lost man? Lapun or dai
pinis.

mesu.

> ----------
> From: 	BURTON John[SMTP:john.burton at tsra.gov.au]
> Sent: 	Thursday, 11 April 2002 12:25pm
> To: 	Multiple recipients of list
> Subject: 	Lost Watut
> 
> Mesulam! 
> 
> > We also
> > have place names like "Watut" stuck in the middle of the bush 
> > of the village
> > where I belong. Brought in from "Bulolo Wau" region during 
> > Gold Mine in the
> > Wau Bulolo years ago.
> 
> The Watut landowners I was working with 1995-200 lost a ancestor of theirs
> in New Ireland during the war. Knowing I had been to New Ireland, they
> asked
> me on many occasions if I could find out what happened. We did a survey
> around 1995 on another matter, when Dinah Minol visited villages between
> Kavieng and Namatanai, but no trace. This is the first I've heard of the
> name "Watut" ringing any bells in New Ireland at all.
> 
> What happened was five men were arrested around 1939 for a witch-killing
> at
> Sapanda village. They were taken to Wau for court, convicted and send off
> to
> serve jail terms elsewhere in New Guinea. Three, possibly four, went to
> Kavieng, and then the war came in 1942 and they were stranded there. Two
> of
> them survived until the liberation and were safely repatriated to Bulolo.
> (There is a subsequent  complication that they had to found a new village
> because of the unavenged murder they had committed.) Both became quite
> famous, one as the luluai of Nauti village, and the other as a prominent
> alluvial miner. Indeed, he became one of the 'black millionaires' of Wau,
> beginning his rise in 1957 when miner's licences began to be issued to New
> Guineans. The first didn't go far from the government station at Kavieng
> and
> probably survived by doing odd jobs for the Japanese garrison. The second,
> however, moved on from village to village, dodging patrols.
> 
> The one that is missing has left a significant gap in the land ownership
> of
> the Upper Watut Valley. The son of the seond man says he was with his
> father
> for part of the time then they got separated. Curiously, he is not written
> off as presumed dead - there is a faint belief that he may have gone to
> ground in the war, got married, and stayed there without telling anyone.
> (I
> should add that Watuts can be quite solitary and characteristically do not
> go in for the networking that is such a feature of other Papua New Guinea
> societies).
> 
> So, what's this place called "Watut"???
> 
> John Burton
>