MARORO MYSTERY

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 910, 1 March 1930, Page 6

MARORO MYSTERY

FISCHER FAMILY AT APIA WRECKED SAILING EAST (THE SUN’S Special Representative) APIA, February 20. The mystery of the auxiliary cutter Maroro’s disappearance from Auckland on November 18, her reappearance without papers at Pago Pago on January 12, and the bare report that she had been wrecked in American Samoa early this month, has been partly cleared up by the arrival in Apia of the Fischer family who made the adventurous voyage in the Maroro. The family, consisting of Mrs. Eugene Fischer, her son (by a former marriage), Mr. A. B. Walker, her two daughters, Ziska, aged about li, and Irma, nine, and her two other sons, Frederick, aged 12, and Desmond, seven, arrived in Apia from Pago Pago by the inter-island steamer Lady Roberts on February 8, and were quartered at the Casino, Apia’s only hotel. They had no money, and so the Administration guaranteed their account at the hotel until the sailing of the Maui Pomare on February 20..

Well-dressed and well-nourished, they might have been a family touring the world. At the hotel they kept very much to themselves, and did not encourage inquiries. The father, Eugene Fischer, remained behind at Pago Pago, hoping, so he had said, either to repair or to sell the wreck of the Maroro. The American authorities at Pago Pago state that the Maroro arrived there on January 12 and left next day for Apia. She ran ashore on the island of Olosenga, in the Manua group, 60 miles due east of Pago Pago. Apia, which is on the north coast of Upolo, lies 88 miles to the north-west. According to A. B. Walker (Fischer’s stepson) the cutter was badly knocked about in a storm. H>r sails were blown away, the engine was put out of action, and the little vessel caught fire. The flames were put out, however, and she ran ashore on Olosenga. The U.S. warship Ontario rescued the shipwrecked family and brought them back to Pago Pago. As the Fischers are the New Zealand Government’s “responsibility, and not that of the Samoan. administration, It was proposed that they should return to Auckland by the Maui Pomare, which sailed today via Niue. Only on the understanding that they obtained the personal guarantee of some reputable citizen of Apia to back their account at the Casino were they allowed to remain until the return of the Maul Pomare seven weeks hence. A German resident came forward with the necessary guarantee only a few hours before the vessel cleared Apia.