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Hero image for Pioneer Women - Hera Ngoungou

Part one of two from this full length drama.

Part two of two from this full length drama.

The credits for this drama.

Part one of two from this full length drama.

Part two of two from this full length drama.

The credits for this drama.

Pioneer Women - Hera Ngoungou

Television (Full Length) – 1983

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This episode in the Pioneer Women series dramatised the story of Hera Ngoungou. In 1874 in Taranaki, Māori kidnapped an eight-year-old Pākehā girl — Caroline “Queenie” Perrett — possibly in retribution for her father breaking a tapu. Her family didn’t see her again until she was 60, when she was a grandmother and had spent more than 50 years living with, and identifying as, Māori. A moving (Feltex award-winning) performance from Ginette McDonald (aka Lyn of Tawa) mixes stoicism with an acknowledgement of good times and a sense of loss for what might have been.

The more I thought about the whole question of a New Zealand identity the more I started to suspect it may well have been the pioneer women rather than the men who determined who we are. Not only did these women have to go out there and survive - and they showed great stoicism in the face of appalling hardship - but they had the task of raising a new generation of children.
– Pamela Jones (now Meekings-Stewart), NZ Listener, May 14 1983