On August 5 , 1915 , the Kwanto Maru arrived in Darwin with 30 Italians from Argentina , lured to the Northern Territory by the promise of work and land by the Commonwealth Government .
Details of the group , described as " Italian Patagonian immigrants ", are contained in interesting articles by researcher Ruth Sheridan in Progenitor, journal of the Genealogical Society of the Northern Territory .
Sheridan pointed out that despite high hopes of doing well in the Territory , by 1922 most of them were on government rations , there being little work, partly due to closure of Vestey's meatworks in 1920.
They failed in a bid to be repatriated back to South America. Work was sought for them on Queensland cane farms . One became a cook and storeman in Cairns, a labourer in Innisfail. An Italian was in a group which found a new mica deposit in the Territory.
Sheridan also wrote about Swiss -Italians, many of them trained carpenters and stonemasons, who came to Victoria during the goldrush .
Particular mention is made of the Traversis in the Territory, Victoria and New Zealand . Mrs A. Traversi ran The British and Foreign Hotel at The Shackle mine township at Yam Creek , in the NT , from 1875-l876.
There was the Traversi Hotel at Daylesford, Victoria, Carlo Traversi , who played the viola , ran a well known orchestra and dance hall in the town . In New Zealand the Traversis were enterprising. There was the Bull and Mouth Hotel at Ross , on the west coast , run by Antonio Traversi , which was destroyed by a fire in l881, everything lost except a piano. He later ran the Golden Eagle Hotel in Greymouth.
He had been born in Switzerland in 1827. After 15 years in the Victorian gold diggings he moved to New Zealand where he also taught music
It is said he made the headlines in 1864 for refusing to admit a woman who paid for a ticket to a ball in his hotel becaue she had been a prostitute and could not call herself a lady. He lost the court case over the refusal .
Sheridan compiled a substantial amount of information about Italians who were involved in mining in Central Australia and various businesses in Alice Springs. There is a front cover photograph on Progenitor of mica miners working underground in the Strangways Ranges , 43 miles from Alice Springs, during WWll.
