In the 1980s, Peter, a well-known academic in the French department at the University of Canterbury, began researching the role of the French in the colonial history of Aotearoa. At the same time, he carefully collected names and other recorded information related to Ngāi Tahu individuals and whānau who lived during the 19th century.  

Christine, also an academic whose career included achieving a PhD and lecturing in Māori studies at Canterbury University, then applied her meticulous skillset to the supervision, review and cataloguing of the data. Daughter Dr Pip Tremewan recalls helping occasionally during her early university days by, “recording information on dozens of little cataloguing cards.” Later, all the information from the many cards was entered into a digital database. 

This collection, ‘Kaitahu’, is described by Ngāi Tahu Senior Archivist Jill Durney as, “a taonga and an incredible feat of work.”  

‘Kaitahu’ encompasses information and source referencing for around 4,000 ancestor names. It has close to 1,000 pages of information that Peter and Christine painstakingly recorded and referenced over many decades. The Tremewan duo selflessly gifted a copy of the database to Ngāi Tahu in 2016. “Their instinct was always to share their knowledge so that others could build on it,” says their other daughter, Tanya Tremewan. “They hoped that the information they passed on would be a useful resource, such as for tracing whakapapa.”