In August 1927, three of the first-generation Veneto market gardeners travelled from the Port of Genova to Port Adelaide on the ship, Città di Genova.
The image of the Città di Genova is from the Australian National Maritime Museum Collection Transfer in the Australian War Memorial. collections.sea.museum
The voyage of nearly 14,500 kms took about 45 days. The route took the passengers from Genova to Suez, Fremantle, Adelaide, Melbourne, and finally to Sydney. The Città di Genova could carry 28 First Class passengers and 596 in Third Class. All the Veneto market gardeners who made the voyage between 1926 and 1928 travelled Third Class.
The ship arrived on Australia shores at Fremantle on 27 August and it carried onto Port Adelaide where 104 men, including Angelo Piovesan, Giovanni Santin and Secondo Tonellato, disembarked on 1st September. It went onto Melbourne and Sydney.
We do not know how Angelo Piovesan, Giovanni Santin and Secondo Tonellato experienced that long sea voyage. But we do get an idea from an account written by Ampelio Acquasaliente (Salent) who was born in 1904 in Santulderico di Tretto, Provincia di Vicenza. He wrote about his experience of travelling by a different ship, the Re d’Italia. He arrived in Melbourne on 24 November 1927 after about 50 days at sea. His account is in the book, “In Search of Kings: What became of the Passengers of the Re d’Itaila?” written by Tony De Bolfo and published in 2002.
The voyage was very, very bad: the food was awful and I was sick the whole time. As everything was rationed for the long and arduous journey, we were fed a lot of soup but hardly any pasta, which was awful, and as the ship was loaded with heavy cargo there were almost no individual cabins and my sleeping quarters comprised a very large room of thirty people or more … the seas were very rough and sometimes you couldn’t even eat because the Re d’Italia rocked so much. (pp 34-35)
The three market gardeners who travelled in August 1927
Angelo Piovesan from Ponzano Veneto was the youngest of the trio at 22 years. Giovanni Santin was 41 years old and it would be 8 years before his wife Costantina and their four children joined him. Secondo Tonellato was 34 years of age and his wife, Elisabetta and five children lived in Caselle di Altivole until they reunited in 1935. We know that Secondo and Giovanni knew each other because they came from the same village. However, it is a mystery to understand the connection between the Tonellato and Piovesan families because the village of Caselle di Altivole is about 30 kms from Ponzano Veneto, a large distance in the days before cars. Secondo Tonellato looked after the young man, Angelo Piovesan when they settled on adjoining properties on leased land on Frogmore Road.
In 2019 Angelo Piovesan wrote a blog that explained the connections between the two families. You can read Angelo’s blog here:
Links between the Piovesan and the Tonellato families
Family biographies on this website
You can also read about each of the men in the family biographies of each of the three first-generation market gardeners who made the voyage in August 1927.
Click here to read the biography of the Piovesan family
Click here to read the biography of the Santin Family
Click here to read the biography of the Tonellato Family
The experience of migration – the departure from the closeness of family and the villages of Italy and arrival in a new country – for all the first-generation market gardeners was a challenge. Today we appreciate the courage and strength and the risks that first generation migrants take to make the decision to begin a new life. Like all migrants, the Veneto market gardeners hoped for a better future for their children and they believed in the promise of the new country.
Madeleine Regan
11 August 2024
My Nonno, Silvio Zanatta, was one of those who disembarked in Adelaide.