Gee Wong was a respected Chinese shopkeeper and doctor, affectionately known as “Dadda Gee’. He was likely baptised in 1869 and had married a European woman, helping her raise her four children. His shop was located opposite the Sofala post office.

By July 1856, Commissioner Johnson reported that 150 Chinese had arrived at Sofala and stated that “they are a patient, industrious race who do well where the Europeans cannot.” In 1861 there was a population of 1,877 Chinese (42%) in Sofala. The police records and Gold Commissioner’s evidence show they were mainly law-abiding.

However, this influx sowed the seeds of public discontent, where in 1858, Europeans viewed them as ‘evil’, ‘destructive to mining’ and ‘that the Christian population are excluded from getting a living’ They were further perceived as a moral hazard with their fire-cracker rituals, opium smoking and Sabbath gambling (M. Higgins 1990).

By the turn of the century, the numbers had dwindled and their last remaining settlement was ‘The Isle of Dreams’ along the Upper Turon Road. Gee Wong died in 1907 and his tombstone is adjacent within the bounds of the proposed Chinese cemetery of 1877. The bones of many Chinese were repatriated back to China from this place. Ah Kow, the last of the Chinese at Sofala, died in Sofala hospital in August 1924, aged 85yr, and was regarded “with affection from the residents of the town”.