Following the massacre, male Mau members fled to the mountains, the traditional retreat of those defeated in war. The resistance continued by other means, with the emergence of a women's Mau to continue the councils, parades, and symbolic protests that the men now could not. For the women's movement, even the game of cricket represented an act of defiance inviting official harassment.  
Following the massacre, the NZ police continued to use excessive force against the Mau men, going so far as to raid their homes and villages in order to capture and arrest them. This drove the Mau men into hiding in fear of arrest or exile, and so in order to continue the movement, the Women’s Mau emerged days after the men had been forced to hide from the administration. The women’s swift response to the tragic events of Black Saturday was made evident across the Pacific through Mau leader Taisi Olaf Nelson’s telegram to New Zealand’s Labor Party: “...SAMOAN WOMEN ACTIVE ORGANIZING NEW MOVEMENT UNPARALLED IN SAMOAN HISTORY..” The four leading women of this movement were Ala Tamasese (widow of High Chief Tamasese Lealofi II), Rosabel Nelson (wife of G.P. Nelson and daughter of H.J. Moors a prominent European businessman), Paisami Tuimalealiifano (wife of Chief Tuimalealiifano), and Faamusami Faumuina (wife of High Chief Faumuina Fiame and daughter of the late King Malietoa Laupepa). These women, along with the many other women of the Mau, had taken charge, not only of hiding and protecting the Samoan men, but also of continuing the movement’s political affairs such as holding meetings, writing letters of complaint and petitions to the NZ administration, organizing protests, etc. Many scholars of the Mau Movement attribute the Women’s Mau for being key to the success of the movement and the subsequent gaining of Samoa’s independence in 1962.
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male Mau members fled to
the NZ police continued to use excessive force against the Mau men, going so far as to raid their homes and villages in order to capture and arrest them. This drove the Mau men into hiding in fear of arrest or exile, and so in order to continue the movement,
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mountains, the traditional retreat of those defeated in war. The resistance continued by other means, with the emergence of a women's Mau to continue the councils, parades, and symbolic protests that the men now could not. For the women's movement, even the game of cricket represented an act of defiance inviting official harassment.
Women’s Mau emerged days after the men had been forced to hide from the administration. The women’s swift response to the tragic events of Black Saturday was made evident across the Pacific through Mau leader Taisi Olaf Nelson’s telegram to New Zealand’s Labor Party:
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“...SAMOAN WOMEN ACTIVE ORGANIZING NEW MOVEMENT UNPARALLED IN SAMOAN HISTORY..”
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The four leading women of this movement were Ala Tamasese (widow of High Chief Tamasese Lealofi II), Rosabel Nelson (wife of G.P. Nelson and daughter of H.J. Moors a prominent European businessman), Paisami Tuimalealiifano (wife of Chief Tuimalealiifano), and Faamusami Faumuina (wife of High Chief Faumuina Fiame and daughter of the late King Malietoa Laupepa). These women, along with the many other women of the Mau, had taken charge, not only of hiding and protecting the Samoan men, but also of continuing the movement’s political affairs such as holding meetings, writing letters of complaint and petitions to the NZ administration, organizing protests, etc. Many scholars of the Mau Movement attribute the Women’s Mau for being key to the success of the movement and the subsequent gaining of Samoa’s independence in 1962.