When Kelepi Akoteu was born in 1846, his father, Semisi Akoteu, was 26 and his mother, Mele Veapipi Foliaki, was 22. He married Lesieli Halapupuhi in 1945. He died in 1964, at the age of 118, and was buried in Faleloa, Ha'apai, Tonga.