Adventurous Life

Late Samuel Russell, of Tahiti

From Our Own Correspondent

Papeete, Sept. 2.

WITH the death of Mr. Samuel Russell at Papeete on August 28, the Tahi tians lost a sympathetic guide and ally and his friends a man who inspired con fidence and esteem and deep affection.

Mr. Russell was born in England in 1879, and when a young man migrated to Natal, South Africa, settling in the city of Pietermaritzburg. He gained his first experience in what proved to be an ad venturous life, as a member of the patrols guarding the passes of the Drakensberg mountains.

Later he joined the mounted police In Southern Rhodesia. In the Boer conflict Mr. Russell served with distinction throughout the whole period of the war, and particularly as a member of Kit chener’s mounted forces.

Mr. Russell was an expert mineralogist, and the practice of his profession carried him to all parts of South Africa and Portuguese East Africa, after the close of the Boer War. The hardships of con stant travel through primitive country and repeated attacks of malarial fever — which resulted finally in blackwater fever —so undermined his health that he was advised to seek a malaria-free climate.

Having passed many years in tropical and semi-tropical lands and learning that the islands of South-eastern Polynesia are free of malaria, Mr. Russell settled in Rarotonga, Cook Group, where he re mained several years as manager of a large plantation.

About 20 years ago he established him self at Tahiti. He was the British Vice- Consul at Papeete, acting for long periods as consul in the absence of his superior officer. He was requested by the Foreign Office to accept the appointment of consul, but declined, owing to the heavy burden of his private interests.

Mr. Russell is survived by Mrs. Russell and one son—now at Tahiti —and by two daughters at school in England.