Halt a Century of Mission

Work Late Monseigneur Doucere, Bishop of New Hebrides

MONSEIGNEUR Doucere, French Roman Catholic Bishop of the New Hebrides, who died recently at Vila, aged 82. was interred at Montmartre Mis sion station, five miles inland, following a Funeral Mass, in Vila Church. In spite of heavy rain, the funeral was attended by the whole Vila population, French and English, Catholic and Protestant, Though little seen of late years, ex cepting at special Church ceremonies, Bishop Doucere was much loved through out the New Hebrides, where he had lived and worked for 50 years. Before the funeral procession moved off. eulogistic speeches, touching on Bishop Doucere’s life and work, were made by Monsieur Sautot (French Resident Commissioner) and Mr. Blandy (Acting British Resident Commissioner). Don Manuel Bosch Bar rett, Spanish President of the Joint Court of the New Hebrides, was also present.

Bishop Doucere was born at Evran, North France, on April 3, 1857. Entering the priesthood as a young man. he was one of the first four Catholic missionaries chosen to launch a Mission in the New Hebrides in 1886. On his way out, how ever, he was retained at Noumea whilst his colleagues went on to the island of Malekula. Later, he was sent to relieve Father Le Forestiere, whose health had broken down through hardship while founding the first mission station at Port Sandwich, Malekula.

The Mission had met with little success and Father Doucere found himself con fronted with a heavy task. There was a shortage of supplies and equipment, and the promised material to build a mission house had not arrived. Pere Doucere lived in a rude native hut, and suffered many perils and hardships voyaging from place to place, in all weathers, in native canoes and small boats. He later returned to Noumea to place the exact state of affairs before his Bishop, Monseigneur Fraysse. He was given reinforcements, supplies, and the material to build the first mission house, which still stands at Port Sandwich.

In 1893, after four years of strenuous work, which had now planted the Mission firmly on its feet, he was again forced to return to New Caledonia on account of ill health. In 1898, he toured the New Hebrides mission stations as Bishop’s Delegate and later as Prefet Apostolique.

A central Mission was then founded at Vila, with mission schools at Mele and Montmartre. The Mission now was flourishing, and in 1904, the New Hebrides was made a separate Bishopric, with Pre fet Doucere as its first Bishop.

The rest of Monseigneur Doucere’s story is told in his book “The History of the New Hebrides Mission”, published a few years ago. Also interesting are his published “Notes Ethnologiques”, a scholarly work dealing with the origins of the native tribes among whom he worked: and his “Curiosities Linguist iques” which gives us a deeper under standing of the native mind and thought

processes.

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