Missionaries

Early South Seas

By Morwell Hodges

TWENTY years ago in Western Samoa, the story of Mrs. E. M. Thomas was well known. She was then living in a London suburb and it was claimed that she was the oldest-living Samoan born papalagi (white person).

The story of Mrs. Thomas and her family reads like a romance. Her father, George Stall worthy, born in Preston Bis set, Bucks,' England, in 1809, joined the Revs. Luxton and Rodgerson, who, with their wives, sailed from London for a voyage around the world, in the whaling ship “Tuscan,” T. R. Stavers master, on October 17, 1833.

Mr. Stallworthy and Mr. and Mrs.

Rodgerson landed at Vaitahu on Tahuata, in the Marquesas, and Mr. Stallworthy remained among the cannibals there from 1834 to 1841, when he was given his walk ing ticket by the chief of the valley wherein he had made his home. The French had by this time occupied the island.

The Rev. Stall worthy then took passage to Tahiti, where he continued his mis sionary labours until 1844, in which year, the London Missionary Society having established a mission in Samoa, he moved to the island of Updlu in that group.

But before doing this he married Miss Charlotte Wilson, whose father, the Rev.

Charles Wilson, a veteran Tahitian mis sionary, had been ordained in London on October 18, 1798, to take the gospel to the South Seas.

The Rev. and Mrs. Stallworthy made their home in Samoa at Falealili, on the south coast of Upolu, and were later joined by Mrs. Stallworthy’s father and stepmother, the Rev. Charles Wilson and his second wife, who had been forced to leave Matavai (Point Venus), Tahiti, be cause of war there between Tahitian patriots and French troops. Mr. Wilson’s successor, the Rev. T. McKean, was killed by a shot while standing on the verandah of Mr. Wilson’s home.

In Samoa, Mr, Stallworthy was called by the natives Taluvale, while old Mr.

Wilson was known as Vilisone. Mr, and Mrs. Wilson died at Falealili, where, to this writer’s belief, their tombstone still remains. Mr. Wilson’s son, the Rev.

Samuel Wilson, with Rev. Platt (not to be confused with Pratt, who compiled the Samoan grammar), came from Tahiti and lived in Samoa long before the first LMS missionaries arrived there. Samuel Wilson distinguished himself by being the first to translate the Book of Matt hew (Mataio) into Samoan; it was printed at Fare, Huahine, by the LMS press.

George Burnett Stall worthy, son of Mr. and Mrs. Stallworthy, was born at Falealili on December 30, 1844, his mother dying in August of the following year.

Mrs. Stallworthy is believed to have been buried iriside the LMS native church on the Apia waterfront. George Junior was brought up by a loved native nurse, Eunite, for whom he had much affection.

Later George’s father married again, his bride being Miss Mary Ann Darling, a schoolmate of his first wife and daughter of Rev. David Darling, another of the old LMS veterans in Tahiti.

They moved to Malua in 1859, where Mr. Stallworthy had charge of the LMS training school for parsons and teachers, during the absence in Scotland of the principal, Dr. Turner, Mr. Stallworthy

died suddenly on November 7, 1859, after conducting two church services and Sun day school, and the widow and family lelt for England, where she lived until her death in 1872, THE son, George Burnett Stallworthy, travelled to England alone in the first “John Williams,” and had a distinguished career in the ministry. He joined the Unitarian Congregation at Tunbridge Wells and served in various churches of that denomination until his death at Billingshurst, Sussex, in 1922, aged 77. He was first cousin of Charles Burnett Wilson, a luminary m Honolulu in the old days of the Hawaiian mon archy, and father of John Henry Wilson, who in the 1920’s was Mayor of Honolulu.

George Burnett Stallworthy wrote several devotional works. A poem he addressed to R. L. Stevenson, a cony of which is in my possession, was printed in the Edinburgh University Students’

Magazine.

In the LMS native church in Apia there was and probably still is a bronze tablet which young George installed commem orating the seed from which he sprang, with special mention of his beloved Samoan nurse Eunite of Falealili.

Mrs. E. M. Thomas, who, in 1928, was claimed by Mr. William F. Wilson, of Honolulu, TH, to be the oldest living Samoan-born papalagi. —From a water-colour by the author.