The Editors’ Mailbag

When Fiji Times Printed

Stamps, Bank Notes

The death of Mrs. C. S. McOwan recalls to the mind of one old Fiji resident some interesting facts about her father, Mr. George Littleton Griffiths.

It was Mr. Griffiths who started the Fiji Times at Levuka in 1869 when Cakobau’s short-lived Fiji Government was in power. (Fiji was not ceded to Britain until 1874) .

Mr. Griffiths was responsible also for the establishment of Fiji’s first postal service and printed the first bank-notes on his printing press.

During Cakobau’s government there were no postal services but Griffiths printed the Fiji Times Ex press Stamps and established a mailing service that worked until the British Government took over.

He had a whale-boat with a crack Fijian crew. This whale-boat was rowed out several miles off Levuka to meet the early sailing boats on their regular routes between Aus tralia and San Francisco.

About the same time he printed on Fiji Times equipment the first crude bank notes. They were in dollars —showing the early American influence in Fiji.

German Bombardment of

Papeete

M. Emile Mazel, of Papeete, has vivid memories of the shelling of Papeete by the German warship Scharnhorst on September 22, 1914. (See PIM issues of September and October, 1955).

M. Mazel was a policeman at the time and was, he claims, the first to be advised of the identity of the two warships, Scharnhorst and Gneisenau that appeared off Papeete at dawn on that day.

It was inevitable that panic would ensue when sleepy, laughter-loving Papeete was suddenly confronted with the might of the German navy, but M. Mazel speaks well of the actions of some of the officials in authority, with special praise for Major Destremeau.

In a letter to PIM, M. Mazel states that only one instance of loot ing by locals was actually sub stantiated.

English Translation of

Parkinson's Famous Book

From a reader in NZ: “Has any one made a translation of Parkin son’s Thirty Years in the South

Seas?” ,

Yes, the famous German book was translated by Mr. Noel Barry, of Kokopo. NG. and the transla tion (still in MS form) is now in

the safe keeping of the Librarian of the School of Pacific Administra-j tion, Mosman, Sydney. It has s curious history.

During World War 11, the Editoic of PIM assisted Mrs. Dolly: Messenger. Dolly was a daughter o;c Mrs. Phoebe Parkinson (widow o:c the author) and was married first to a German. The Parkinson family (Phoebe was a full sister or “Queen Emma” Kolbe) had strongj German associations; and, wher World War II settled upon thu Pacific, Dolly was interned in Ause tralia, although her second husbanoj was British. Later, she was releasee* from Tatura, and was rather brutall;!

“man-powered” to a hospital kitcheif job in Cobar, NSW. The PIM helper her to escape from there, and intd a job in Sydney: and, just befori she died, about the end of the war, she told the PIM about a “ven valuable manuscript” which shr claimed was her property—the Barn translation of her father’s book.

We found out that, before the Jai invasion, Mrs. Parkinson (who dies in New Ireland during the Jai occupation) gave the MS to as American sea-captain connectes with Millionaire Archbold’s scientific expedition; and the captaii promised that it would be publishes in USA.

The subsequent search for the MI by the PIM occupied years, and ws prosecuted in three countries Eventually, we located it in Souti Carolina, USA, in the possession o the widow of the American ses captain; and it came to us H registered post.

The idea that it was valuable has spread. Claim was laid to it U another member of the late Mn Parkinson’s family. A claim alsJ was lodged on behalf of Mr. Barr —the man who, in association win Mrs. Parkinson, had done all tn work.

But their hopes were in vain. Tli original German printed text wr lavishly illustrated: the origin: illustrations have long since dir appeared: the text is useless witn out the pictures. No publisher woui look at it.

Unable to decide between the rivv claims, and unwilling to allow thi valuable record of early New Guinu (the only translation extant) to 1 lost, the Editor of the PIM handtt the MS over to the Library namti above.

U Mr. R. B. Carpenter, Managiri Director of W. R. Carpenter & C Ltd., Sydney, and Mr. J. B. Bail©.

General Manager of the Southed Pacific Insurance Co., were, in eau.

February, on a visit to Fiji fron Australia. Mr. Carpenter was ti specting the various interests of n Company in the light of the ntu Carpenter-Morris Hedstrom alliamr