Planter Is Broken , Neglected

The Parkinson Saga Recalled

nument To New Guinea's First Planter Is Broken , Neglected

By R. W. Robson

I am not happy about the last resting-place of New

inea’s most distinguished pioneer-planter.

The location is ideal; but the treatment is shocking. Could the New Britain Historical Society do something about it?

IS in Rabaul at the end of me, three days after a big ass-fire swept the coastal between Kokopo and Malapau of a vast choking mass of and scrub. This (I told my is my opportunity to locate examine the old Karadui inson) mat-mat. don Thomas and friends, some ago, after a great search, for me the old family gries of Gunantambu (“Queen” i Forsayth) and Karadui (her Phoebe Parkinson). I had red historical riches from the r; but I had never seen the ison cemetery. >r an hour’s search over those ;ned hills, covered with ashes leaked in sweat, I found the [aradui mat-mat. is on a high, narrow ridge, ng eastward over the sea, into mrise. It is shaded by great, foliaged trees, probably gd there by Parkinson, himself inguished botanist. It is only ards from the Rabaul-Kokopc

Little Remains

gr 50 years, there is little re jig there except a heap of 5. What was once an elaborate ment to Parkinson lies on the id, in four pieces; and on one the words, “R. H. R. Parkinson, 1844—24.7.1909” are deeply en d. (See photograph.) kinson children have been d there; but Parkinson’s be wife, the former Phoebe Coe, of “Queen Emma”, lies buried g she died, aged about 80, in a be New Ireland village, during rap occupation. jiding there, looking around it the coconut plantations he lished there 75 years ago, I re bered bits and pieces of the ry of this very notable man. rkinson’s father was an English and on the staff of one of the is of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. When principality or dukedom was rbed by the new Germany, inson took German nationality; his son, R.H.R., was born a nan, and highly educated.

I first came on Parkinson’s name when searching through the files of The Samoa Times. That weekly paper was published before Ger many annexed Samoa, and it died 80 years ago. In 1876 it carried an advertisement in which one R. H. R.

Parkinson begged the people of Savaii to help him obtain a speci men of a very rare bird which had been seen occasionally in that volcanic island.

Parkinson in Samoa

Parkinson had been taken to Samoa by the German “Long Handle” firm, as an agricultural adviser. There, he married Phoebe Coe while she still was a teen-ager; and eight or ten children came from their long, happy union.

After a series of stirring events — both political and romantic—Emma Forsayth (nee Emma Coe) departed fiom Samoa with saloon-keeper Thomas Farrell, and settled in the extremely raw land of New Britain.

Many of her brothers and sisters (half and full) joined her there, later; and, in the early ’Eighties, about the time she got rid of Farrell, Emma brought Richard and Phoebe Parkinson over to the new country. With the Parkinsons came their own two or three children, and

Emma’s only son, the well-known Jonas Myndersse Coe Forsayth.

It was Parkinson, about 1883, who planted up the great Ralum Plant ation. in the Gazelle Peninsula, for Mrs. Forsayth—and (I am not sure of this without research) I think that was the very first coconut plantation established in what is now the Trust Territory of New Guinea.

Germany annexed the Territory in 1884; but by then Ralum was partly planted; and about then Mrs, Emma Forsayth moved from Mioko over to her famous Gunantambu bungalow, near the Ralum wharf, at Kokopo; while the Parkinsons settled in at Karadui, a short distance further north.

These Ralum plantations now are known by other names. The Car penter plantation, Malapau, is part of them.

For 20 years, Parkinson was an outstanding figure in that com munity. He was a scientist, and a completely practical planter and settler.

Both he and Emma Forsayth had a passion for introducing plants from other tropical countries; and even today expert botanists will find, in that Kokopo area, various kinds of trees and shrubs that are completely exotic.

Planter and Famous Writer Parkinson made a close study of the New Britain and New Ireland peoples, and of the area’s flora and fauna; and his careful observations are embodied in his famous book, Thirty Years in the South Seas, one of the classics of South Pacific litcrfliturc Various letters of his preserved in the Mitchell Library, Sydney, show that Parkinson was a master of perfect English; but his book was

In the old Parkinson family cemetery, New Britain. Richard Parkinson's monument now lies on the ground, in four pieces.

en in German and, unhappily, r published in English, el Barry, of Rabaul, made a ilation just before World War nd it became lost in that period, earned about it, during World 11, in a conversation with the Mrs. Dolly Messenger (Parkin daughter) ; and the story of I tracked it down, and eventu recovered it, in Florida, USA, the widow of a member of an bold Expedition, may some day Did. The MS (translation) is in the library of the Australian ol of Pacific Administration, ey. :e most of the Coe families fished in German New Guinea, Parkinson family was broken nd partially ruined by the two d Wars —some remained Ger and some became British ralian. ere must be scores of descend of Richard and Phoebe Parkin- Mostly, they are handsome, in ent people—they got good looks the Malietoa princess who led Jonas M. Coe in Apia about years ago; and brains from ard Parkinson and Jonas Coe i was a member of an old and

iguished American family).

would be a nice gesture on the of the N. B. Historical Society or present-day members of the inson family, if the monument restored to that lonely .grave be Malapau hillside, and if the tins of dear old Phoebe Parkin were brought from the New nd village and re-interred be her husband and those of their Iren who are buried there, sidentally, has anyone got a ograph of R. H. R. Parkinson?