Martyr of the Islands - The Life and Death of John Coleridge Patteson

Published by Hodder and Stoughton, 1971. Dustjacket spine faded, with wear at spine extremities, otherwise good secondhand copy.

... The biography of John Coleridge Patteson, first missionary Bishop of Melanesia, who was murdered o the tiny atoll of Nukapu in the Western Pacific in September, 1871. While still a boy at Eton, Patteson was deeply moved by a sermon preached by George Augustus Selwyn, the newly appointed Bishop of New Zealand, and conceived the wish to become a missionary. Foruteen years later he left his quiet parish in Devon and went with Selwyn to New Zealand ... Against the background of the Maori wars in New Zealand and cannibalism and superstition in the Melanesian Islands, in a situation bedeville by the horrors of blackbirding, the trade in native labour for Queensland and Fiji, Patteson set about his task. With unflinching courage and faith he set the pattern for the expansion of the Melanesian Mission ...