History of Micronesia: A Collection of Source Documents: Vol. 26 Micronesian Mission, 1852-1909

Levesque, Rodrigue (2004). History of Micronesia: A Collection of Source Documents: Vol. 26 Micronesian Mission, 1852-1909. 26. Gatineau, Québec: Lévesque Publications. ISBN 978-0-920201-26-8.

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Abstract: HOM.26 documents the Micronesian Mission of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) from 1852 to 1909, tracing the origins, expansion, and daily life of Protestant missionary activity across the Caroline Islands, Marshall Islands, and Mariana Islands. Early sections center on the founding of the mission in Honolulu, the departure of missionaries aboard the schooner Caroline, and the establishment of the first stations on Pohnpei (Ascension Island) and Kosrae (Strong’s Island) by figures such as Luther Halsey Gulick, Albert A. Sturges, Benjamin G. Snow, and their Hawaiian assistants Opunui and Kaaikaula. The volume contains letters, journals, and reports describing early encounters with island societies, including contacts at Butaritari (Taritari) and Makin in the Gilbert Islands, as well as observations of chiefs such as King George of Kosrae and local communities throughout the Caroline archipelago.  A large portion of HOM.26 is devoted to the logistical and social development of the mission network across Micronesia. Repeated voyages of missionary vessels—including the Morning Star, Hiram Bingham, Robert W. Logan, Annie, and other schooners—linked stations on Kosrae, Pohnpei, Chuuk (Truk), the Marshall Islands (notably Ebon), and later Guam and the Gilbert Islands. Missionaries such as George Pierson, Edward T. Doane, Samuel C. Damon, Francis M. Price, and the Logan and Walkup families appear frequently in correspondence and reports. These documents describe the founding of churches and schools, translation of scriptures into local languages, publication of early primers and newspapers in Marshallese and Gilbertese, and the daily practical challenges of missionary life—shipwrecks, illness, epidemics, food shortages, and travel between remote atolls.  Later sections extend into the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, documenting missionary expansion and regional political change. Reports cover developments in Chuuk, Kosrae, Pohnpei, the Marshall Islands, and the Mariana Islands, especially Guam, where Protestant missions operated alongside the long-established Roman Catholic Church. Personal narratives—such as Mary Logan’s accounts of life in Chuuk, Ella Theodora Crosby’s writings on Kosrae and the Ponape troubles, and journals from missionary vessels—provide ethnographic descriptions of island communities, education efforts, and religious conversion. Appendices list missionary ships, rosters of Protestant missionaries active in Micronesia from 1852 onward, and references to mission activity in the Missionary Herald, making the volume a major documentary record of the institutional history and regional spread of Protestant missions across Micronesia.