JAMES CHALMERS

Missionary and a bite of Lunch - (1841 - 1901)

James Chalmers was born in Ardishaig in 1841. The son of a stonemason and his wife. His upbringing was typical of Highland peasantry.

Legend has it that on hearing a reading of a letter from a missionary which was being read to his Sunday School class, young James was filled with the spirit of the Lord and from that point determined to join the Church.

In 1865 he was ordained a Minister in the Free Church of Scotland (a misnomer of laughable magnitude ... Free Church). The following year, with his bride of fifteen months, he was shipped off to Rarotonga, an island in the South Pacific.

Life was well organised already on the island, and the natives' prime time fun was fighting and indulging in drunken festivals involving gross immorality. Of course young Chalmers put a stop to this.

In 1877, now that he had civilised the natives on Rarotonga, and following much petitioning for a move to a more challenging parish, James Chalmers and his wife were allowed to move to New Guinea.

On his arrival he found the natives of New Guinea spent much of their energy fighting. Tribal disputes were settled by bloodshed, and victorious tribes celebrated with cannibal feasts.

For the next 24 years James Chalmers worked tirelessly to civilise the natives and to end the barbarous cannabilism which was a feature of local culture. What the natives made of the Christian practice of "eating" the body and soul of Christ at Communion, is not related.

In April 1901, the natives finally got their own back.

The killed and ate James Chalmers.

Yum !!!!!