“Papa, Papa, come and see my room!” Billy yelled. “I have a window all to myself, and a collection of sea eggs.”
John was delighted to see how well everyone had settled into the new home.
With so many novice missionaries scattered on the surrounding islands, John had plenty of work to keep him busy, but his heart was never far from the voyage west. Eventually, after John had been back in the Pacific islands for ten months, he felt the time was right to make the trip. A full moon glittered on the ocean as John said good-bye to Mary and the rest of his family. Hundreds of Christians gathered on the beach at midnight as John, twenty Samoan missionaries, and James Harris, a young Christian man from England who had come to Samoa to observe the work of the LMS for himself, were paddled out to the Camden. It was November 3, 1839, and John expected to be away for several months.
The Camden stopped in at Apia, farther along the coast of Upolu, where Nicholas Cunningham, a young adventurer and recently appointed British vice consul in the area, asked if he could join them on the trip west. John agreed, and they journeyed on to several mission stations on Savai’i before heading west for Rotuma.
John hoped to leave two Polynesian missionaries on Rotuma to set up a halfway station between Samoa and the New Hebrides. However, the Rotumans proved very unfriendly. The women and children jeered at the ship and threw sticks and stones into the water. Several men did go ashore, but the head chief refused to meet with them, and everyone on the Camden felt it was best to make a quick exit.
The next island they visited was Futuna, the most easterly island in the New Hebrides. The people who lived on these islands were not Polynesian but Melanesian. Their skin color was darker than that of the Polynesians, and their language was very different. The chief of Futuna was much friendlier than the chief on Rotuma had been. He presented the missionaries with food and gestured that he would be willing to have a missionary live among them at some later date.
From Futuna the Camden sailed on to the island of Tanna, where the missionaries were greeted with cautious friendliness. John was very impressed with the potential of this island as a mission station, and he left two of the Samoan missionaries there, promising to check up on them on the return voyage.
It was early morning on November 20 when the Camden cut its way through the sea on the south side of the island of Erromanga. John watched from the deck as a canoe containing three men paddled out from the shore. “Lower the boat,” he said to Captain Morgan. “We shall go and meet our new friends.”
Soon the rowboat was lowered, and John, Captain Morgan, Nicolas Cunningham, James Harris, and four Polynesian rowers climbed in and headed toward the canoe.
“We greet you as friends,” John yelled in Samoan. He knew they would not understand what he said, but he hoped his tone would convey a certain friendliness.
The men in the canoe did not answer. Instead they looked shyly away and headed back toward the beach.
“What do you think?” John asked the others. “Should we follow them?”
“Look, there are boys on the beach now. That’s a good sign. Islanders put children out of the way when they are plotting an attack, don’t they?” Nicolas asked.
“That’s true, but where are the women? I’d be much happier if I could see them as well,” Captain Morgan replied.
The conversation went back and forth as the canoe got closer to shore. Everything looked normal as the three men pulled their canoe up onto the beach.
“Let’s go,” John said. “The other islanders we’ve met have been shy, too.”
A few minutes later the rowboat was just offshore. Several Erromangan men ran along the rocks toward them, and John threw out some beads, hoping to set their minds at ease. Then he held up some fishhooks and a small mirror, motioning for the men to come and get them. When they did not, the four white men in the boat climbed out and waded ashore.
John reached out to shake hands with the first Erromangan he came across, but the man ran away.
“They certainly are shy,” Captain Morgan remarked.
Even so, the islanders did show signs of friendliness. They fetched water for the men and opened coconuts for them to drink. In return John gave them cloth and the other goods he had with him.
All appeared to be going well when James said, “I think I’m going to walk up the beach a little and stretch my legs.” As he walked, six Erromangan men followed him.
“I think I’ll walk a bit, too. How about you?” Nicolas said to John.
“Good idea,” John replied.
With that the two men walked down the beach a little way while Captain Morgan and the Samoan rowers stayed near the boat.
Again several island men followed them. John held up five fingers and started to count in Rarotongan. He hoped the men would catch on and count out loud in Erromangan so that he could hear how different the words were.
Nicolas stopped to pick up a shell from the beach when suddenly he and John heard a shout. James came sprinting out of the bushes.
Nicolas dropped his shell and yelled, “Run for the boat.”
John hesitated for a second and then dashed for the sea. He was a good swimmer, and he hoped that the boat would pick him up in the water. Three men wielding clubs were close on his heels.
Crack! John felt the thud on the back of his head. Searing pain shot through him as he stumbled on. Then everything went black. His head fell forward, and he collapsed at the water’s edge.
“Hurry,” Captain Morgan yelled to Nicolas. He grabbed Nicolas’s jacket and heaved him onto the bottom of the boat as soon as Nicolas was close enough. “Go! Go!” he ordered the rowers.
The four rowers pulled on the oars with all their might, and the boat slipped away from the beach. Several of the Erromangan men pursued them, but not for long.
As the rowboat headed for the Camden, Captain Morgan looked back. The islanders were stripping the bloodied bodies of John and James. “God have mercy on them,” he said.
Everyone was crowded onto the deck of the ship, waiting to hear what had happened.
“We have lost Williams and Harris,” Captain Morgan yelled up to them. “They are dead. The natives have killed them.”
One of the Polynesians began to wail, and soon others joined in. “Our father! Our father! They have killed our father!”
Captain Morgan ordered the sails be hoisted as soon as he was aboard the Camden. He maneuvered the vessel as near to the shore as he dared and fired a shot into the air, hoping to scare away the islanders. Instead of running from the slain bodies, the men dragged them away into the bushes. There was little more anyone could do, and so with a heavy heart Captain Morgan set a southeasterly course. They would sail to Sydney and request a navy ship be sent to recover the remains of the two men.
That night Captain Morgan read a portion of John’s diary to everyone aboard. John had penned some words the day they sailed away from Rotuma. “We live in a dying world,” the entry began. “Ere long some friend will communicate to surviving relatives the information of our death. The grand concern should be to live in a constant state of preparation. I am all anxiety but desire prudence and faithfulness in the management of the attempt to impart the gospel to these benighted people and leave the event with God.”
On November 30, 1839, the Camden arrived in Sydney bearing its grim news. And on February 1, 1840, the warship HMS Favourite was available to return to Erromanga. Nicolas Cunningham went along on the ship to show the captain the spot where the two men had been murdered.
Eventually the captain of the Favourite was able to make contact with the Erromangans, and through a series of hand signals, he learned that the bodies of John and James had both been eaten. The islanders offered two skulls and some bones, which they claimed belonged to the men, but there was no way to know whether they were telling the truth.
From Erromanga the HMS Favourite sailed on to Samoa, where Mary Williams and her children had already heard the news of John’s death from Captain Morgan. A funeral service was held, and the bones of John Williams were buried in Apia, Samoa. A memorial stone was placed on top of the grave. It read, “Sacred to the memory of Rev. John Williams, Father of the Samoan and other missions, aged 43 years and 5 months, who was killed by the cruel natives of Erromanga, on November 20, 1839, while endeavouring to plant the Gospel of Peace on their shores.”
George Pritchard, one of John’s old missionary friends and now British consul to Tahiti, wrote about John’s death in a letter to a friend. In it he tried to explain why the Erromangans were so hostile to the missionaries.
In this case, as in most others, the foreigners have been the first aggressors. A few years ago, several foreigners united, chartered vessels, and went with an armed force, took possession of a part of Erromanga, built a fort to protect themselves, and then cut, at their pleasure, the sandal wood belonging to the poor natives. This sandal wood is very valuable in the China market. After obtaining a considerable quantity, a disease broke out among them which carried off a great many; the others were compelled to leave; many of the natives were killed by them. I am not sure that Mr. Williams knew that this was the island where the sandal wood expedition had been; but there is no doubt his death, and that of Mr. Harris, was in consequence to the base treatment the natives had received from the foreigners who forced their way upon these shores.
The Williams family stayed on in Samoa for two years, after which time Mary decided to return to England with Billy. She settled in Islington and attended Union Chapel there until her death in 1851.
The careers of each of John’s sons reflected a part of his own calling. John Jr. spent the rest of his life in the South Pacific, where he was at various times both the American and the British consul. Samuel became a Congregational minister in England, while Billy set up a publishing business there.
In life John Williams inspired many young Polynesians to go as missionaries and take the gospel to neighboring islands. After his death this did not stop. The missionaries continued with the pattern John had set, and Polynesians continued to be sent out to the islands of the Western Pacific until Christianity was finally spread all the way to New Guinea. John Williams’s vision had come to pass; like links in a chain, the gospel now stretched across the Pacific Ocean.
