VISITED WELLINGTON LAST YEAR

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 217, 10 June 1936, Page 11

VISITED WELLINGTON LAST YEAR

Missing Missionary

BELIEVED MURDERED BY SAVAGE INDIANS

Many Wellington people must have made the acquaintance of at least one of the missionaries thought to have been murdered by wild Indians in Brazil. The leader of the party, Mr. F. J. Roberts, was in Wellington lecturing only last year, within a few months of his departure on an expedi tiou from which, according to another member of his mission acquainted with the nature of his work, lie and Ills companions are never likely to return. A cable message in Monday's "Dominion” stated that three missionaries, Mr. F. J. Roberts, Mr. F. 11. Wright, and Mr. F. C. Dawson, were believed to have been ambushed aud murdered by savage Indians in the wild region of the Rio Zingu, Brazil. Searchers had found the missing men’s canoe smashed, and their huts unoccupied, aud had heard an account of the ambush from a remote tribe. The attack was stated to have taken place about a year ago; but news had only recently been received.

Personally acquainted with the three men, aud herself an active member of their organisation, the Unevangelised Fields Mission, Miss G. F. Yerbury, at present lecturing in Wellington, said yesterday that there was little hope of their being found alive. The tribes among which the three men were working were wild and hostile. The only white people on whom they had ever before set eyes had dis-

appeared under similar circumstances and their fate had never been known. These Indians killed on sight; they still practised cannibalism. The missionaries went in constant peril of their lives. In his last letter, Mr. Roberts, leader of the party, had said, “What we’ve heard of the Kayapo Indians would turn your hair grey, but we’re going there just the same.”

Two others of the mission, Mr. H. H. Banner aud Mr. W. Johnstone, normally stationed on the Gurupy River, had gone into the jungle among the wild natives in search of the missing three, but had evidently failed to find them. It was their report to London headquarters that had formed the basis of the cable message. The fact of the ambush, coupled with the finding of the broken canoe and tho deserted huts, was to those with knowledge of the ways of these savages sufficient indication of their fate. Mr. Roberts was in Wellington at the beginning of last year, said Miss Yerbury. He was lecturing in Nelson and Wellington, and had made a lasting impression ou those who met him. “He had a great personality and was a fine speaker; no one who had heard him could ever have forgotten him,” said Miss Yerbury. "Ho was a real pioneer.” She added that Mrs. Roberts, who had been a missionary too, had died in the field, of fever. Mr. Roberts had been some years in the Amazon forests, but Mr. Dawson, the other Australian, had only been about four months up the river, anti Mr. Wright little longer. They were members of an organisation that worked only at pioneering in parts of the earth where no other evangelical bodies, and practically no other whites, ever went. They had about 40 missionaries in the Amazon country, including three New Zealanders. Their other spheres of activity were the Belgian Congo and Papua. In all these fields they were among savage and untutored races, who practised cannibalism, witchcraft, head-hunting, or even more barbarous customs. Iu many places their missionaries had ventured among tribes with reputations just as sinister as that of the Kayapo Indians, and had not only received a welcome, but made converts. “We had hoped it would be the same in this case,” said

Miss Yerbury, ‘-but God’s plans were apparently otherwise.” DANGERS REALISED One of Party’s Statement (Received June 9, 9.15 p.m.) Sydney, June 9. Mr. Fred. Roberts, who, with two other missionaries, is reported to have been murdered by Indians iu Brazil, was at Leeton, southern New South Wales, ou furlough two years ago. He told friends on that occasion that he realised the grave dangers of the Matto Grobso region on the Bolivian border, whither ho intended to penetrate. This was where Colonel Fawcett and his son had disappeared, and the Government wag planning to send a punitive expedition.