MISSIONARY SHIP

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27059, 19 April 1949, Page 7

MISSIONARY SHIP

CROWDS OF VISITORS LAST OPPORTUNITY FOR INSPECTION About 1500 people visited the London Missionary Society’s ship John Williams VI when she, was open for public inspection yesterday. It was the last opportunity Dunedin people had to inspect this trim little motor vessel, for this morning she will dock at Port Chalmers for cleaning and painting before resuming her tour of other New Zealand ports. She is expected to sail for Timaru on Wednesday, and thence for Lyttelton on Thursday. The hours for inspection were from 10 a.m. to 12 and from 2 p.m. to 5. There was a steady stream of people making for the Rattray street wharf most of this time. Children, naturally enough, predominated, for their pen nies helped to purchase the ship, and will help to maintain it in its island work. Even before 10 a.m. crowds of excited children had congregated on the wharf.

In the morning the recording unit of the National Broadcasting Services’ Station 4YA visited the ship and made recordings of songs by the native crew, and these records were later broadcast. Another interesting visitor was a Niue Islander, now living at Purakanui, whose great-grandfather was on the John Williams II when she was wrecked on ■ her first voyage on Niue or Savage Island in 1867. The John Williams VI is the sixth vessel to be owned by the London Missionary Society. The first three all met with misfortune on the seas, two being wrecked and the other disappearing. The ships were named after the explorer and missionary, John Williams, who, with a young companion, were murdered in 1839 by cannibal islanders of the New Hebrides. His work inspired others in England, and it was resolved to buy a ship to carry on his name and work. The first John Williams was launched in 1844, and since then there has always been a ship of that name to carry on the tradition.