Occasional Papers from St. Augustine's College, Canterbury, 1853-1935

From the Dean and Chapter Library, Canterbury, and Lambeth Palace Library, London, England

5 reels 35mm silver microfilm, ISBN 1897955 34 0

List price: POA

St. Augustine's was originally founded as an Abbey and endowed by King Ethelbert, AD.605; suppressed in 1538 it was restored 310 years later as an Anglican Mission College, under Royal Charter, in 1848 - that turbulent year.

The Missionary College of St. Augustine was established to "relieve the deficiency of an adequate supply of Ministers, duly prepared by special training, to labour with effect in the dependencies of the British Empire."

The Occasional Papers, the first of which was published on 31st May 1853, had their origin in the letters that had been received from various quarters, the reading of which had been a regular feature of the Sunday evening gatherings at the College.

The Occasional Papers, which contain many of these letters from former students, constitute a valuable corpus, giving a wide range of contemporary views and opinions on Christian mission fields. Some detail pioneering labours and successes; others reflect first impressions on arrival in their far-flung regions of appointed service of the societies, terrain and peoples they met; most supply a broad range of local, social, geographical and anthropological, as well as missiological information.

Occasional Papers publish letters from all around the world; some originate in Africa, the Americas, Australia, Canada and China; others come from India, New Zealand, the Pacific Islands, South-East Asia, and the West Indies. Some are written aboard ship (eg. "The Osprey" off the coast of Newfoundland, May 16, 1853); others are from remote missions located only by their navigational co-ordinates (eg.La.50"17'N).

The Missionaries themselves came from diverse nationalities and backgrounds (including one Eskimo named Kallihirua), the major requirements for admission to the College being communion with the Church of England and "satisfactory certificates of baptism, and of religious and moral character". Some examples of St. Augustine's College syllabus and teaching programmes are also recorded.

Some of the interesting subjects detailed refer to matters of anthropological interest (eg. detailed descriptions of the "Head Feast" of the Dayaks in Sarawak (nos.47-48); and the "Feather Cloak" from Hawaii (in 1898). Others refer to the use of local cures (eg. "Native medicines in the Cape" (No.44), etc.). There are descriptions of the siege of Standerton, Transvaal, 1881 (No.220); news from the mission field in China, 1889 (No.249); from Zululand, 1891 (No.249); a description of Christmas in Basutoland, 1891 (No.249); also a detailed account of the murder of Rev. S.M.W. Brooks by the Chinese Secret Society of the Great Dagger in 1900, along with many other interesting items, including material on the Boer war, and on Melanesian, Polynesian (including the Maori) and other indigenous cultures.

These letters reflect the attitudes of participants in an important period of expanding Church of England missionary activity. They record early contacts with indigenous peoples (eg. Dayaks, Inuits, Maoris and Zulus) and reveal the painful efforts of colonial pioneers to adapt English social and religious practices to very un-English environments. These Occasional Papers will prove an important source for missiologists, and anthropologists, and more widely for their portrayal of British colonial and post-colonial history at a local level.

The microfilm has been made from the only complete set of the Occasional Papers known to exist exist, which is lodged in the archives of Canterbury Cathedral.

Contents of Reels: