The Cape Bedford Mission was the first

Christian mission A Christian mission is an organized effort for the propagation of the Christian faith. Missions involve sending individuals and groups across boundaries, most commonly geographical boundaries, to carry on evangelism or other activities, such ...

on the

Cape York Peninsula Cape York Peninsula is a large peninsula located in Far North Queensland, Australia. It is the largest unspoiled wilderness in northern Australia.Mittermeier, R.E. et al. (2002). Wilderness: Earth’s last wild places. Mexico City: Agrupación ...

Queensland, Australia ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , established_ ...

. It is the oldest surviving mission in northern Queensland. Founded by

Lutheran Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...

staff from the

Cooper Creek The Cooper Creek (formerly Cooper's Creek) is a river in the Australian states of Queensland and South Australia. It was the site of the death of the explorers Burke and Wills in 1861. It is sometimes known as the Barcoo River from one of its t ...

area of South Australia (who also established the Elim Aboriginal mission in Queensland), it became a stable community with the assignment of two young

Neuendettelsau Neuendettelsau is a local authority in Middle Franconia, Germany. Neuendettelsau is situated 20 miles southwest of Nuremberg and 12 miles east of Ansbach. Since 1947 it has a Lutheran seminary ( ''Augustana Hochschule''). Diakonie Neuendettelsau ...

missionaries (George Schwarz and Wilhelm Poland). Schwarz stayed for 55 years, and Poland for 20; they added the

Hope Vale Hope Vale (also known as Hopevale) is a town within the Aboriginal Shire of Hope Vale and a coastal locality split between the Aboriginal Shire of Hope Vale and the Shire of Cook, both in Queensland, Australia. It is an Aboriginal community. I ...

site. The community was evacuated during World War II because its German missionaries were reclassified as "enemy aliens" and imprisoned for the duration. After the war, Hope Vale was established on a new site. Schwarz is still remembered there; it has remained a cohesive community, home to indigenous activists.

Language and traditional land

Guugu Yimithirr (also known as Koko Yindjir, Gugu Yimidhirr, Guguyimidjir) is an

Australian Aboriginal language The Indigenous languages of Australia number in the hundreds, the precise number being quite uncertain, although there is a range of estimates from a minimum of around 250 (using the technical definition of 'language' as non-mutually intellig ...

and the

Cooktown Cooktown is a coastal town and locality in the Shire of Cook, Queensland, Australia. Cooktown is at the mouth of the Endeavour River, on Cape York Peninsula in Far North Queensland where James Cook beached his ship, the Endeavour, for repairs ...

area. The language region includes the local government area of the Aboriginal Shire of Hope Vale and the

Shire of Cook The Shire of Cook (The Shire) is a local government area in Far North Queensland, Australia. The Shire covers most of the eastern and central parts of Cape York Peninsula, the most northerly section of the Australian mainland. It covers an area ...

, particularly the localities of Cape Bedford, Battle Camp and sections of the

Normanby River The Normanby River, comprising the East Normanby River, the West Normanby River, the East Normanby River North Branch, the East Normanby River South Branch and the Granite Normanby River, is a river system located in Far North Queensland, Aust ...

and

Annan River The Annan River ( Kuku Nyungkal: ''Yuku Baja'') is a river located in the Wet Tropics of Far North Queensland, Australia. Course and features The river rises in the Yorkey Range below Mount Romeo near , north-northwest of . The river flows g ...

History

StateLibQld 1 231156 Cape Bedford Mission Station

19th century

The Cape Bedford mission was seen as a stepping stone into

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu Hiri Motu, also known as Police Motu, Pidgin Motu, or just Hiri, is a language of Papua New Guinea, which is spoken in surrounding areas of Port Moresby (Capital of Papua New Guinea). It is a simplified version of ...

, which Germany had acquired in 1884; Papua was British.

Johann Flierl Johann Flierl (16 April 1858 – 30 September 1947) was a pioneer Lutheran missionary in New Guinea. He established mission schools and organised the construction of roads and communication between otherwise remote interior locations. Under his l ...

, who was working at the

mission in

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

, was authorized to start a Lutheran mission in New Guinea. However, he was delayed for several months in Cookstown in 1885 and used this time to establish the Cape Bedford mission. Flierl stayed for six months before moving to

German New Guinea German New Guinea (german: Deutsch-Neu-Guinea) consisted of the northeastern part of the island of New Guinea and several nearby island groups and was the first part of the German colonial empire. The mainland part of the territory, called , ...

. He was replaced by C. A. Meyer and his wife, Mathilde, from the Cooper Creek mission. In September 1886, George Pfalzer and his wife (also named Mathilde) arrived from

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

to assist Meyer. In January 1887, government start-up funding for the mission was withdrawn. Its support was taken over by the Neuendettelsau Society in

Bavaria Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total lan ...

and German Lutheran communities in southern Australia. After another reorganization of the mission staff, George Schwarz arrived in September 1887 and Wilhelm Poland in 1889. These missionaries and their wives helped stabilize the mission and make it more cohesive. The Polands ran a school at Elim, while Schwarz settled with the young men on a new outstation at Hopevale for

agricultural Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating Plant, plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of Sedentism, sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of Domestication, domesticated species created food ...

and

pastoral A pastoral lifestyle is that of shepherds herding livestock around open areas of land according to seasons and the changing availability of water and pasture. It lends its name to a genre of literature, art, and music (pastorale) that depicts ...

work. Poland and Schwarz emphasized teaching in the

Guugu Yimidhirr language Guugu Yimithirr, also rendered Guugu Yimidhirr, Guguyimidjir, and many other spellings, is an Australian Aboriginal language, the traditional language of the Guugu Yimithirr people of Far North Queensland. It belongs to the Pama-Nyungan langu ...

, and soon some of the mission girls were teaching at the school. In 1890, the Queensland government offered a £200 annual subsidy to the mission on condition that lessons be taught in

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

. This funding stopped in 1893, leaving Schwarz and Poland to teach the students in their choice of language. In 1900, when a government teacher arrived, English instruction resumed. Due to fluctuations in funding, for about the first 15 years of the mission's existence its residents were at least

trilingual Multilingualism is the use of more than one language, either by an individual speaker or by a group of speakers. It is believed that multilingual speakers outnumber monolingual speakers in the world's population. More than half of all E ...

20th century

In 1900, the Elim community was relocated to Hopevale with the arrival of government teacher Mary Allen. The residents of the Lutheran missions at Marie Yamba and Bloomfield were added in 1901 and 1902. Thirteen years after the mission's founding, the first adults were baptised in 1899 (before the adult baptisms, a few girls had been baptised in 1896 and 1897). In August 1892, a deathbed

baptism Baptism (from grc-x-koine, βάπτισμα, váptisma) is a form of ritual purification—a characteristic of many religions throughout time and geography. In Christianity, it is a Christian sacrament of initiation and adoption, almost inv ...

was performed. In 1903, when the church opened at Hopevale, 12 residents were baptised: six girls, one boy and five young men. During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, Schwarz moved the mission and its residents to Spring Hill, south of the mission reserve and closer to the Cooktown road; as a result, it was now accessible overland as well as by sea. Communications with Neuendettelsau was disrupted, and supervision of the mission devolved to a

Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the states and territories of Australia, Australian state of Queensland, and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a populati ...

-based Lutheran committee. Although Schwarz was naturalised in 1905, married to an Australian woman and his children were Australian-born and spoke only English, one of the mission's neighbours called him an "officially-pampered Hun" and accused the government of "subsidizing an institution conducted by an enemy subject to teach the Aboriginals German sentiment and German language." World War I ended the direct involvement of the Neuendettelsau Mission Society in the Cape Bedford mission. The Lutheran

synod A synod () is a council of a Christian denomination, usually convened to decide an issue of doctrine, administration or application. The word ''wikt:synod, synod'' comes from the meaning "assembly" or "meeting" and is analogous with the Latin ...

Iowa Iowa () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States, bordered by the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west. It is bordered by six states: Wisconsin to the northeast, Illinois to the ...

, United States, assumed its financial support for a time; increasingly, it recruited staff from descendants of German

immigrants Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not natives or where they do not possess citizenship in order to settle as permanent residents or naturalized citizens. Commuters, tourists, and ...

(through the Lutheran Immanuel College in

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

) rather than from Germany. Nevertheless, there was a lingering sense that the mission was "too German." In 1933, the mission was given to the United Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Australia (UELCA). The outbreak of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

brought fears about the loyalties of Aborigines educated by Germans and in close contact with the Japanese in the marine industries. On 11 May 1942,

American army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

trucks arrived; Schwarz was arrested, and everyone else was transported to the Cooktown wharf for transport to the

Aboriginal reserve An Aboriginal reserve, also called simply reserve, was a government-sanctioned settlement for Aboriginal Australians, created under various state and federal legislation. Along with missions and other institutions, they were used from the 19th c ...

Woorabinda Woorabinda is a rural town and locality in the Aboriginal Shire of Woorabinda, Queensland, Australia. In the , Woorabinda had a population of 962 people. It is an Aboriginal community. Geography Woorabinda is in Central Queensland, inland abo ...

in central Queensland. During their seven years in exile, 60 residents died. In 1949, a group returned to the Hope Vale site to reestablish the mission. The army had taken over the land, and damage had been done by it and by storms. The mission was rebuilt on a new site on the

Endeavour River The Endeavour River ( Guugu Yimithirr: ''Wabalumbaal''), inclusive of the Endeavour River Right Branch, the Endeavour River South Branch, and the Endeavour River North Branch, is a river system located on Cape York Peninsula in Far North Queen ...

, from the old mission. Australian-born pastor Victor Wenke took on the role of missionary. The Lutheran

Joh Bjelke-Petersen Sir Johannes Bjelke-Petersen (13 January 191123 April 2005), known as Joh Bjelke-Petersen, was a conservative Australian politician. He was the longest-serving and longest-lived premier of Queensland, holding office from 1968 to 1987, during ...

was a supporter of the Cape Bedford mission; it was the first mission to receive a

Deed of Grant in Trust A Deed of Grant in Trust (DOGIT) is the name for a system of community-level land trust established in Queensland to administer former Aboriginal reserves and missions. They came about through the enactment by the Queensland Government of the '' ...

(DOGIT) in 1986, which turned it into a community with its own

council A council is a group of people who come together to consult, deliberate, or make decisions. A council may function as a legislature, especially at a town, city or county/shire level, but most legislative bodies at the state/provincial or natio ...

References

Sources

Many Voices: Reflections on Experiences of Indigenous Child Separation – Google Books

Up from the Mission: Selected Writings – Noel Pearson – Google Books

Ethnicity and the Bible – Google Books

External links

* {{cite web , url=http://missionaries.griffith.edu.au/qld-mission/cape-bedford-mission-hope-vale-1886-1942 , title=Cape Bedford Mission (Hope Vale) (1886–1942) , publisher=Griffith University History of Queensland Christianity in Queensland