Missionary Life In Labrador

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 15, 8 April 1927, Page 10

Missionary Life In Labrador

The famous missionary and doctor, Dr W. T. Grenfell, C.M.G., has just returned to Labrador, after a brief visit to England, to continue his self-imposed task of carrying hope and healing to the frozen lands of the Far North. The “Uncrowned King of Labrador,” as he is called, tells in this article of some of his adventures.

OF ALL the many thrilling incidents in my life the most exciting started one afternoon some 18 years ago, with an emergency call for medical help from a place 60 miles south of St. Anthony, Northern Newfoundland, where I was staying at the time. I started off immediately with a team of fjne dogs, and all went well until I had to break through some pack-ice while crossing an inlet—a common experience. To cut a long story short, I found myself on a piece of ice which broke loose from the main part. In an instant I cut loose the dogs from the sleigh, otherwise they would have been drawn into the vortex, and I should have been left alone. Then the “pan” broke into two, and I was plunged into further trouble, the only escape from which was to dive into the icy water and, with my invaluable dogs, swim to another. This “pan” was about the size of a dining-table, and on it I spent a night and a day, clad only in a light sweater and vest, without hat, coat, or gloves. I had been three times in the water, and I should have been frozen to death but for the dogs. I I was forced to kill three of my faithful companions during the night, and used their skins for coverlets, their bodies for windshields, their harness for puttees, and their frozen legs as a flagpole, on which I attached my shirt as daylight came, in the hope of attracting the attention of someone on the shore or some passing craft. In this way I drifted some 20 miles, when, fortunately, some men engaged in seal-hunting observed the “pan” with its peculiar burden, and reported my plight to the nearest village. The wind was in my favour, and was drifting me in towards the shore, although no boat could be launched, as the ice along the coast was breaking up. Before daybreak, however, a fine volunteer crew had been got together, and they effected a rescue. When at last I stepped ashore, tied up in flags stuffed out with oakum, and wrapped in the bloody skins of my dogs, my night on the inhospitable ice seemed like a ghastly nightmare. Fight to Save a Life. The founding of our orphanage here was the result of a grim accident in my life amongst these sturdy fishermen of Northern Labrador and Newfoundland. I had been summoned to a lonely headland to see a very sick family. Among the spruce trees in a small hut lived a Scottish salmon fisher, his wife and five little children. When we anchored off the promontory we were surprised to see no signs of welcome. When we landed and entered the house we found the mother dead on the bed, and the father lying on the floor, dying. Next morning we improvised two coffins, contributed from the wardrobes of all hands enough black material for a “seemly” funeral, and later, steaming up the bay to a sandy stretch of land, buried the two parents —and found ourselves left with five little mortals in black sitting on the grave mound. There and then we founded our first orphanage. One day a father of eight children

sent in from a neighbouring island for immediate help. His gun had gone off while his hand was on the muzzle, and had practically blown it to pieces. To treat him 10 miles away on that island was impossible, so we brought him in for operation. To stop the bleeding he had plunged his hand into a flour barrel and then tied it up in a bag. and as a result the wounded arm was poisoned away up above the elbow. He preferred death to losing his right arm. Day and night for weeks our nurse tended him, as he hovered between life and death; but eventually he pulled through, and at last a secondary operation for repair became possible. We took chances on bonegrafting to form a hand, and he was left with a flipper like a seal’s. But there was no skin for it. So a fellow

doctor and I shared the honour of supplying some. Pat—for that was his name—has been a veritable apostle of the hospital ever since. Though he has English Episcopal skin on the palm of his hand and Scottish Presbyterian skin on the back of it, the rest of him still remains a devout Roman Catholic. The Substitute Bride. I have found the Eskimoes a singularly interesting people. They are extraordinarily free from convention, as the following anecdote will prove. A travelling minister was called on at a place named Spotted Islands to marry a couple, the bridegroom being a kind of head man in the vicinity. When the minister arrived at the island he found all the islanders awaiting him in the school-room. It was not till he had actually entered the building that he discovered that the bride was the deceased wife’s sister. This being a forbidden relationship at the time, the minister naturally refused to proceed with the ceremony, whereupon the intended bridegroom quite calmly remarked: “Never mind, mister, one of these others will do.” So, turning to the expectant crowd, he selected' a partner. She being willing, the ceremony was performed, and the merrymaking started.