DEATH OF TAMASESE

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 861, 3 January 1930, Page 1

DEATH OF TAMASESE

SAMOANS ASSEMBLE FOR REQUIEM COMMUNION SERVICE AT ST. ALBAN’S Kneeling in quiet devotion and tome weeping silently, 30 Samoan natives and as many Europeans attended a requiem celebration of the Holy Eucharist in St. Alban’s Church, Dominion Road, this morning in memory of High Chief Tamasese and his six compatriots who died in the recent riot at Apia. THE service was arranged by the *• vicar, the Rev. A. J. Greenwood, at the request of friends of the dead chief living in Auckland. The assembly included the Hon. O. F. Nelson and hit daughters, and Messrs. J. Westbrook. A. Jensen, L. McFarland and the Chief Tauvao. After the singing of the hymn, >ow the Labourer's Task Is O'er,” thh vicar said prayers for the dead, ending with the commendation, “We commend to Thee the souls of Thy faithful departed servants, Tamasese and his compatriots.” In the course of the service the constellation sang "Through the Night of Doubt and Sorrow,” and “O God Our Help In Ages Past.” LOVED AND RESPECTED "This is not the occasion for many words—our hearts are too full at the present moment with sorrow and resret for those whom we had known, loved and respected,” said Mr. Greenwood. “We are here not only to commemorate the me nory of those who were dear to us, but also to remember their services which may have been misunderstood in some directions.”

Victory, said Mr. Greenwood, could only come through sacrifice during life and through what men called death. Tamasese and his six comrades were not to be regarded as dead. There was no death. It had been swallowed up 1,000 years ago In the sacrifice of Calvary. “We now say: ‘O grave, where In they victory. O death, where is thy sting,” the vicar continued. The only sting of death was sin. As long as they carried on their work with honesty of purpose, with true hearts striving to do the right, and true and good though the world was being kept in ignorance the death of th dr brethren would not have been in vain. ’I have felt the death of Tamasese T ery deeply,” Mr. Greenwood said. “To meet him was to love him. I had >umme*l him up as a Christian gentleman. During the six months of his mcarceration in Mount Eden gaol, his wife cnme to Holy Communion Sunbay by Sunday and he himself frequently received the sacrament.” “As children of the Prince of Peace bey must follow a peaceable course J nd seek by that means to do what 'bey honestly believed right in the ''Slit of God to bring about a settlement of those difficulties which had time to time troubled Western Srhuml**

Mr. Greenwood concluded with an “diorUtion to steadfast endurance. :Q the words of God Quietness and would be their strength. ground was gained without the —no victory without sacrifice, ‘be Sunoan people must be prepared 0 go on suffering in silence for the ?**&*'• God in His own time would 0n *ig truth and light out of untruth *nd. darkness. At the conclusion of the Benediction j e congregation stood for the playQ S o! the “Dead March in Saul/* The r San at introduced a touch of amoan colour in a subdued renderRobert Louis Stevenson’s K ®qviem.”