AMARSDEN MEMORIAL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 54, 25 August 1911, Page 6

AMARSDEN MEMORIAL.

A GREAT MISSIONARY. The inhabitants of Farslcy, near Leeds, are about to honor the memory of the late Rev. Samuel Marsdcn, the distinguished missionary and pioneer of the Australian wool 'trade, by erecting a memorial hall, at a cost of £SOOO, for public use. The London Christian World says:-

"Mr. Marsden, who was born at Fa relay in 1704, received his early education at the Hull Grammar School, and subsequently proceeded to Magdalen College, Cambridge. 01 marked intellectual gifts, Mr. Marsden was appointed a Government chaplain to the new convict settlement at Sydney, Australia. Devoting himself with extraordinary ardor to the welfare of the convicts" during the ensuing fourteen years, he succeeded by means of churches, schools and kindred institutions in reclaiming hundreds of the worst specimens. He established 'The Model Farm' at Sydney, for the rearing of sheep, which was destined to play so important a part in the wo»l trade and the rise of the great London colonial wool sales. Sailing for Englaud in 1808 with the first wool in barrels, the zealous missionary-coloniser was cordially welcomed by the Prime iMinister (Lord Castlcreagh), nnd introduced by,him to King George 111. The latter countenanced the mercantile projects by ordering a suit of clothes to be made from the first cloth manufactured out of Australian wool. Encouraged by a present of five merino sheep from the King, Air. Marsden returned again to Australia in ll>lo. Besides inaugurating the woollen industry, this remarkable man also pioneered with amazing foresight the future of Australia by utilising and training convict labor, and thus making the Antipodes the source on which the English manufacturer might depend for his supplies of wool. He fitted out at his own cost a missionary expedition to New Zealand, and in face of the utmost peril from savage cannibal natives he landed, accompanied by one companion only, and preached the first Gospel message to the Maori race on Christmas Day, 1814. To Marsden and his fellow laborers is credited Britain's possession of that vast and prosperous dominion. He died in his seventy-fourth year, in 1838, at Parramatta, near Sydney. A church was erected to his niem%ory at a cost of £6OOO. It is intended to make collections throughout the woollen industry in the West Riding with the object of honoring the memorv of this great Yorkshireman."