15. Two missionaries were killed and eaten by cannibals in the New Hebrides in 1839
John Williams and his wife Mary established their first mission in the Society Islands in 1817. The Society Islands were a group of islands so named by James Cook, to honor the Royal Society in Great Britain. Tahiti and the other islands of French Polynesia are included in the group. From 1817 to the 1830s, Williams expanded his mission in the South Seas, becoming the first missionary to visit Samoa, as well as the first to visit Rarotonga, which had been discovered by Fletcher Christian and the Bounty mutineers as they searched for Pitcairn Island, though the discovery had been unknown in Europe. In 1839 Williams and a companion visited the New Hebrides chain to establish a mission there.
Upon arrival at the island of Erromango, part of the Vanuatu chain, the two missionaries were attacked, killed, and eaten by cannibals. Erromango had been first discovered by Captain Cook, and its name was bestowed, according to local lore, by a misunderstanding on the Englishman’s part. When handed a yam by a native, Cook was told what he believed to be the name of the island on which he stood. What he heard was Erromango. What was actually said in the extinct language of the islanders was armai n’go, which was not the name of the island at all, but which meant, in reference to the yam, “this food is good”.