Sister Merle Farland (1906?-1988) trained at Auckland Hospital. In 1938 she was appointed to a nursing position at NZ Methodist Mission's Helena Goldie Hospital at Bilua, Vella Lavella. Most of the missionaries left the Solomon Islands in January 1942 when the Japanese first attacked Rabaul, however Sister Farland refused to leave on the grounds that a nurse was necessary to attend to the needs of Solomon Islanders and that, as she had just returned from furlough, she was the right person to stay. From Bilua she visited New Georgia, Simbo and Choiseul which were occupied by the Japanese at the time. For a time, Miss Farland ran a coast watching station herself. Travelling a good 100 miles by canoe through enemy lines she was eventually evacuated by Catalina from Sege at the south end of New Georgia. After the War Sister Farland became a tutor sister at Lautoka Hospital where she was presented with a MBE for her services on 12 May 1947. (Fiji Times, 14 May 1947)

Sister Merle Farland: diary, 1938-1940, 1941-Feb 1943(photocopy of the original); index to Sister Farland's diary; The Gizo Scuttle, by Rev. J. R. Metcalfe; press cuttings, 1942-1988; correspondence, 1942-1944. <P><b>See reel list for further details</b>