The Pacific Concerns Resource Center was the secretariat of the Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific Movement. The first conference of the Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific Movement was held in Suva in April 1975. The Pacific Concerns Resource Center published several documents relating to a nuclear free and independent Pacific, including Pacific news bulletin, a monthly journal first published in Sydney, and from 1999, in Suva. Issues and countries it covered include decolonisation and self-determination struggles, the environment and sustainable development, indigenous rights, sovereignty and land rights, demilitarisation and anti-nuclear campaigns, intellectual property rights for indigenous peoples, East Timor, West Papua, Bougainville, Kanaky, Te Ao Maohi and the Philippines.

Other documents filmed include: Pacific Concerns Resource Centre annual report (1999-2004); Canberra Kanaky bulletin (1985-1986), edited by Barry and Dorothy Shineberg; Kanaky update: towards New Caledonian independence (1984-1989), edited by George Tieman and Reverend Dick Wooton; Nuclear free Pacific news (1982-1983); Pacific Concerns Resource Center bulletin (1981-1985); and, Pacific news (later title: Pacific news bulletin) (1983-2004).

The collection also includes: To'ere: no te tiamaraa, a private newspaper published weekly in Faa'a, Tahiti, and edited by Claude Marere from 2002-2006; and, Independence and sovereignty for Te Ao Maohi (French Polynesia), translated by Nic MacLellan and published in Faa'a, Tahiti in 1997.

The 15 manuscript items on this microfilm were bought by the Territory of French Polynesia at an auction of Pacific manuscripts in Paris in June, 1969. They were formerly part of the Ropiteau-O'Reilly collection.

The 15 items are:

1. A six-page account of Tahiti by Chenard de la Giraudais, commander of 'l'Etoile', the consort of Bougainville's ship 'La Boudeuse', which visited Tahiti in April, 1768.
2. Letter written in Tahiti on February 6, 1799, by the L.M.S. missionary John Harris.
3. Journal of the missionaries Henry Nott and James Elder describing a preaching tour, Tahiti in 1802.
4. Letter from King Pomare II to the L.M.S., London, dated January 1, 1807.
5. Journal kept by the missionaries William Henry and John Davies during a preaching tour on the island of Huahine in 1809.
6. Letter from Pomare II dated September 25, 1812, to the missionaries on Moorea informing them of his determination to abandon false gods and ancient rites against evil spirits.
7. Letter from the missionaries John Williams, L.E. Threlkeld and J.M. Orsmond from Raiatea to the L.M.S. in London, dated September 5, 1819. Collective report on affairs at the missions on Raiatea and Tahaa.
8. Letter from the missionary George Platt from Bora Bora, dated May 28, 1828, describing a visit to the island of Maupiti.
9. Letter from Queen Pomare IV and her second husband Ariifaaite to the missionary Henry Nott dated February 4, 1836, asking to be readmitted to church membership.
10. Letterbook (pp71) copies of 19 letters by George Pritchard, British Consul in Tahiti - November 26 1836 to February 15 1837.
11. May 11, 1846 letter from Queen Pomare IV at Raiatea to the directors, L.M.S., stating she would never live under the French protectorate.
12. 94-page report, 'Look Again, or a few observations on the affairs of Tahiti from 1845 to 1849 by an eye-witness' by Rev. J.M. Orsmond to President of France.
13. & 14. Letters from Queen Pomare IV to President of France (August 26, 1851) re government of her country and French Governor (September 18, 1872) re funeral of her small daughter.
14. Account book 1877-1882 by Pomare V Tahiti's last king, d.1891

In June 1853 two ordained Hawaiian ministers, Rev. James K. Kekela and Rev. Samuel Kauwealoha, and their wives, and two deacons and their wives, were chosen by the Hawaiian Missionary Board to sail on the English brigantine, Royalist, for the Marquesas Islands located 2,300 miles to the southeast. Accompanied by New England missionary Benjamin Parker of Kaneohe Mission Station, these native couples were the first Hawaiian families to serve as missionaries in the Marquesas, 1853-1909. Supported entirely by the Hawaiian churches and the Hawaiian Evangelical Association, the deputation of native Hawaiian missionaries was predicted to succeed where non-Polynesian missionaries had failed. Although support was strong at first, it diminished over time, and in 1909, with no hope of fresh reinforcements, the last surviving Hawaiian missionaries yielded their efforts to French Protestants from Tahiti.<P>

Also included in this collection is one folder of documents pertaining to an earlier mission to the Washington Islands (Marquesas), 1831-1834. A preliminary visit to explore the islands was made by Messrs. Whitney, Tinker and Alexander of the Sandwich Islands mission in 1832. A favourable report led to the departure in July 1833 of American Protestant missionaries Richard Armstrong, W. P. Alexander and Benjamin W. Parker and their wives to establish a mission in the Marquesas. Their labours proved unsuccessful, however, and the mission was aborted. They returned to the Sandwich Islands the following year to resume their missionary work.

The Marquesas Collection, 1831-1834, 1853-1918, consists of 2.5 linear feet of manuscript material, including personal letters, formal reports of general meetings and mission station reports. Correspondence by native Hawaiian missionaries to the Hawaiian Evangelical Association in Honolulu is in the Hawaiian language. A portion of this correspondence was translated into English in the 1930s by Rev. Henry Pratt Judd, a member of the Hawaiian Board of Missions and the grandson of American Protestant missionary, Gerrit P. Judd. Microfilm copies of these translations can be found at PMB 1171. See Finding aids for details.

The Manuscript Mission Histories are, in fact, mainly collections of chronologically arranged newspaper clippings, with some typescript entries, concerning the work of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in the Pacific Islands. The histories cover the following territories and periods: French Polynesia (1849-1959), Hawaii (1850-1959), Samoa (1871-1959), Tonga (1891-1959).

Captain Fowler went to the Pacific in 1868 as captain of the London Missionary Society vessel JOHN WILLIAMS III. He was dismissed in 1871 because of his treatment of Pacific Islanders. The logbook begins on 12 November 1868 when Captain Fowler left London. It continues to 25 February 1869 when the JOHN WILLIAMS III passed Jervis Bay, NSW. It resumes on 30 March 1869 when the JOHN WILLIAMS III left Sydney for a cruise to the Pacific Islands, which extended to Tahiti, back to the New Hebrides (Vanuatu) and then to Raiatea before returning to Sydney on 31 December 1869. The cruise took in Raiatea, Tahaa, Huahine, Tahiti, Mangaia, Rarotonga, Aitutaki, Niue, Pago Pago, Apia, Aneityum, Mare, Lifu, Uvea, Tubuai and Savai'i. The logbook resumes again on 4 April 1870 when the JOHN WILLIAMS III was at Huahine. Subsequent calls were made at Raiatea, Tahiti, Mangaia, Rarotonga, Aitutaki, Manihiki, Rakahanga, Pukapuka, Mitiaro, Mauke, Atiu, Tutuila, Niue, the Tokelau, Ellice (Tuvalu) and Gilbert Islands (Kiribati), the southern New Hebrides and the Loyalty Islands. The JOHN WILLIAMS III returned to Sydney on 20 December 1870. Captain Fowler returned to England in 1871 in the ship BUCKLEY CASTLE.

Times and Seasons, which was published at Nauvoo, Illinois, was a publication of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints before the split that resulted in the establishment of the Reorganized Church in Lamoni and later, Independence, Missouri, and the Church at Salt Lake City, Utah.

The letters were written by Addison Pratt, Benjamin Grouard and Noah Rogers, the first missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to serve in the South Pacific. They were mainly on the island of Tubuai, Austral Islands. For other publications of the Reorganized Church see also PMB 92, 93 and 100 for The Saints Herald; PMB 94 and 109 for Autumn Leaves; PMB 104 for Zion's Ensign; and PMB 105 for Journal of History.

Letters from missionaries in French Polynesia. The last three letters, dated August 1884, are from Joseph Smith III, President of the Reorganized Church, to (1) the French Consul in San Francisco, (2) the US Consul in Tahiti, and (3) the Church Mission in Tahiti.