On his return from the Middle East, Rhys Healey’s unit was disbanded so he transferred to ANGAU in early 1943. On 8 November 1948 Rhys Healey accompanied District Commissioner Horrie Niall to open Telefomin station, in Papua New Guinea, together with Assistant District Officer Des Clifton-Bassett and Patrol Officer Rodgers. Healey’s job as Medical Assistant was to check on the malaria situation – he noted that the disease was already in the valley. Healey also took with him his well trained Dokta Boi, Bunat, and both stayed six weeks to organise the building of the native hospital. As no European medical Assistant was available, Bunat stayed in charge to supervise the running of the hospital and Healey returned to Angoram on the Sepik River to his family for Christmas. Bunat was awarded a Government Medal for looking after Harris and the wounded Police in 1953. At the request of Sir Michael Somare Rhys Healey stayed in PNG after independence, until Christmas 1981, mainly to take charge of the Finance Department and to train indigenous staff quickly. (Notes from Mrs Dorothy E. Healey, April 2006.)

Following the murders, an investigative patrol was flown into the area. The patrol was lead by District Commisisoner Allan Timperley and included Distict Officers George Wearne and Allan Corrigan, Cadet Barry Ryan and Medical Assistant Rhys Healey. They inspected the villages of Komdavip and Misinmin and the rest houses in the Eliptamin Valley.

These photographs were taken by the investigative patrol in Nov 1953.

Sister Lida Tonkin (Mrs L. Gill), a nursing sister from Young, NSW, first arrived at the Methodist Mission at Raluana in New Britain (Papua New Guinea) in 1916.

The photographs and post cards include events, daily life and traditional customs practiced in Rabaul in the early 20th century. Funerary and marriage customs are represented. There is a good set of photographs on traditional fishing (PMB Photo 1_31 to PMB Photo 1_46). Other images show canoe building and sailing, basket, broom and string making and traditional houses, mission life and the Malabunga hospital. Dances, such as the Kulau dance, carvings used in dances and the

The Oceania Marist Province Archives Series (OMPA) is the result of a special project during which records of the Catholic Church in islands of the Western Pacific were copied by Father Theo B. Cook, SM in collaboration with the Pacific Manuscripts Bureau. (Cook was born Theodorus Bernardus Wilhelmus Kok but chose to go by the name Cook in Australia: Povey, 2010). The OMPA series covers the Diocese of Tonga (OMPA 1-25), Diocese of Samoa and Tokelau (OMPA 26-74), Marist Fathers, Rome (OMPA 80-100), Diocese of Wallis and Futuna (OMPA 101-126), Diocese of Port Vila (OMPA 127-178), Archdiocese of Noumea (OMPA 179-360) and the Oceania Marist Province Archives (OMPA 361-400).

Detailed indexes were prepared for the six diocese and those records copied in Rome. These can be found at http://asiapacific.anu.edu.au/pambu/collections/microfilm.php or compiled in The Catholic Church in the Western Pacific: a guide to records on microfilm (Robert Langdon, ed.), Canberra, 1986.

The records are in a series numbered D100 to D137. Some items could not be located for microfilming; others were not microfilmed because of their minimal historical value. The contents of the two reels are:

Reel 1: D100 - College diary, 1899-1901
D109 - mark book, 1868-71
D110 - mark book 1880-91
D111 - mark book 1893-96
D114A - History of Britain 'Bilitonia' by Dr J.E. Moulton
D115 - E.E.V. Collocott papers comprising Pita Vi's narrative (30pp.) typescript
D116 - Collocott papers, beings songs, poems, stories (Tongan)

Reel 2: D117 - original notes (in several hands) from which Collocott transcribed
D118 - examination papers 1898
D120 - daily meteorological records 1874-78
D129 - diary, notebooks of J.E. Moulton and E.E. Crosby re Wesleyan-Free Church conflict, 1885
D130 - Diary, notebooks of J.E. Moulton - 1887, Wesleyan-Free Church conflict
D131 - diary, notebook, J.E. Moulton, 22 January - 14 May 1887.

Eleanor J. Walker was a member of the Methodist mission at Dobu in the D'Entrecasteaux Islands of Papua New Guinea (then called British New Guinea). The mission was established in June 1891. For details, see George Brown, D.D., Pioneer Missionary and Explorer : An Autobiography, London, 1908, pp485-92.

The diary describes how the diarist came to join the mission and gives an account of her life at Dobu.

Minutes of Missionaries' Committee, 1929-1938 and Minutes of the Mission Council, 1935-1951, of the London Missionary Society (Samoan District)

Donaldson was one of about 40 British employees of the British-owned Pacific Phosphate Company on Nauru when World War I broke out. Nauru was then a German colony. On 6 September 1914, the Germans deported the British employees to Ocean Island, part of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Protectorate. On 3 November 1914, an Australian force under Colonel W. Holmes, arrived at Ocean Island in the company's ship Messina, reembarked the British employees and returned them to Nauru, which was placed under Australian military control.

The diary gives an account of these events and those preceding and following them.

Bishop Poncet (1884-1973), a priest of the Society of Mary, arrived on Wallis Island in 1925. On his elevation to bishop in March 1936, he became the first Vicar Apostolic of Wallis and Futuna. He retired in 1962. His 'Histoire Succincte de l'Ile Wallis' has been microfilmed as PMB Doc.212. He was also the author of Histoire de l'Ile Wallis, the second volume of which was published by the Societe des Oceanistes, Paris, in 1972.

Diaries of Father (Bishop) Alexandre Poncet:<BR>Reel 1: 5 July 1924 - 3 February 1938<BR>Reel 2: February 1938 - March 1947.

Minutes of meetings of the Samoan District Committee of the London Missionary Society for December 1916 - February 1929

Minutes of meetings of the Samoan District Committee of the London Missionary Society for June 1836 - July 1851 and March 1898 - May 1905.