The Introduction 'Courte biographie de Mademoiselle Eugenie Peter-Contesse' supplied in 1988 by Lydie Peter Contesse, shows that Eugenie Peter, as she was often known, was born in Switzerland in 1889 and died there in 1974 after having spent most of the years 1923-51 in New Caledonia. As a missionary teacher for the Societe des Missions Evangeliques (Paris) she was based chiefly at Bethanie in Lifou but made duty visits to the other Loyalty Islands (Mare, Ouvea and Tiga) and to Noumea, Do Neva (Houailou) and elsewhere on the Grande Terre often to attend the annual Protestant conferences. She was based in Do Neva for several months in 1939. Her letters are usually in fact 'letter-diaries'. They provide therefore a detailed record of life on the Loyalty Islands during the depression, World War II and immediate post-war years. They contain detailed accounts of relations with the Boula and Haeweng families on Lifou. Eugenie Peter and her colleagues (Maguerite Anker, Pierre Begninus, Etienne Bergeret, Marc Lacheret, Philippe Rey-Lescure and many others) contributed frequently to the Journal des Missions Evangeliques (PMB Doc.101-173). Their letters and articles are detailed on pages 241-245 of Patrick O'Reilly's Bibliographie ... de la Nouvelle Caledonie (Paris: Musee de L'Homme, 1955).

Eugenie Peter's letters begin in Marseille on 16 May 1923 and end in Noumea on 28 August 1951, with two interruptions, in 1929/30 and 1937/38, for visits to Europe. Her letters were typed and circulated to members of the large Peter-Contesse family. They were subsequently also photocopied. The present photocopied set, lent to the PMB by Mlle Therese Peter-Contesse, has been microfilmed regardless of the illegibility of some pages, as the originals and/or other sets were not available. Some of the letters are numbered, and there are occasionally gaps in the sequence. Others in the wartime series, have been censored.