Autograph letter signed, Jericho, Linstead, P.O., Jamaica to Rev. James Hume

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Autograph letter signed, Jericho, Linstead, P.O., Jamaica to Rev. James Hume

• March 1877 (Production)

"An extensive autobiographical letter written by John Clarke, pioneer of the Baptist Missionary Society in Jamaica, Fernando Po, and the Cameroons, to his fellow missionary Rev. James Hume.

Clarke, an Englishman, sailed for Jamaica in 1829, where he worked until 1840. In response to the desire of many newly emancipated slaves to send the gospel to their native continent, he and G. K. Prince were sent by the BMS to West Africa in 1840 to explore the possibilities of a mission to the Niger. They landed on the island of Fernando Po in January 1841 and began work among the freed slave population. Rather than proceeding to the Niger, Clarke and Prince recommended that the BMS establish a mission on the island on the neighboring Cameroonian mainland. In the course of 1842 and 1843, Clarke visited Jamaica twice and England once to recruit volunteers for the new mission. In February 1844, he returned to Fernando Po with a party of forty-two Jamaican teachers and settlers. This experiment was not a success, as it was dogged by problems of ill health and quarreling. In 1847, Clarke led many of the migrants home to Jamaica. Nonetheless, the Cameroons mission survived and later became the springboard for the BMS Congo mission. Clarke spent the rest of his life as a Baptist minister in Jamaica." –Michael Brown Rare Books

Typed transcript of letter included in folder.