George Grenfell (1849-1906)
As an apprentice in a machinery plant, George Grenfell acquired knowledge there that would be invaluable later in his life. Aged 24, Grenfell felt the missionary call and entered the Baptist College at Bristol, being accepted a year later for service in Africa and sailing for Cameroon in 1874.
Grenfell was as much an explorer as a missionary and had managed to establish a printing press, teach brick-making, treat the sick and do Bible translation as well as his exploration and cartography.
Thomas Comber (1852-1887)
Thomas Comber spent four years at Regent’s Park College where he trained as a missionary student. He spent a further year in London taking classes in medicine, before travelling to Cameroon with BMS at age 24.
Comber was known for his boundless energy and happy nature, stemming from his unshakable faith. He was called ‘Vianga-Vianga’ in the local language, which means ‘Hurry-Hurry’.
Just one year before, in 1877, the river in
Congo had been followed for the first time from its upper reaches to its mouth, proving that its upper stretches were not in fact a headwater of the Nile, but of the Congo! For the missionaries, this was unchartered territory in its most literal form!
After reaching San Salvador and welcomed by Dom Pedro V, King of Congo, Comber and Grenfell started the longer expedition to reach Stanley Pool – an overland journey to by-pass the cataract stretch of the river.
However, they were not able to make it to Stanley Pool, or to explore the miles of waters beyond, as they were forced to turn back by an unfriendly tribal chief. Despite this, they sent messages back to the BMS Committee encouraging the mission to continue.
The mission was put under threat however early on, as Grenfell submitted his letter of resignation in 1878. The reason was that his former Jamaican housekeeper in the Cameroons, Rose Edgerley, was about to give birth and he was the father. He had promised her that he would return and marry her.
Grenfell remained there for two years before being recommended by Comber as the right man to run the strategic mission depot at the mouth of the Congo. He was accepted by the Committee, readmitted to the mission and returned to Congo with his new family. The reinstatement was a risk, but Grenfell was to prove invaluable to the inland mission over the next 25 years.
Meanwhile, in 1879, Comber and several other missionaries were able to proceed in the work. Establishing base stations for the West African mission on the coast and at the mouth of the Congo River was not much of a problem. However, reaching the interior was the goal. The Congo became navigable for over 1,000 miles inland from Stanley Pool, but it took 13 attempts before Comber and others were able to establish an overland route to Stanley Pool from the coast, finally achieving it in February 1881.
In 1880, with Grenfell back on the scene, the mission strategy was evolving. A gift of £4,000 was given to BMS for the purchase and upkeep of a purpose-built steamer for the Congo in order to move eastwards towards the upper reaches of the river.
The Peace was built in London and eventually launched at Stanley Pool in 1884 after having been disassembled into around 800 parts in order to be carried by 400 porters the 250 miles to reach that point (which took four months!).
Between 1884 and 1886, Grenfell charted 3,400 miles of waterways and assessed the best locations for mission stations as he voyaged up-river on the Peace. For this pioneering work, he was awarded the Founder’s Medal of the Royal Geographical Society.
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The Peace on the beach at Bolobo
Grenfell was saddened and appalled by many of the practices he encountered – murders, witchcraft, slave raiding, cannibalism and sadistic methods of punishment.
Comber was also faced with the beliefs and practices of the native religions. On one occasion he was shown an image of wood, with a large protuberance on its back and a similar protuberance on its chest, looking as though it were both hump-backed and pigeon-breasted at the same time. "Could this image hurt me?" asked Comber. "Oh, yes; it would strike you dead." Comber took it in his hand, and turned it about. "What would happen if I were to cut it?" Comber asked. "Oh, it would strike you dead!" they exclaimed in alarm. "May I try?" he asked. "Oh, it will kill white man," they asserted. But as he pressed for permission, they at last agreed. So in breathless silence Comber drew his knife from his pocket and slowly cut off the pigeon-breast of the figure. Scrap after scrap fell from the image, but still it made no sign. After feeling he had done enough, he stopped. "Behold," he exclaimed, "your god has no power. See what I have done, and yet I am not hurt. It is but a senseless piece of carved wood." Comber then went on to explain the difference between such "gods" and the God he believed in.
Shortcut to heaven
Africa was already known as the ‘White Man’s Grave’ and Congo had the highest death rate of missionaries, earning it the nickname ‘the shortcut to heaven’, although there were many enthusiastic volunteers for service. Between 1883 and 1887, 17 missionaries died in Congo. Grenfell buried his first wife and four of his children there, whilst Comber’s bride died after four months of marriage.
The diminishing manpower meant that missionaries worked under physical, mental and spiritual strain. Comber tried to encourage the Committee back home that ‘unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed; but if it dies, it produces many seeds.’ Sadly Comber’s confidence and exuberance waned as he buried and comforted more and more people before he too died of fever in 1887.
The mission continues
With much of the focus being on geographical extension rather than church planting, early growth was not evident. There were very few converts, the earliest being the young Africans employed by the missionaries as domestic servants and assistants. It was eight years after the work in Congo started, in March 1886, that the first baptism took place, and 1887 when the first church was formed, in San Salvador.
Grenfell continued his work further up river and founded four new stations: Bolobo (1888), Upoto (1890), Monsembe (1890) and Yakusu (1896). A second steamer, the Goodwill, was launched in 1893 from Bolobo.
By 1900, in the lower reaches, the churches had around 400 in attendance, whilst on the upper river, church membership stood at 50. The mission work on the Congo had survived in unfavourable and unlikely circumstances and took off after the turn of the century. In 1902, Grenfell wrote of a village on the river: