Donald Gilbert Kennedy
Donald Gilbert Kennedy | |
---|---|
Born | March 1898 |
Died | 1976 Bayly’s Beach, New Zealand |
Occupation(s) | teacher, colonial administrator |
Donald Gilbert Kennedy (March 1898 – 1976) was a teacher, then an administrator in the British colonial service in the
Childhood and education
Kennedy, the son of Robert and Isabelle Kennedy (née Chisholm), was born at Springhills near Invercargill. The family moved to Oamaru in 1904 and Kennedy attended local public schools: Tokarahi primary school (1904–1910) and Waitaki Boys' High School (1911–1915).[2] He attended Kaikorai School in
Service in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony
In 1921, he became assistant master at the Suva Boys’ Grammar School in
In 1926, he was instrumental in establishing the first co-operative store (fusi) on Vaitupu, which became a model for the bulk purchasing and selling cooperative stores established in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony to replace the stores operated by
In 1929, Kennedy donated a large quantity of Tuvaluan artefacts to the
In April 1932 Kennedy became the resident District Officer at
Service in the British Solomon Islands Protectorate in World War II
In 1940 he transferred to the
He organised an intelligence-gathering network of local informants and messengers to carry out the role of Coastwatchers; who were planters, government officials, missionaries and islanders who went into hiding after the Japanese invasion of the Solomon Islands in 1942. The Coastwatchers monitored Japanese shipping and aircraft (reporting by radio) and also rescued Allied personnel who were stranded in the territory held by the Japanese.[2][8][9]
On 20 April 1942, Kennedy established a base at Mahanga (Mahaga), which overlooked
Kennedy lead a force of about 30 Solomon Islander fighters, with about 60 carriers of equipment.[10] Kennedy gained a reputation for physical abuse of his subordinates and islanders that he viewed as defying his authority.[3][11]
By March 1943 the U.S. command were planning the
1944–46 Resettlement of Banabans on Rabi Island, Fiji
In February 1944, he was appointed as acting district commissioner, based in the new capital of the BSIP in Honiara on Guadalcanal. In July 1944 he returned to New Zealand and divorced Nellie then married Mary Campbell. In December 1944, after receiving hospital treatment for alcoholism, he was appointed by the WPHC to an administration position in Fiji.[2][3]
In August 1945, he was appointed as the ‘Banaban adviser’ to draw up a constitution for the ‘council and the management of a cooperative society’ for the Banaban people of
Activities 1947 to 1950
Following vacation leave he retired as ‘District Officer, BSIP’ on 25 April 1947. He and Mary went to live on ‘Glen Aros’ station in
He was employed by ASIO for 7 months in 1950. He spent three months of that time in Lae in Papua New Guinea (PNG) before resigning. Kennedy was involved in the establishment of a branch of the Australian Security Service in PNG, which appears to be motivated by a fear of Communist infiltration.[3]
1951–52 Resettlement of Vaitupuans on Kioa Island, Fiji
In 1945 Kennedy had visited Vaitupu, where overpopulation was an issue, some of the islanders were receptive to resettlement.[14] Kennedy encouraged Neli Lifuka in the resettlement proposal that eventually resulted in the purchase of Kioa island in Fiji.[5][6][7]
In June 1946, Kennedy and Henry Evans Maude, bought the island of Kioa in Fiji on behalf of the Vaitupuans who wanted to migrate. Between 1947 and 1963, 217 people moved to Kioa.[15] Kennedy was invited to Kioa to act as an advisor to the community. He arrived on Kioa in September 1951 and initiated an ambitious development program involving clearing bush, planting coconuts and grazing cattle in order to create an enterprise that could attract further Ellice Islanders to live on Kioa. This program was not accepted by the settlers and the following year they expelled him from the island.[2][3]
Retirement 1952 to 1976
He purchased the small island of Waya, in the Kadavu Group, Fiji in 1952. He and Mary were divorced in the same year.[2][3]
In 1958 Emeline, an Ellice Islander, became his common-law wife. In 1973 Kennedy’s health declined; as a consequence he sold the island, after marrying, he and Emeline retired to New Zealand. He died in 1976, aged 77 yrs.[2][3]
Publications
- Kennedy, Donald Gilbert, Field notes on the culture of Vaitupu, Ellice Islands’ (1931): Thomas Avery & Sons, New Plymouth, N.Z.
- Kennedy, Donald Gilbert, ‘Te ngangana a te Tuvalu – Handbook on the language of the Ellice Islands’ (1946) Websdale, Shoosmith, Sydney N.S.W.
- Kennedy, Donald Gilbert (1953). "Land tenure in the Ellice Islands by Donald Gilbert Kennedy". Journal of the Polynesian Society. 62: 348–358.
- Kennedy, Donald Gilbert (1931). The Ellice Islands Canoe Journal of the Polynesian Society Memoir no. 9. Journal of the Polynesian Society. pp. 71–100. Archived from the original on 6 October 2022. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
Sources
- Butcher, Mike (2012). ... when the long trick's over': Donald Kennedy in the Pacific. Kennington, Vic., Australia: Holland House. ISBN 9780987162700.
- ISBN 0-14-014926-0.
- ISBN 1-59114-466-3.
Notes
- Footnotes
- ^ Synopsis: The President of the United States takes pleasure in presenting the Navy Cross to Donald G. Kennedy, Captain, New Zealand, for extraordinary heroism in action against Japanese forces as a Coast Watcher at Sergi Point, New Georgia, in the Solomon Islands. Captain Kennedy he led his men in numerous skirmishes and destroyed or captured many Japanese troops, machine-guns, and barges, with negligible injury to his force. He also rescued many downed American airmen.[4]
- Citations
- ^ "Major Kennedy Decorated". XIV(5) Pacific Islands Monthly. 17 December 1943. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ^ ISBN 9781921666322.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-9871627-0-0.
- ^ a b "Full Text Citations For Award of The Navy Cross". To Foreign Personnel - World War II. Archived from the original on 2 July 2017. Retrieved 25 July 2017.
- ^ ISBN 0708103626.
- ^ a b c Goldsmith, Michael (2008). "Chapter 8, Telling Lives in Tuvalu". Telling Pacific Lives: Prisms of Process. London: ANU E Press.
- ^ a b Noatia P. Teo (1983). "Chapter 17, Colonial Rule". In Laracy, Hugh (ed.). Tuvalu: A History. University of the South Pacific/Government of Tuvalu. p. 37.
- ^ "Coastwatchers". Solomon Islands Historical Encyclopaedia 1893–1978. Retrieved 21 July 2017.
- ^ "Coastwatcher Donald Kennedy". Axis History Forum. 2008. Retrieved 8 June 2015.
- ^ "Kennedy's Boys Go A-Feudin'". XV(12) Pacific Islands Monthly. 17 July 1945. Retrieved 29 September 2021.
- ^ Laracy, Hugh (1991). "George Bogese: "Just a bloody traitor"?" (PDF). Remembering the Pacific War. University of Hawai'i Center for Pacific Island Studies.
- ^ "Battle of Marova Lagoon". XIV(8) Pacific Islands Monthly. 20 March 1944. Retrieved 28 September 2021.
- ISBN 0-7858-1307-1.
- ISBN 0708103626. Archived from the original(PDF) on 7 August 2020. Retrieved 18 November 2018.
- ^ G. M. White (1965). Kioa: an Ellice community in Fiji. Project for the Comparative Study of Cultural Change and Stability in Displaced Communities in the Pacific, 1962–63: Oregon University, Department of Anthropology.