Joseph Merrick (missionary)
Joseph Merrick (August 1808 – 22 October 1849) was a
mission on the Cameroon
coast of Africa.
Biography
Merrick was born in August 1808 in Jamaica.[1]
Merrick began preaching in 1837 in JamaicaBaptist Missionary Society of London, were seeking Jamaican lay missionaries to join them on an expedition to the Cameroon coast. Merrick signed on.[4] The party reached England on 8 September 1842,[5] and arrived at Spanish-controlled Santa Isabel on the island of Fernando Po in 1843.[3]
Ministry
He visited
Isubu language,[2] set up a brick-making machine and a printing press, and used the latter to publish his Bible translation and a textbook for teaching in Isubu. Merrick made excursions into the interior, as when he climbed Mount Cameroon and when he became the first non-African to visit the Bakoko people.[8]
In 1849, Merrick was in ill health. He set off for England on furlough, and on 22 October, he died at sea.Northwest Province, Cameroon, is named for him.[8]
Notes
- ^ Mark Dike DeLancey, Rebecca Neh Mbuh, Mark W. Delancey, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Cameroon, Scarecrow Press, USA, 2010, p. 245
- ^ a b Ngoh 352.
- ^ a b c d Fanso 102.
- ^ DeLancey and DeLancey 45; Fanso 101–2.
- ^ Ngoh 49.
- ^ Samuel D JOHNSON, La formation d'une Eglise locale au Cameroun. Le cas des communautés baptistes (1841-1949), KARTHALA Editions, France, 2012, p. 37
- ^ Francis B. Nyamnjoh, Regional Balance and National Integration in Cameroon: Lessons Learned and the Uncertain Future, African Books Collective, UK, 2011, p. 198
- ^ a b DeLancey and DeLancey 174.
- ^ DeLancey and DeLancey 174; Ngoh 69.
References
- DeLancey, Mark W., and Mark Dike DeLancey (2000): Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Cameroon (3rd ed.). Lanham, Maryland: The Scarecrow Press.
- Fanso, V. G. (1989). Cameroon History for Secondary Schools and Colleges, Vol. 1: From Prehistoric Times to the Nineteenth Century. Hong Kong: Macmillan Education Ltd.
- Ngoh, Victor Julius (1996). History of Cameroon Since 1800. Limbe: Presbook.
- Sundkler, B. & Steed, C. (1993) A History of the Christian Church in Africa