Religion: First Martyrs

The first case of missionaries martyred by the Japanese in World War II was reported last week. At Ruavatu on war-torn Guadalcanal four Roman Catholic missionaries of the Society of Mary and the Marist Fathers were bayoneted in the throat: Sisters Mary Sulvia of France and Mary Odilia of Italy, Father Henry Engberink of The Netherlands and Massechusetts-born Father Arthur Duhamel. Three days later the Dutch announced that eight more Catholics, including the 70-year-old Bishop of the Kai Islands, north of Australia, had been executed.

Blond, slim, wavy-haired Father Duhamel was 33, one of ten children. Two of his brothers are in the U.S. armed forces. From boyhood he wanted to be a missionary. In 1939 he got his wish, was sent to the Solomons. One of his brothers suggested that “trouble” was brewing and that the Orient was not a safe place. Said Father Duhamel: “That is what I am going there for.”