The Awakening Coast: An Anthology of Moravian Writings from Mosquitia and Eastern Nicaragua, 1849-1899

31. Quamwatla

31 Quamwatla Hermann G. Schneider, Quamwatla: Eine Missionserzählung Für De Jugend. Mitteilungen von Missionar Siebörger, mit 16 Original-Bildern, 3 Illustrationen und einer Karte von der Moskito-Küste [Quamwatla: A Missionary Account for Young People. According to the Reports of Missionary Siebörger, with 16 Original Drawings, 3 Illustrations, and a Map of the Miskito Coast] (Herrnhut: Verl. des Missionsbuchhandlung der Missionsanstalt der Evang. Brüderunität, 1900). Moravian Church writer Hermann Schneider uses the missionary reports of Wilhelm Siebörger to describe the founding of the Quamwatla station . After serving twenty-five years in Mosquitia and almost a decade as mission superintendent, Siebörger retired in 1899, and Schneider probably interviewed him in Germany to produce this “Account of Missions for Young People.” The story takes place in four acts, with each providing a piece of the arc from heathen darkness to mission founding. A centerpiece of the story is the dedication to mission service by the young man Samuel Hall and his wealthy spouse, Emma Hall. The two set out from Bristol, England, and attempt to set up a mission station at Cape Gracias in 1866 but return to England in 1868 for family reasons. They return in 1871 and find a needy village in Quamwatla. After only a few months in which the couple communicated with villagers “by signs,” Samuel caught a fever and died at age thirty-two. Mrs. Hall ends up helping out as a teacher at Wounta Haulover for a year and half and then at Corn Island for two years. To commemorate her husband’s efforts she bequeaths £1,000 to fund a station at Quamwatla. As is their custom, however, the Indians abandon the village when a sickness arrives. Curiously, the residents are called Prinzo Indians but Quamwatla | 347 appear to be the same Miskito-speaking Tungla Indians discussed in no. 6, and are certainly not Mayangna Indians as some writers have assumed.1 Schneider tells us that the rubber trade is “flourishing more than ever” in the region. Indeed, it was a rubber merchant in the area who saved Emma Hall from the same fate as that of her husband. Rubber fever and the arrival of new tappers combined with a flourishing rum trade had, in fact, turned the worlds of the Prinzo and upriver Mayangna Indians on end. With the arrival of the Great Awakening by the end of 1881, some families that had abandoned Quamwatla return. These and other Tungla and Mayangna Indians reached out to missionary Siebörger at Wounta Haulover, the nearest Moravian station (see fig. i.1). The heady days of the Awakening inspire these people to resettle Quamwatla, and with the money bequeathed by Mrs. Hall, a new mission station is founded in 1884. Benjamin Garth, a Mayangna-speaking Creole missionary from Pearl Lagoon, becomes the first missionary. The village comes to serve as a point of outreach for upriver Mayangna residents who visit annually on Christian feast days. Garth played this same role later as a liaison to the Mayangna on the Wangki River (see no. 25). 1. “. . . thy wound is grievous.” (Jeremiah 30:12) As a child I once watched how a weaver who wandered in these parts as a merchant packed up his wares. My mother had purchased something from him, and now the man intended to push on again and try his luck at other homes. How did he do it? He divided a piece of cloth into two equal parts and with the wink of an eye shoved one part into a long sack, but only filled a third of it. Then the weaver grabbed the sack and twisted around the middle section, until it formed a sort of pliant sausage. At this point he packed the rest of his wares in the other third and tied it up fast. In this way the two ends of the sack were filled tight, but the middle left empty. And the purpose for this remarkable packing became clear when the weaver took up his load. That is, he laid the sausage-like twisted middle 348 | Quamwatla piece over his right shoulder; thus, one-half of his wares rested in front, on his chest, while the other half rested on his back, which did not have to bear the whole burden alone. This canvas bundle gives the reader an idea of the geography of a part of...