Holy Trinity Church is a heritage-listed Anglican church at Saibai Island, Torres Strait Island Region, Queensland, Australia. It was built from 1917 to 1938. It is also known as Holy Trinity Church of England. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 21 October 1992.
History
The first missionaries, representing the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, arrived at the newly established settlement of Somerset, Cape York Peninsula, in March 1867, followed by the London Missionary Society (LMS) in July 1871. The London Missionary Society arrived at Saibai Island in July 1871. The first substantial building for Christian worship was constructed in 1881. This was replaced by the Holy Trinity Church, on which construction began about 1917 and was completed about 1938.
The first Christian missionary in the Torres Straits, Rev F.C. Jagg, was appointed on behalf of the Society for the Propagation of Gospel in Foreign Parts, and arrived in Somerset with his family on 15 March 1867. A young English schoolteacher, W.T. Kennett, funded by the Queensland Government to establish a school at Somerset, arrived with Rev Jagg and started a mission school on 1 October 1867. A lack of funding, lack of support from the government administration and dismay at the brutality of the police meant that the mission was closed by June 1868.
In 1871 the London Missionary Society arrived in the Torres Strait on the vessel Surprise, a ship owned or chartered by the LMS, after the French Government had demanded their removal from the Loyalty Islands and New Caledonia in 1869. The LMS decided to expand into the Torres Strait and New Guinea. They were represented by two Englishmen, Revs S. Macfarlane and A.W. Murray, 8 Lifu (Loyalty Islander) evangelists and their wives. The missionaries arrived at Darnley Island (Erub) on 1 July 1871, an event which came to be known as the "Coming of the Light" and which is now celebrated by Torres Strait Islanders annually.
Two Islander missionaries were left on Darnley Island while the remaining missionaries travelled to Warrior Island (Tudu Island), where they were welcomed by Captain Banner, who had an established pearl shell fishery on the island. John Joseph, an employee of Banner's, travelled with the missionaries as an interpreter to Dauan Island on 6 July, and finding most of the islanders were away on Saibai Island, they were taken to Saibai by Nudai, the chief of Dauan. Two islander missionaries, Josaia and Sivene, were left at Saibai and Dauan. Further missionaries were left on Yorke and Yam Islands, while HMS Surprise sailed to the newly established settlement at Somerset.
The London Missionary Society established temporary headquarters at Somerset from where they could expand their operations into other Torres Strait Islands and the mainland of New Guinea . Between 1871 and 1878 at least 131 Pacific Islander teachers, mainly from Loyalty Islands, Cook Islands, Niue, Society Islands and Rurutu, taught in the Torres Strait and New Guinea, along with their wives and families. Only four European missionaries taught in the same period .
In 1872 the London Missionary Society revisited selected islands in the Torres Straits. They reported that the missionaries that had been left on Dauan and Saibai had been accepted into the local tribes and had been given land by the local chiefs.
The Queensland Government annexed the islands of the Torres Straits within of the mainland in 1872, followed by the remainder of the islands in 1879. This was in response to fear of rival colonial powers controlling what had become an important shipping route, also as a means of controlling the increasingly lucrative beche-de-mer and pearl shelling economies and in particular regulating the use of Torres Strait and South Sea Islander labour in these industries. The government moved its administration centre from Somerset to Thursday Island in 1877; however, the lack of government resources, such as a regular patrol boat, meant that administration of the islands had to be left to the London Missionary Society .
A theological facility called the Papuan Institute was established on Mer, an island of the Torres Straits, to train Torres Strait Islanders as priests and suitable students were selected by the London Missionary Society. The Institute was closed in 1888, but had trained a number of local priests who were familiar with both formal missionary teaching and the local Islander customs.