Joseph Merrick (August 1808 – 22 October 1849) was a Jamaican Baptist missionary who, assisted by Joseph Jackson Fuller, established the first successful mission on the Cameroon coast of Africa.
Biography Merrick was born in August 1808 in Jamaica.Mark Dike DeLancey, Rebecca Neh Mbuh, Mark W. Delancey, Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Cameroon, Scarecrow Press, USA, 2010, p. 245
Merrick began preaching in 1837 in JamaicaNgoh 352. and was ordained a full missionary in 1838.Fanso 102. In 1842, Reverend John Clarke and Dr. G. K. Prince, members of the Baptist Missionary Society of London, were seeking Jamaican lay missionaries to join them on an expedition to the Cameroon coast. Merrick signed on.DeLancey and DeLancey 45; Fanso 101–2. The party reached England on 8 September 1842,Ngoh 49. and arrived at Spanish-controlled Santa Isabel on the island of Fernando Po in 1843.
Ministry He visited Bimbia, Cameroon, in 1843 and spoke to King William of the Isubu people to request permission to establish a church on the mainland. Despite some initial resistance, the king acquiesced. Merrick founded the Jubilee Mission in 1844.Samuel D JOHNSON, La formation d'une Eglise locale au Cameroun. Le cas des communautés baptistes (1841-1949), KARTHALA Editions, France, 2012, p. 37 That same year, he founded a school.Francis B. Nyamnjoh, Regional Balance and National Integration in Cameroon: Lessons Learned and the Uncertain Future, African Books Collective, UK, 2011, p. 198 Over the next four to five years, translated parts of the New Testament into the Isubu language, 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.DeLancey and DeLancey 174.
In 1849, Merrick was in ill health. He set off for England on furlough, and on 22 October, he died at sea. On Merrick's death, Joseph Jackson Fuller took charge of the mission station and congregation at Bimbia. Merrick's efforts also paved the way for Alfred Saker to make further progress – he made use of Merrick's printing press to translate and print the Bible in Duala.DeLancey and DeLancey 174; Ngoh 69. Joseph Merrick Baptist College in Ndu, Northwest Province, Cameroon, is named for him.
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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