Nathaniel Turner (March 1793 – 16 December 1864) was an English-born missionary for the Wesleyan Church in early colonial New Zealand, Australia, and Tonga.
Early life in England Nathaniel was the fifth of seven children of Thomas and Elizabeth Turner. He was baptised on 10 March 1793, at the Anglican parish church of Wybunbury in Cheshire. The family lived in a village just north of Wybunbury, called Hough, Cheshire. When the youngest son, Thomas, was eighteen months old, his mother died aged only 39. Eight months later their ten-year-old daughter Ann died, followed to the grave by their father Thomas on 7 April 1801, aged 41. The eldest of the orphans, Aaron, was only 16; Nathaniel only eight. They were brought up by friends and relatives in the village.
Nathaniel was fostered by an uncle, and became involved with the local Methodist Church. Although brought up in the Church of England, he attended Wesleyan class-meetings and eventually, on 5 February 1812 “found peace with God”. Soon after his conversion in 1812, Nathaniel began to preach and convert others. When the next Wesleyan circuit plan appeared, his local superintendent allotted him 42 appointments. He was not well received at home, and had to move to Blakenhall, a few miles south east of Wybunbury. He lived here with Thomas Salmon, where he studied, preached, and read the missionary intelligence reports from abroad. By March 1820 he was nominated for missionary service, but had to stay in England a while longer before funds could be found. He therefore began his mission at home, among the “sadly benighted and demoralised” villages in Cheshire and Staffordshire. He often met with opposition from the locals and Anglican priests alike, and was even physically attacked by the parish clerk in one village. Towards the end of 1821 he was instructed to prepare to depart for New Zealand by the Wesleyan Missionary Society (WMS).
Just before leaving Cheshire, on 10 January 1822 he married Anne Sargent, daughter of John Sargent of Ipstones, Staffordshire. Together they travelled to London, where Narthaniel was ordained on 23 January 1822. Fellow missionary William White was ordained the same day.
New Zealand Mission, 1823 to 1827
Voyage to Australia On 23 January 1822 in London, Nathaniel was ordained; three weeks later he and Anne left England aboard the Deveron. It sailed on 15 February, bound for Van Dieman's Land (Tasmania) and then New South Wales. The 250 ton brig carried only 20 passengers, including the Reverend William White, whom the Methodist Missionary Society had sent to New Zealand along with the Turners. The ship nearly sank in the Bay of Biscay, and lost its rudder in a gale off the Cape of Good Hope. They arrived at Tasmania after 124 days at sea; Anne was already pregnant, and gave birth to her first child, Ann Sargent Turner, in Hobart.
Nathaniel had arrived only seven years after the first Methodist Missionary, Rev. Samuel Leigh, had landed in Tasmania, and only 34 years after the founding of the penal colony in New South Wales by the “First Fleet”. Leigh was replaced by Rev William Horton as Minister in Hobart in 1821 when Leigh was sent to New Zealand, and it was Horton who welcomed the Turner family.
On to New Zealand Turner, who had been appointed to New Zealand, had to wait in Hobart several months as the Maori wars were raging across the land they were heading for. The Maori chief Hongi Hika had just returned from a trip to England, and had obtained firearms in Sydney on the way home. In the ruthless war that he started in North Island many rival Māori were killed and even eaten in Hongi's bid to become ultimate ruler. However, by April 1823 the war subsided, and Nathaniel set sail with his wife, and their baby daughter, for Sydney. Here he met up with John Hobbs, his companion for the New Zealand mission, and after ten weeks of preparation and consultation, set sail on The Brompton. They arrived at the Bay of Islands in north east New Zealand on 3 August 1823.
Samuel Leigh had started the first Methodist Mission to New Zealand in 1822, and found a suitable place to establish their base at Wangaroa Bay - forty miles north of the Bay of Islands - which they called Wesleydale. By the time the Turners arrived a year later Leigh was “seriously invalided”. On arrival at the Bay of Islands Turner and Hobbs set off overland walking for three days to find Wangaroa and poor Mr Leigh. They returned to the Brompton in a chartered schooner to collect Mrs Turner, the baby, a nurse for the child, a servant girl named Betsy, and their possessions. On arrival back at Wangaroa, in the pouring rain, the Turners had to scrabble up the muddy bank to find the dismal house that was to be their home for the next three years.
Wesleydale Leigh and White had only been in Wesleydale for a few months before Turner and Hobbs arrived. Leigh left immediately and White also left for Sydney, to look for a wife, returning unsuccessful, February 1824, to continue the work of establishing the first Wesleyan missionary station in New Zealand. After six months the missionaries began to teach the local children, and built a chapel that was consecrated in June 1824. Anne Turner had her second child, Thomas, in March 1924, born in Wesleydale. Wesleydale was in the territory of the Ngāti Uru (or Ngatehure) iwi (or tribe) based in the Whangaroa area. One of the sons of the chief of the tribe, called Te Ara, had been the central figure in the Boyd Massacre. This had occurred in December 1809 when Māori of Ngāti Pou killed and ate between 66 and 70 European crew members from the British brigantine Boyd. Te Ara was known as George by the crew of the Boyd and by the missionaries of Wesleydale. After the death of his father, Te Ara became the chief of the Ngāti Uruiwi, and periodically threatened the missionaries and pilfered items from the Mission, as did his brother Te Puhi.
By early 1825 the relationship between the missionaries and the local Māori had begun to deteriorate. In March 1825, Turner was attacked and struck unconscious by Te Puhi, and a visiting whaling ship was plundered. Turner temporarily evacuated his wife and young children down to the Anglican mission in Kerikeri, some eight hours walk to the south. She returned to Wesleydale a few weeks later, after the death of Te Ara and the anticipated ‘prospect of tranquility’.
Later in 1825 William White left the Mission, to return to England; Rev Turner was then the only recognised ordained Wesleyan missionary in New Zealand. Along with John Hobbs and James Stack, the three completed the building of further houses, and expanded the area set aside for wheat growing. In May 1825 Anne Turner gave birth to their third child, Nathaniel Bailey, but he was to die eleven months later, and be buried in Wesleydale.
Destruction of the Mission Station In late 1826 Hongi Hika, the Chief who had visited England and had ambitions to conquer the whole area, was approaching Wesleydale - he sent word ahead for the local tribes to leave their food and fly for their lives. Eventually a three hundred strong war party entered Wesleydale and destroyed all the crops. Acting contrary to the orders of Hongi Hika, some of his Ngāpuhi warriors plundered Wesleydale on 9 January 1827, breaking into several outhouses. They threatened to return the following day. The Missionaries therefore decided to call for help, sending Stack to make his way overnight to the CMS mission in Kerikeri.
By dawn on 10 January, the warriors returned, and smashed their way into the tool house, store rooms and eventually the main house. The missionaries had no option but to flee, and abandon Wesleydale. The group set off for the twenty mile walk to the CMS mission in Kerikeri: The Reverend Turner and his wife Anne; their three surviving children Anne (aged 3), Thomas (aged 2) and John Sargent (aged one month); their nanny Miss Davies; John Hobbs; Luke Wade and wife. They were accompanied by five boys and two girls from the Ngāti Uru Māori that had remained with the missionaries. “Mr. Turner, carrying his eldest son in his arms, with his dear wife and two other children, escaped only with their lives.”
The group of sixteen walked all day, meeting help coming to their aid from Kerikeri, having been alerted by Stack. Further rescuers came from the CMS station in Paihia, and with their help the missionaries made it to Kerikeri by 7pm. After a night there, the group moved further from danger, heading by boat to the CMS mission station in Paihia. A few days later, they heard that the Wesleydale mission had been totally destroyed; the buildings burnt, the cattle killed, and the stores of wheat burnt. The Mission party eventually returned to Sydney, leaving New Zealand on 28 January 1827.
Tonga Mission, 1827 to 1831 The Turners remained in Sydney for several months waiting for advice from London on where they should go to resume their missionary work. At last the Committee decided and they left Sydney for Tonga, to relieve the resident minister who was very ill. On 8 October 1827 they set sail on the eighty-ton schooner “Endeavor”. Nathaniel and Anne now had three children, and they were accompanied by Mr and Mrs Cross, Mr and Mrs Weiss and their three children, two European servants and three Maori children.
As the previous missionaries had encountered a lot of trouble in Hihifo, Nathaniel decided to form the new station on another island in the Tonga group - Nukuʻalofa. The local chief was content, and gave them two local houses until they could build a permanent station. Turner set to learn the language, which was helped by his knowledge of Māori, and after a few weeks was able to preach a simple sermon, and write a Tongan hymn. By the end of the year Nathaniel had prepared an alphabet for the Tongan language, and had a first school book printed in Sydney for the missionaries to use in a school that was set up in March 1828. Numbers at the school rapidly increased, so they used the brighter pupils to teach the youngsters, and books were copied out in longhand. By the end of 1830 there were a thousand attending, and many other Tongans converted to Methodism.
Turner's health began to weaken, so the WMS arranged for additional support from England. In early 1831 three new Missionaries arrived - one was Peter Turner from Cheshire, but no relation. A hurricane accompanied them, and devastated Tonga; a number of ships were wrecked in the harbour, but not those that brought the missionaries (which impressed the Tongans). The captain of one ship pleaded “if the Lord will only spare my vessel to me, I will never beat my wife again”. Nathaniel's health continued to decline, so the family left Tonga on the barque "Lucy Ann", 27 April 1831. They were seen off by their fellow missionaries and Tongan friends, and left the islands with great sadness, but content that they had done a good deal to convert the Tongans to Methodism. They were accompanied by the sloop of war “Comet”, arriving in Sydney after a laborious six week voyage.
The family stayed a while in Sydney, moving into the vacant Mission House in Parramatta and preaching there until the Missionary Society decided on their next posting. During this time one of the Turners’ infant children, George, died 17 October 1831, having been weakened on the long crossing. But by the end of 1831 the Society had agreed that the Turners should return to Hobart: they sailed there on the “Argo” arriving on 24 November 1831.
Tasmania Mission, 1831 to 1836