He named his property "Lakeba" (pronounced Lakemba) after the Lakeba island in the Lau Islands group of Fiji, where his second wife's grandparents, Rev and Mrs Cross, were missionaries from 1835.
Lakeba |
In about April 1826, two Tahitian Missionaries, Hape and Tafeta, from the London Missionary Society (LMS), stopped over in Nuku’alofa on their way to Lakeba in Fiji.
He faced opposition, however, from local chiefs who saw him at best as first among equals, and also from the Tongan Prince Enele Ma'afu, who had established himself on the Island of Lakeba in the Lau archipelago in 1848.
# Lomaloma and Moturiki also to Yadrana village on Lakeba Island and also to Moala Island
He served first at Lakeba and then at Rewa, and after that the station was closed because of the wars, at Viwa.
Ratu Te, as he was known, hailed from the chiefly village of Tubou on the island of Lakeba in Lau Province.
One of eight villages on Lakeba, it is considered the capital of the Lau Islands, being the seat of the Vuanirewa clan, a powerful chiefly family from which Fiji's longtime Prime Minister and President, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara (1920–2004) and one of Fiji's famous cricketers I. L. Bula (1921–2002), hailed.