Rikitea

Rikitea is a small town on Mangareva, which is part of the Gambier Islands in French Polynesia. A majority of the islanders live in Rikitea. The island was a protectorate of France in 1871 and was annexed in 1881.

History

The town's history dates to the era when the island was first settled with people from the Marquesas Islands in 1100 AD. Captain James Wilson of the London Missionary Society arrived in 1797 on the Duff, naming the islands after the English Admiral James Gambier who had facilitated his expedition.

Before the Catholic missionaries' arrival, cannibalism was practiced under the rule of the local kings. French Picpus priests Father François Caret and Father Honoré Laval, of the Congregation for the Sacred Hearts, landed here in 1834. They arrived from Chile. After Caret left for Tahiti, Laval administered the town under his rule, enslaving the native population. It is said that an old man of the island had predicted that "two magicians whose god was all powerful would come". Laval overturned the most feared stone statue of the god Tu on the religious marae of the island. He acted with single-minded purpose and determination to enforce Christian morals and conscripted the island population as slaves in order to build a cathedral and other structures in the town. His ruthless actions resulted in almost total decimation of the local people; a population of 9,000 was reduced to 500. In 1871, Laval was removed from Mangareva on a French warship, convicted for murder in Tahiti, and declared mad. Father Hippolyte Roussel, who had arrived at Rikitea with more than 100 Rapa Nui people on 4 July 1871, assumed charge of Laval's Rikitea mission, and served there till he died in 1898.