Death On Nikumaroro
By early 1941 the Battle of Britain had distracted London's attention far from the tiny colony. Shipping was a constant challenge and Gallagher, now certified as fluent in the colonists' I Kiribati language, traveled on the few available ships, working day and night, personally loading and unloading supplies along with distributing coast-watching personnel and equipment throughout the colony, often in secret.
On 20 September 1941, Sir Harry Luke, high commissioner of the western Pacific, sent Gallagher a coded telegram with word he was about to be promoted as secretary to government and reposted on Ocean Island, but Gallagher didn't reply to the polite query asking for his thoughts on this. That day he had fallen seriously ill at sea with tropical sprue, an infection sometimes aggravated by poor nutrition which interferes with the small intestine's ability to absorb nutrients, resulting in symptoms related to malnutrition.
He arrived at Nikumaroro on the 24th. Gallagher's first night back on the atoll and in the rest house seemed to bring an improvement. However, according to a witness, when Gallagher learned of his promotion the news put him at "the end of his tether." He had come to consider the Gilbertese colonists his own native people. Meanwhile, with Gallagher's permission a British doctor opened his abdomen and was shocked by the advanced state of damage he found. Gallagher's condition deteriorated rapidly and he died in his sleep at 12:06AM on September 27, 1941 at the age of twenty-nine.
The outpouring of grief, including dozens of condolence telegrams to his parents, was remarkable. Gallagher's former boss Harry Maude wrote Sir Harry Luke, high commissioner of the western Pacific:
We were both terribly upset to hear the news about Gallagher- what a blow it is to the Gilbert and Ellice, as he was by far the best man we had. It was some time before we could realize that he was no more. He was the only officer of the pioneering type in the Colony and now that he has gone it is difficult to see who can ultimately take over...
He was buried on the parade ground in a grave resembling Robert Louis Stevenson's in Samoa, a house-like rectangle of concrete beneath a fluttering Union Flag on the 69-foot (21 m) flagstaff he had helped to build. A plaque installed soon after on the monument bore text reading,
In affectionate memory of Gerald Bernard Gallagher M.A. of the Colonial Administrative Service, officer in charge of the Phoenix Islands Settlement Scheme who died on Gardner Island, where he would have wished to die, on the 27th September, 1941, aged 29 years. His selfless devotion to duty and unsparing work on behalf of the natives of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands were an inspiration to all who knew him and to his labours is largely due the successful colonization of the Phoenix Islands. R.I.P.
His younger brother, Terence Gallagher, had died the previous March in Malta during an air-raid.
Read more about this topic: Gerald Gallagher
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