New Georgia
Encyclopedia
New Georgia is the largest island
Island
An island or isle is any piece of sub-continental land that is surrounded by water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, cays or keys. An island in a river or lake may be called an eyot , or holm...

 of the Western Province
Western Province (Solomon Islands)
Western Province is the largest of the provinces of the Solomon Islands. The area is renowned for its beautiful tropical islands, excellent diving and snorkelling, coral reefs and WWII wrecks, ecotourism lodges, and head-hunting shrines...

 of the Solomon Islands
Solomon Islands
Solomon Islands is a sovereign state in Oceania, east of Papua New Guinea, consisting of nearly one thousand islands. It covers a land mass of . The capital, Honiara, is located on the island of Guadalcanal...

.

Geography

This island is located in the New Georgia Group, an archipelago including most of the other larger islands in the province. About 72;km (45 miles) long, it forms part of the southern boundary of the New Georgia Sound
New Georgia Sound
New Georgia Sound is the body of water that runs approximately through the middle of the Solomon Islands. The Sound is bounded by Choiseul Island, Santa Isabel Island, and Florida Island to the north, and by Vella Lavella, Kolombangara, New Georgia, and the Russell Islands to the south...

; Kolombangara
Kolombangara
Kolombangara is an island in the New Georgia Islands group of the Solomon Islands in the southwestern Pacific Ocean...

 lies across the Kula Gulf
Kula Gulf
Kula Gulf is a waterway in the Western Province of the Solomon Islands. It lies between the islands of Kolombangara to the west, Arundel Island to the southwest, and New Georgia to the south and east. To the north, it opens into New Georgia Sound...

 to the west, Vangunu
Vangunu
Vangunu Island is an island, part of the New Georgia Islands in the Solomon Islands. It is located between New Georgia and Nggatokae Island, at , between the islands of New Georgia and Nggatokae. In the north of the island is Lake Marovo, the largest salt water in the world....

 is to the east, and Rendova to the south, across the Blanche Channel
Blanche Channel
Blanche Channel is a waterway in the Western Province of the Solomon Islands. It lies between the islands of New Georgia and Vangunu to the northeast, and Rendova and Tetepare to the southwest. It connects to the Solomon Sea at both east and west ends....

.

The island is rugged and heavily forested.

History

Central part of New Georgia is cradle of Roviana culture. The large complex of Bao megalithic shrines and other structures was developed in 13th century AD. Later, in 15th - 17th centuries Roviana people moved over to smaller barrier islands at New Georgia with a hub in Nusa Roviana. Through trade and heat hunting expeditions Nusa Roviana turned into regional centre of power and trade. In late 19th century the rule of the last chief of head hunters Ingova was overpowered by British colonial army.

The Methodist
Methodism
Methodism is a movement of Protestant Christianity represented by a number of denominations and organizations, claiming a total of approximately seventy million adherents worldwide. The movement traces its roots to John Wesley's evangelistic revival movement within Anglicanism. His younger brother...

 Mission in New Georgia was established by Rev. John Frances Goldie in 1902. He dominated the mission and gained the loyalty of Solomon Islander members of his church. The relationship with the colonial administrators of the British Solomon lsland Protectorate were also fraught with difficulty, at this time due to Goldie’s effective control over the Western Solomon Islands. From 1927 to 1934 Dr Edward Sayers
Edward Sayers (doctor)
Sir Edward George Sayers was a New Zealand doctor, , Methodist missionary, military medical administrator, consultant physician then Dean of the University of Otago Dunedin School of Medicine,...

 worked at the Methodist
Methodism
Methodism is a movement of Protestant Christianity represented by a number of denominations and organizations, claiming a total of approximately seventy million adherents worldwide. The movement traces its roots to John Wesley's evangelistic revival movement within Anglicanism. His younger brother...

 mission where he established a hospital at Munda and carried out fieldwork in the treatment of malaria
Malaria
Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease of humans and other animals caused by eukaryotic protists of the genus Plasmodium. The disease results from the multiplication of Plasmodium parasites within red blood cells, causing symptoms that typically include fever and headache, in severe cases...

.

During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

' New Georgia Campaign
Battle of New Georgia
The New Georgia Campaign was a series of battles of the Pacific campaign of World War II. It was part of Operation Cartwheel, the Allied grand strategy in the South Pacific...

 opened with landings on New Georgia and nearby islands on 30 June 1943. New Georgia was secured by American forces on 23 August, after weeks of difficult and bloody jungle fighting, although fighting continued on some nearby islands until October 1943. Rodger Wilton Young, an Army
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...

 soldier who was originally a Sergeant, and had requested a demotion to the rank of Private due to his deteriorating sight and hearing, destroyed a machine gun nest in combat on New Georgia, allowing his comrades to reach safety. For this action in combat, he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Also, several significant naval battles between warships of the U.S. Navy and its allies, and the Imperial Japanese Navy
Imperial Japanese Navy
The Imperial Japanese Navy was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1869 until 1947, when it was dissolved following Japan's constitutional renunciation of the use of force as a means of settling international disputes...

 occurred in the waters near New Georgia Island, such as the Battle of Kula Gulf
Battle of Kula Gulf
The naval Battle of Kula Gulf took place in the early hours of 6 July 1943 during World War II and was between United States and Japanese ships off the coast of Kolombangara in the Solomon Islands.-Background:...

, in 1943

Munda
Munda (Solomon Islands)
Munda is the largest settlement on the island of New Georgia in the Western Province of the Solomon Islands, and consists of a number of villages...

, the Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

ese base on New Georgia Island, was the main objective of the assault on the island. This base was not overrun until 5 August 1943. The Japanese port at Bairoko Harbor
Bairoko Harbor
Bairoko Harbor is situated along the northwestern shore of the island of New Georgia in the Solomon Islands.During World War II Japan used Bairoko Harbor to resupply its forces at Munda Point, an airstrip situated along the south coast of New Georgia...

, 13 km (eight miles) north of Munda, were not taken until 25 August.

Languages

The ten languages spoken on the island are from the family of New Georgia languages
New Georgia languages
The ten New Georgia languages are a group of the Northwest Solomonic languages spoken on or near New Georgia Island in the Western Province of Solomon Islands.-Languages:...

, a subgroup of the Northwest Solomonic languages
Northwest Solomonic languages
The family of Northwest Solomonic languages is a branch of the Oceanic languages. It includes the Austronesian languages of Bougainville and Buka in Papua New Guinea, and of Choiseul, New Georgia, and Santa Isabel in the Solomon Islands....

 within the Oceanic languages, a major group of the Austronesian family
Austronesian languages
The Austronesian languages are a language family widely dispersed throughout the islands of Southeast Asia and the Pacific, with a few members spoken on continental Asia that are spoken by about 386 million people. It is on par with Indo-European, Niger-Congo, Afroasiatic and Uralic as one of the...

.

Further reading

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