19th century Beginning of mission work The history of the Diocese of Sabah begins with the mission work which was carried out in the crown colony of
Labuan and
British North Borneo. In 1846, the island of Labuan was ceded to Great Britain by the
Sultanate of Brunei as the result of the
Treaty of Labuan. As there was no resident Anglican priest in Labuan, the
Bishop of London granted the Lieutenant Governor, John Scott, the authority to perform weddings and funerals using the 1662
Book of Common Prayer. Among the first Anglican missionaries sent to
Borneo in 1846 was the Revd Dr
Francis Thomas McDougall, a priest, medical doctor and surgeon. Although his base was in
Kuching,
Sarawak, technicalities in
canon law led to him being consecrated as the Bishop of Labuan and its Dependencies in 1855. The Church of Our Holy Saviour, Labuan which was the first Anglican church in the present-day Diocese of Sabah, was consecrated by Bishop McDougall in 1866, although there is evidence of a congregation on the island since 1850. In 1878,
Baron von Overbeck, the Austrian Consul in Hong Kong, and
Alfred Dent, a British entrepreneur, obtained territorial possession of what became British North Borneo. The
North Borneo Chartered Company was set up to administer this region. The Englishman
William Burgess Pryer was appointed "Resident" of the East Coast. He founded the town of
Sandakan in 1879. A committed Anglican, Pryer requested ministerial assistance from the then-Bishop of Labuan,
George Frederick Hose. Bishop Hose was unable to visit Sandakan until 1884 but in 1883 sent a Chinese catechist, Ah Leng, to minister to the Chinese-speaking Christians in
Kudat as well as Sandakan.
First two churches in North Borneo The first priest sent to North Borneo was the Revd William Henry Elton, a missionary of the
Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts (SPG). Arriving in Sandakan in 1888, he found a suitable piece of land to build the first Anglican church in present-day Sabah,
St. Michael's and All Angels Church, Sandakan. He also set up
St Michael's Boys' School and St Monica's Girls' School. The first capital of British North Borneo was
Kudat. Groups of
Hakka Christians were brought over from
China to farm the surrounding area. Although they had been evangelised by disparate denominations back in China, Elton managed to convince them to form a single congregation. Thus, St James' Anglican Church, Kudat was born. The first Asian priest in North Borneo, the Revd Fong Hau Kong, was ordained deacon in 1898 and priest in 1910 having served as a catechist in Kudat.
20th century Expansion on the coasts The port town of
Jesselton was founded in 1899. Elton swiftly secured land for a church, and the SPG sent a missionary priest, the Revd George Clarke, to the area in 1902. By 1914 the mission included a boys' school, known later as
All Saints' School,
St Agnes' Girls School and All Saints' Parish Church. In the southeastern town of
Tawau, the church of St Patrick's was finally established in 1917, 18 years after Revd Elton's first visit to the town in 1899. The first resident priest, Revd Vun Nen Vun, was a graduate of the short-lived but notable College of the Holy Way in Kudat, an experiment in educating local clergy.
World War II and aftermath Mission work in the region was severely affected by the
Second World War. The Japanese army's assault on North Borneo began on 27 December 1941, and by the end of February they had taken over the territory. Foreign clergy and other missionaries were interned, including Sisters Irene and Alison from the
Community of the Companions of Jesus the Good Shepherd, who were serving as teachers in Sandakan. Into the vacuum created by the imprisonment of the missionaries stepped the few local clergy, including the five graduates of the College of the Holy Way, namely the Revd Chin Phu Yin, the Revd Chong En Siong, the Revd Lai Chun Sang, the Revd Lim Siong Teck and the Revd Vun Nen Vun. Christians suffered persecution during the Japanese occupation as they were adherents of a faith considered to be "Western." Nevertheless, most held on to their faith during this difficult time. North Borneo was liberated by the
Allied Forces in October 1945. Much had to be done to rebuild the church both in a physical as well as a spiritual sense. The Rt Revd
Nigel Cornwall, the newly-appointed
Bishop of Borneo, managed to secure assistance in the form of missionary nurses, priests and teachers from the
Australian Board of Missions and the Australian branch of the
Church Mission Society.
The Sabah Anglican Interior Mission (SAIM) Throughout the first seventy years of Anglican mission work in North Borneo, the focus had been on the coastal areas which were generally urban or semi-urban. An attempt to evangelise the peoples of the interior was started in
Keningau in 1896, but this work among the
Murut people had to be abandoned in 1902 due to the ill-health and transfer to
Singapore of pioneer missionary the Revd Fred Perry. Work in the interior resumed in earnest in 1958 with the founding of the Sabah Anglican Interior Mission (SAIM). The initial impetus behind the SAIM came from Bruce Sandilands, a district surveyor who was moved by the poverty he encountered during his trips along rivers which reached deep into the interior, such as the
Kinabatangan. He convinced the Rector of St Michael's Sandakan, the Revd Canon Frank Lomax, to accompany him upriver. Lomax was similarly moved by the difficulties faced by the rural villagers, and thus the SAIM was conceived and born to uplift the spiritual and material well-being of the peoples in the interior. == Archdeaconries ==