Birth:28-09-1809
Home Calling:28-06-1840
Homeland : Scotland, United Kingdom
Place of Vision: Tonga and Fiji Islands
Margaret Cargill was one of the pioneers of the Fiji Mission, in the days when all mission-work in the South Pacific was attended with personal danger and excessive privation. Following her marriage with David Cargill, the couple set sailed for Tonga in 1832.
Soon after arriving in Vava’u, she threw herself into the mission work with characteristic earnestness and zeal. As soon as she could talk sufficiently in the language to be understood, she visited the elder women in their huts and told them in simple terms of God’s great love. She then commenced teaching in the schools and formed classes for instruction in womanly arts for the younger women and girls. She gave religious and secular instruction to all classes, with a geniality of manner, and patience which won the hearts of all with whom she came into contact.
The couple was then posted in Lakemba, Fiji Islands, where the natives practiced cannibalism. In the earlier stages of this work, Margaret took a prominent and useful part, not only by assisting her husband in every possible way but also by laboring most earnestly for the improvement of the condition of the native women. She also formed classes for their instruction and taught them both for this world and the next. These pioneers experienced many trials of faith and patience, most of which were only known to their Master in Heaven. They lacked the commonest necessaries of life for months together; for the ship that carried stores to mission stations in the Southern Pacific-including Fiji-refused to go any nearer than Tonga, on account of the cannibal propensities of the Fijians.
However, Lakemba was not the only island blessed by the couple’s presence and efforts. They moved from island to island where the good seed of the Word of God was faithfully sown, and many became obedient to the truth. After labouring in different parts of the Fiji group, and enduring her full share of hardship and privation, the health of Margaret began greatly to decline and went to be with the Lord in 1840
