Tolai people

The Tolai are the indigenous people of the Gazelle Peninsula and the Duke of York Islands of East New Britain in the New Guinea Islands region of Papua New Guinea.

The Tolais almost universally define themselves as Christian and are predominantly Roman Catholic and United Church.

However, in 1878 when some of the tribespeople ate four of the missionaries, the Englishman who led the missionaries, George Brown, directed and took part in a punitive expedition that resulted in a number of Tolais being killed and several villages burnt down.

[citation needed] In August 2007, the descendants of Tolai tribespeople who ate a Fijian minister and three Fijian teachers in 1878 publicly apologized for the incident to Fiji's High Commissioner, Ratu Isoa Tikoca.

At the event, Papua New Guinea's Governor-General Paulias Matane told the crowd he appreciated the work of the early Fijian missionaries in spreading Christianity in the islands region.