FEATURE Viegen was offered the opportunity to participate in this journey up to the camp, he hesitated at first, according to his letters. Could he abandon his mission post for such a long time? The assistent-resident, however, pointed out that the area along the river was densely populated and promised him that they would stop at the various villages so that he could acquaint himself with these new tribes. Viegen was enthusiastic at the prospect because, as he wrote, as a missionary his main interest was in people. He eagerly accepted Coenen’s offer. In the early morning of the first Sunday after Easter and at the onset of the monsoon season, Viegen departed for the Noordwest River on the Valk. On Tuesday afternoon, the Valk glided into Flamingo Bay. The flat, sparsely forested land was filled with branching rivers, deltas, and backwaters. Around two o’clock in the afternoon, they steamed onto the Noordwest River and after some time observed that a number of canoes were being launched from along the banks. At one point they counted 113 boats around the ship. Because they couldn’t reach the exploration detachment 116 before nightfall, they decided to anchor for the night. The anchor was hardly dropped, Viegen recorded, before trade activity with the Asmat exploded. Pigs, a cassowary, fish, parakeets, arrow bundles, shields—anything they wanted was lifted up from the canoes, all of it in exchange for si (iron), the only accepted currency. There was no interest whatsoever in pieces of cotton, and the little dolls in red and blue dresses that Viegen had brought were not even deemed worth looking at. The people here were headhunters too, Viegen noted with an air of resignation. The men in the canoes offered him strings of skulls in return for just one iron nail. Viegen noted that this was a clear indication that the people here saw nothing bad in this horrifying practice, and he wrote immediately after that he had no doubt “that these people can be turned into good Christians.” During this trading frenzy at the mouth of the river, Viegen collected some shields but mentions the transaction in his account so tersely that it could easily be overlooked. No details, no numbers, no descriptions. He did write about a man who had made a “miniature axe” out of two pieces of wood to show what he wanted in return for his goods. Viegen loved this and gave him a knife as a gift. Viegen had no idea what the Asmat actually did with all those nails. What could they possibly use them for? Three weeks later, when he received a sculpted human figure, he would note that it had a bonnet made out of braided fiber held in place by a nail, “which shows they had well understood the purpose of nails.” During this brief stopover, Viegen tried to obtain some information about the language, but it proved impossible to question anyone: “They were entirely absorbed by the trade, which was what they had their sights set on. They had no attention for anything but iron and more iron.” In the early morning the ship was once again brought under steam and around 11 a.m. the Valk was moored along the “bivouac ship” Zwaluw.8 The people stationed here were busy working up the measurements they had taken and charting the mouth of the Noordwest River. Promptly, the commander of the exploration detachment, Captain Le Cocq d’Armandville (fig. 5),9 along with Luitenant ter-zee J.-L. Chaillet (fig. 6)10 came on board. Father Viegen and Captain Le Cocq turned out to know each other, and Viegen wrote, “It was pleasant to meet them in this loneliness and eternal wilderness. The circumstance that the leader happened to be an old fellow townsman of mine added to the pleasure in no small amount.” The pleasure was brief, however, and the captain informed them that several of his men had been afflicted by an “evil disease of the bowels.” Six men had already died and the remaining twelve would have to be evacuated as soon as possible. Among the sick was the health officer, for whose life they feared, so the detachment was currently without a doctor. It was decided that the sick would be transported to the hospital in Ambon aboard the Valk. Viegen could therefore not go back to Merauke—at least not for the moment. What to do? Captain Le Cocq had a solution: Why did Viegen not join in the expedition? A fourteen-day journey had been planned with the goal of exploring the waterways west of the Noordwest River, and making further surveys of the mountain range. Now that there was no longer a doctor on board, they could certainly use a pastor. The extract of the military journal notes, “On the invitation of the detachment commander, Father Viegen takes part in this expedition, so as to be able to test with the tribes living here the theories that his far-advanced studies of the customs and habits of the populace have brought him.”11 In the early morning of April 19, Viegen boarded the exploration ship Ketti. “At the stroke of half past six, the signal sounded and promptly the fleet got into motion. It consisted of the Ketti, a decent little steamer of about twentyfive tons (fig. 7), two sloops, and six canoes.” The expedition personnel consisted of seventy-six men, not counting thirty-seven forced laborers. Soon, the Ketti was steaming up the Antassan River, which connected the Noordwest River to the Hellwig River (fig. 8). The entire day, Viegen saw nothing but woods and wetlands. It rained incessantly and the river was filled with driftwood. FIG. 12: MSC installation at the missionary exhibition in 's-Hertogenbosch, June 26–30, 1920. Shields nos. 20 and 21 are included. Next to the posts are four figures (see fig. 9: E, A, J, and H). Reproduced with the kind permission of the Capucins of Tilburg. FIG. 13: “A stand that has attracted particular attention” at the missionary conference held in Maastricht, July 12–14, 1921. On the wall are two shields (from left to right: 20 and 1) and two sculptures (fig. 9: C and A).
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