Heinrich Küper

Heinrich Küper (born in 1888 in Berlin Germany died 1950 in Owaraha) was a German adventurer who lived in the Solomon Islands.

Küper lived in Gupuna village, Owaraha, Makira-Ulawa Province, between 1912 and 1950, the year of his death. He was a former officer of the Kaiserliche Marine who had deserted. During World War I Küper was arrested by the British authorities of the Solomon Islands protectorate and was brought to Tulagi. Very soon thereafter though, he was released after promising that he would not cooperate with the enemy.

Küper was married to a respected and influential local woman, Kafagamurirongo, and was the only aefaka (white) who ever reached the arafa (high person) status within a Melanesian community. His first child was born in 1917. Heinrich and Kafagamurirongo had a total of four children, three boys and a girl.

During his life in Owaraha he met ethnographer Hugo Bernatzik, who wrote a sympathetic report based on his own glimpses of Küper's life. According to Bernatzik, Küper had wholly adapted to the local island culture, which he respected and admired. According to Küper the customs of the Solomon Islanders were full of ancient wisdom, unfathomable to the European visitor, and in harmony (im Einklang) with their surroundings. Therefore, Küper mistrusted European influence as a whole, warning local people in Owaraha against certain missionaries, whom he accused of breaking down the ancestral authority structures and bringing about a moral breakdown, as well as against all Overseas Chinese traders, for he felt that non-traditional material possessions in the island context promoted greed and brought about conflict.

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