MAZZUCCONI, Giovanni. — Missionary in Melanesia and Micronesia, b. at Rancio (Lecco) in 1826, killed by natives on Woodlark Island in 1855. Ordained priest in 1850, he was among the very first students of the newly founded Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions in Milan, for which he, together with his colleagues, drafted the first outline of its rules and composed its earliest prayers.
He departed for Oceania in March 1852 and carried out his missionary work on Rook Island, opposite New Guinea, for three years. Falling ill, he was obliged to seek treatment in Sydney, and during the long voyage he studied a good number of the islands in the archipelago, filling a notebook with notes, which, unfortunately, was lost with him on the return journey to his island. The schooner on which he was traveling was wrecked on a coral reef off Woodlark Island, where he and the entire crew were attacked and massacred by the natives, beginning with the missionary. Of pure and delicate spirit, he was regarded as a martyr, comparable to Blessed Chanel, with whom the Marist Fathers, who had witnessed his virtues, associated him.