Gwali Mission

Chumie was established in 1820 by Reverend John Brownlee,  as a station of for the Glasgow Missionary Society. The village which grew up about it was subsequently named Emgwali, takes its name from the Gwali River, a tributary of the Tyumie River. Also known as Tyumie Post and Chumie Mission.

James Backhouse reported in February 1839 that: "The Chumie Mission Station ... consists of a neat chapel, used also as a school-room, the residence of the missionary, and two other houses, with some outbuildings of stone. It is situated on a streamlet issuing from a range of bold, basaltic hills, among which wood and rock and grassy slopes are beautifully intermingled."

The 1875 census indicated that Emgwali mission station had a population of 908. In 1891 this number had dropped marginally to 890, but by 1904 it stood at 1,216.