In 1820 he admitted the first company of missionaries (from New England), who, within two years, had learned the language, reduced it to writing, and printed the first textbook. Kamehameha resisted conversion to Christianity, allegedly because he refused to give up four of his five wives as well as rum drinking. In 1823 he sailed on a visit to England, in a delegation that included two of his wives. Stricken with measles in London in June 1824, Kamehameha and his favourite wife, Kamamalu, died there.