Peter T Young

January 30, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Bathing Suit Law

“Shades of Stephen Desha! It seems that the bluest of blue laws, that nefarious ‘cover your knees’ bathing suit law is going to be inforced even on our own little island.”

“Haint you never heard of Stephen Desha? Don’t you know of the bathing suit law? Don’t you know that you are not supposed to have knees, or if you must have them that, you’ve got to keep ‘em covered.” (The Garden Island, April 25, 1922)

Stephen Langhern Desha Sr “was a colorful personality and was an outstanding leader of his people. Tracing back to New England and Kentucky as well as Polynesia, he combined the best qualities of both races in perpetuating their traditions and exemplifying traits that distinguish both the Polynesian and the Anglo-Saxon.”

“Mr Desha was born in Lahaina, Maui, on July 11, 1859, and spend the first years of his boyhood on the Island of Lanai. He later moved to Honolulu and in his adolescent years was an employee of the firm of C. Brewer & Company.”

“Being filled with the desire to preach the Gospel, he entered the North Pacific Missionary Institute and graduated in 1885. He became pastor of the Kealakekua Church in Nāpoʻopoʻo in that year and served in this, his first charge, for four years.”

“In 1889 he received a call to become pastor of the Haili Church in Hilo, and for forty-five years labored in the one parish which was to feel the strong influence of this great preacher and forceful personality.”

“Mr Desha was no ordinary preacher of the word. He had a remarkable gift of oratory in his native tongue, in which he was a master. He was saturated with the spirit of ancient mele, folklore, traditions and stories of the Hawaiian people, and this gave him considerable influence among his own people.”

“It was easy for him to make his point known by introducing some apt story or telling illustrations from Hawaiian history or mythology.”

“First and foremost. Mr. Desha will be remembered as a Christian minister. His work in the pulpit was outstanding and he was often called upon to make addresses and to give sermons not only in his own parish, but in various parts of the territory.”

“His intimate knowledge of the Scriptures increased his ability in proclaiming the Word. Mr. Desha was also a good pastor and vitally interested in the welfare of his flock as a good shepherd should be.”

“In his relationships with his fellow ministers, ‘Kiwini,’ as he was generally known by his associates, was always regarded as a friendly counsellor and loyal coworker. His interest in the island and territorial associations was genuine, and he was always present except when ill-health prevented his being with his associates.”

“We must not forget that Mr. Desha was also a journalist and for many years was editor of “Ka Hoku o Hawaii” (The Star of Hawaii), a weekly newspaper published in Hilo. This contained a good deal of church news as well as translations of stories from the English language and general items of interest to Hawaiian readers.”

“Stephen Desha was not only a Christian, but also a loyal patriot, and the Hawaiian people have never had a more zealous champion for their rights and privileges than ‘Kiwini.’ In association with the late Prince Kūhiō, Mr. Desha was a great advocate of the Hawaiian rehabilitation plan and did all within his power to preserve and perpetuate the Hawaiian race.”

“Mr. Desha fulfilled the definition of the true patriot – one who loves his country and zealously supports its authority and interests. He accepted the change from the monarchy to the provisional government, and later to that of the Republic of Hawaii and the subsequent transfer of authority to the United States of America.”

“It was most natural for him to become interested in politics, for he was not a mere theorist in matters of government. After serving a term as supervisor of the County of Hawaii, he became a senator and served five terms, with the total record of twenty years as a member of the senate of Hawaii.” (The Friend, August 1, 1934)

One year, when Desha “came to Honolulu for the biennial session of the territorial legislation after a considerable period of hibernation in his native habitat, the sights that he saw a the beach at Waikiki resulted in the enactment of a new law. And this is what he says:” (Washington Herald, May 30, 1921)

“Section I—No person over 14 years of age shall be or appear on any road or highway within the Honolulu District, City and County of Honolulu, in a bathing suit unless covered suitably by an outer garment reaching at least to the knees.”

Section 2. Any person violating the provisions of this Act shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor and shall be punished by a fine not to exceed $50.00.

“The Desha law was designed to give pause to young and older mermaids who had been in the habit of dashing through the streets of the Waikiki district clad in bathing suits which made Mack Sennett’s girls look all dressed up. But it didn’t give them much pause.”

“The Waikiki beach beauties still fly along the highways and byways, en route to the surf, wearing suitable outer garments, but hardly covered by them, save around the neck, the rest of said garments fluttering in the breeze like the tail of a comet in a hurry to go somewhere, with most everything Senator Desha wanted to cover up still available for optical appraisal.”

“The spirit, not the letter of the law is observed, but thus far no arrests have been made in an effort to make the word ‘covered’ in the law mean something. The sight at Waikiki still exercises a strange fascination for elderly tourists.” (Washington Herald, May 30, 1921)

“Honolulu policemen are reported to have taken the Desha Law onto the beach at Waikiki. The general impression has been that it applied only to streets and alleys and that the bather could discard the superfluous covering after reaching the beach. If sun baths are to be taken only in robes and mackintoshes, the remaining popularity of the much sung of strand will still further wane.” (Maui News. April 21, 1922)

The law met with opposition, across the Islands, “Honolulu’s Bathing Suit law is still regarded as a joke where it is regarded at all, is the word coming from the capital city. The Desha Bill was a joke when introduced and has never been able to outgrow it.” (Maui News, July 15, 1921)

The Maui News cynically followed up with, “Honolulu has a curfew law and a Desha bathing suit law that appear to be enforced to an equal extent.” (Maui News, March 7, 1922)

“(T)he Desha Bathing Suit Law so unpopular in Honolulu that it can be repealed at the next legislative session.” (Maui News, April 21, 1922)

Not regularly enforced, and ignored by many, it wasn’t until 1949 that the law was eventually repealed. “I don’t think many Hawaiians know about the law. The only reason I learned about it is that someone dug it out of the mothballs the other day and is working the territorial legislature to repeal it.”

“The repealer passed the senate and is now before the lower house. If it passes there, as seems absolutely certain, we can all go around the way we’ve been going – but legally, yet. … But it’s nice to know it’s going to be repealed. As a law-abiding citizen it goes against the grain for me to leer illegally.” (Dixon, The Independent, April 15, 1949)

Bathing_Suit_Law-Andre de la Varre with Waldron Sisters at the Outrigger Canoe Club Waikiki Beach, 1923

January 29, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Sherwood Forest

“Far-famed Waikiki is vastly inferior to Waimanalo as a pleasure ground in every feature save surf riding … those who have tried the water on the windward side, and completion of the Waimanalo road will render this beach almost as accessable, as Waikiki.” (SB Jan 1, 1921)

“Different areas of Oahu differ widely in flavor and atmosphere. No part of the island is any more individualistic than the Waimanalo section on the windward side. Verdant, rolling fields stretch from a rugged coastline up to the sheer wall of the Koolau mountains.”

“Waimanalo lies between Makapuu point at the northeast tip of the island and the Kailua-Lanikai district. The highway runs close to the shore for several miles, at one point passing under a huge arch of stately ironwood trees.” (Advertiser, August 12, 1956)

It’s not clear who planted or when the ironwoods were planted at Waimanalo. But in the late-1800s and early-1900s Ironwood was one of the favored trees for windbreaks, shade and buffers because of its fast growth and resistance to adverse environmental conditions. (Iwashita)

As examples, Kapiolani Park was dedicated in 1876; Archibald Cleghorn, Governor of Oʻahu and father of Princess Kaʻiulani, was the park’s designer. Cleghorn planned the park’s landscaping, including the ironwood trees along Kalākaua Avenue.

On the windward side in 1906, many rows of ironwood trees were planted in Kailua as a windbreak and a fence had to be built to keep cattle out of the ‘Coconut Grove’.

“Ironwood trees dominate the shoreline. Here is a whole forest of them on and around Bellows Air Force Station, a small air base that cuts off much of the town’s beach frontage. The trees grow so thickly that the area outside the base has been used for a while as a hiding place for a den of young thieves and was nicknamed, not surprisingly, Sherwood Forest.” (Advertiser, April 21, 1968)

Immediately following statehood, the State was looking to provide more beach access … “The State emphasizes: Residents outnumber servicemen and their dependents four to one. Yet the public is confined to four miles of beach while 11 are open to servicemen.”

“Seven miles out of a total 11 miles of beach deemed ‘safe and sandy’ on Oahu are military-controlled. This is one of the key points in a State document loaded with statistical evidence to demonstrate that residents aren’t getting a fair share of Island recreational space.”

“The report is aimed at getting back from the Federal Government two of three miles of choice beach at Bellows Field and a 1.66-acre piece in front of Fort DeRussy.” (SB Feb 25, 1962)

“The Federal Government has held Bellows since 1900 when it was ceded by the Republic of Hawaii. The State has long agitated for its return.” (SB March 4, 1965)

“At Bellows, the Department of the Air Force has admitted that 77 acres will no long be needed after relocation of certain facilities. (Adv August 5. 1961)

“The State began moving 32 old buildings this week off the 77 acres of Bellows Air Station it expects to obtain from the Air Force later this year. The 77 acres includes 2,650 feet of beach frontage already open for public use. … The old Non-Commissioned Officers Club will be left where it is for public use”. (SB March 4, 1965)

“The Federal government is returning 77 acres of valuable Bellows Field land to the State of Hawaii, including about a half mile of precious Windward Oahu beach frontage.

“Signing of the fee simple deed by the Federal government climaxes seven years of negotiations between the Federal and State governments for the return of the Waimanalo area land … no longer needed by the Federal Government.”

“‘The 77 acres of Department of Defense land which will be transferred to the State will provide much needed land for development on the Windward side of Oahu.’” (Inouye) (SB, July 26, 1966)

Shortly after the transfer, “The area has been described as a ‘Sherwood’s Forest’ – a hang-out for hoodlums.” (Adv, June 14, 1967)

“There are several versions of the Robin Hood story. … Legend has it that Robin Hood was an outlaw living in Sherwood Forest with his ‘Merry Men’. … One certain fact is that he was a North Country man, with his traditional haunts as an outlaw in Sherwood Forest and a coastal refuge at Robin Hood’s Bay in Yorkshire.”

“Robin became a popular folk hero because of his generosity to the poor and down-trodden peasants, and his hatred of the Sheriff and his verderers who enforced the oppressive forest laws, made him their champion.” (Historic-UK)

“ls a 77-acre portion of Bellows Field, now owned by the State, being used as a hideout for thieves, car strippers and drug pushers? The president of the Waimanalo Council of Associations the Rev. Jack Hedges, says it is.”

“Hedges made his charges on Wednesday during a visit to Waimanalo of the Mayor’s annual Windward Safari. He claimed that crime as rampant in the bushes and abandoned buildings in the State-owned strip and that nearby beaches were unsafe at night”

“He said that burglars used the bushes for their headquarters, while organized gangs roamed out of the thick ironwood jungle to strip cars, peddle dope and look for new crimes to commit.”

“‘It’s a wonderful place for hoodlums to hide out in. They practice car-stripping in the bushes. It’s quite a hide-out area . . . It’s become a sanctuary for these people.’”

“He also claimed that ‘no one dares to walk on Waimanalo Beach after dark anymore’ and that residents have been so intimidated by the gangs that they are afraid to call the police. … He compared it with the Sherwood Forest of Robin Hood’s days”. (Adv. May 12, 1967)

“The principal difference between Robin Hood’s forest and the ’forest’ at Waimanalo lies in the cast of characters. Robin Hood’s band was composed of essentially ‘good’ men, while the delinquent and dope addicts who populate the ‘forest’ are a menace to society.” (SB May 10, 1967)

“At least 59 houses along the short Laumilo Street near the ‘forest’ have been broken into since January. Many residents of the area have been ‘intimidated’ by the gangs so much that they are afraid to call the police.”

“Police Chief Dan Liu said the department is adding 18 new patrolmen to the Windward area this year. This will provide two beat patrolmen day and night for Waimanalo. Liu told the Mayor his men will work on clearing the area of crime and protecting the houses.”

“‘The best solution is to remove the hazard rather than creating a larger police problem,’ the Mayor said. He promised to talk with State officials in an effort to clear the area of the protective undergrowth and abandoned buildings.” (SB, May 10, 1967)

First used by the State as the ‘Waimānalo State Recreation Area’, managed by the Department of Land and Natural Resources, Division of State Parks for outdoor recreational uses for the public including camping and picnic areas, in 1992, the Park was transferred to the City and County of Honolulu and was the Waimānalo Bay Beach Park.

The City later renamed it Hūnānāniho, that archaeological reports noted was “a small hill said to have been famous in olden days as a place of refuge (puuhonua)” from battle and that “all the chiefs recognized the sacredness of this hill and the lives of those who reached this elevation were spared”. (C&C Resolution 21-132)

January 27, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

ʻAuwai

In pre-Captain Cook times, kalo (taro) played a vital role in Hawaiian culture. It was not only the Hawaiians’ staple food but the cultivation of kalo was at the very core of Hawaiian culture and identity.

Taro can be cultivated by two very different methods. Upland, or dryland, taro is planted in non-flooded areas that are fed by rainfall. Lowland, or wetland, taro is grown in water-saturated fields.

The early Hawaiians probably planted kalo in marshes near the mouths of rivers. Over years of progressive expansion of kalo lo‘i (flooded taro patches) up slopes and along rivers, kalo cultivation in Hawai‘i reached a unique level of engineering and sustainable sophistication.

Kalo lo‘i systems are typically a set of adjoining terraces that are typically reinforced with stone walls and soil berms. Wetland taro thrives on flooded conditions, and cool, circulating water is optimal for taro growth, thus a system may include one or more ʻauwai (irrigation ditches) to divert water into and out of the planting area. (McElroy)

Most important in the system of distribution of water for application to the soil were the main ditches diverting the water from natural streams.

Each of these large ʻauwai was authorized and planned by the King or by one or more chiefs or konohiki whose lands were to be watered thereby, the work of excavation being under the direction of the chief providing the largest number of men. (Perry, Hawaiʻi Supreme Court)

The ʻauwai construction and maintenance formed foundations around which an entire economy, class system, and culture functioned. The ʻauwai, lo‘i and the taro plant’s mythical and spiritual connections in Hawaiian society influenced individual and social activity within the ahupua‘a. (Handy, HART)

Taro cultivation affected many aspects of Hawaiian life: the labor required to build and maintain the ʻauwai; the shared water rights; and tributes to the Mō‘ī and to the chiefs (Ali‘i.) (Handy, HART)

All ʻauwai had a proper name, and were generally called after either the land, or the chief of the land that had furnished the most men, or had mainly been instrumental in the inception, planning and carrying out of the required work. All ʻauwai tapping the main stream were done under the authority of a konohiki of an ahupuaʻa. (Nakuina, Thrum)

ʻAuwai were generally dug from makai – seaward or below – upwards. The konohiki who had the supervision of the work having previously marked out where it would probably enter the stream, the diggers worked up to that point.

The different representatives in the ahupuaʻa taking part in the work furnished men according to the number of kalo growers on each land. (The quantity of water awarded to irrigate the loʻi was according to the number of workers and the amount of work put into the building of the ʻauwai.)

Dams that diverted water from the stream were a low loose wall of stones with a few clods here and there, high enough only to raise water sufficiently to flow into the ʻauwai, which should enter it at almost a level. No ʻauwai was permitted to take more water than continued to flow in the stream below the dam (i.e. no more than half.)

Use of the water was regulated by time increments, which varied from a few hours each day for a small kalo patch to two or three days for a kalo plantation. By rotation with others on the ʻauwai, a grower would divert water from the ʻauwai into his kalo. The next, in turn, would draw off water for his allotted period of time. (KSBE)

The ʻauwai primarily existed to support taro cultivation. Other crops, such as sweet potatoes, bananas or sugar cane, were regarded as dry land crops dependent on rainfall. Sugar cane and bananas were almost always planted on loʻi banks (kuauna) to receive moisture seeping through. (Nakuina, Thrum)

ʻAuwai varied in size and structure depending on the number and size of lo‘i they irrigated. In smaller lo‘i, water could be directed from one terrace into the next below it.

However, larger lo‘i required individual ʻauwai capable of carrying more water. In more complex systems, these might be branches from another ʻauwai, often connected to the same source. (HART)

An early description of ʻauwai is from explorer Nathaniel Portlock, noting the Kauaʻi ʻauwai in 1787, “This excursion gave me a fresh opportunity of admiring the amazing ingenuity and industry of the natives in laying out the taro and sugar-cane grounds …”

“… the greatest part of which are made up on the banks of the river, with exceeding good causeways made with stones and earth, leading up the valleys to each plantation; the taro beds are in general a quarter of a mile over, dammed in, and they have a place on one part of the bank, that serves as a gateway.”

“When the rains commence, which is in the winter season, the river swells with the torrents from the mountains, and overflowed their taro-beds; and when the rains are over, and the rivers decrease, the dams are stopped up, and the water kept in to nourish the taro and sugar-cane during the dry season …”

“… the water in the beds is generally about one foot and a half, or two feet, over a muddy bottom … the taro also grows frequently as large as a man’s head.”

Another early description of ʻauwai and loʻi is from Otto von Kotzebue, a Russian naval officer who was in the Islands in 1816, “The artificial taro fields, which may justly be called taro lakes, excited my attention. … I have seen whole mountains covered with such fields, through which water gradually flowed; each sluice formed a small cascade which ran … into the next pond, and afforded an extremely picturesque prospect.”

The burden of maintaining the ditches fell upon those whose lands were watered; failure to contribute their due share of service rendering the delinquent hoaʻāina (tenant) subject to temporary suspension or to entire deprivation of their water rights or even to total dispossession of their lands. (YaleLawJournal)

In some ʻauwai, not all of the water was used; after irrigating a few patches the ditch returned the remainder of the water to the stream. (YaleLawJournal)

One notable ʻauwai, with water still flowing through it (however, the loʻi kalo is long gone) is in Nuʻuanu. After damage to the ʻauwai system during the battle of Nuʻuanu, Kamehameha moved to quickly restore the valley’s agriculture production, summoning Kuhoʻoheiheipahu Paki to rebuild the irrigation system.

“(I)n three days, (Paki) rallied several hundred men to construct the tremendous Nuʻuanu irrigation system which supplies the numerous pondfields (from Luakaha, near Kaniakapūpū to around what is now Judd Street) …this irrigation system is known even today as the Paki ʻauwai.” (Hawaiʻi Legislature)

Among other loʻi along its course, Paki ʻAuwai served the loʻi kalo of Queen Emma at Hānaiakamālama (the Queen’s Summer Palace.)

The image shows a portion of the rock-lined Paki ʻAuwai in Nuʻuanu (just below Kaniakapūpū (you take the same trail to see each.))

January 26, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Sailamokus

There is historical evidence suggesting that Hawaiians began moving to the US mainland as early as the late-1700s for economic survival.

As early as 1811, Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) had already hired twelve Hawaiians on three year contracts to work for them in the Pacific Northwest. By 1824, HBC employed thirty-five Hawaiians west of the Rocky Mountains.

When British and American ships, lured by the fur trade, entered into the Pacific in the wake of Captain Cook at the close of the eighteenth century, young Hawaiian men were regularly recruited off the Islands as deckhands. Thousands of shipped out as seamen, called “sailamokus”.

“Hawaiian men proved to be valuable sailors who were at home in the seas and their excellent swimming skills had a variety of uses, such as repairing hulls underwater and dislodging stuck anchors.” (Brown)

The whaling industry had a major effect upon Hawaiian commerce and trade. As the Northwest fur trade decreased and sandalwood supplies and values dropped, the whaling industry began to fill the economic void. Hawaiians took to the sea and sailors traveled all over the world.

Thousands of Hawaiians shipped out as seamen aboard the whaling ships, so many that the crews were often half Hawaiian. (NPS) “Sandwich Island crew … are complete water-dogs, therefore very good in boating. It is for this reason that there are so many of them on the coast of California; they being very good hands in the surf.”

“They are also quick and active in the rigging, and good hands in warm weather; but those who have been with them round Cape Horn, and in high latitudes, say that they are useless in cold weather. In their dress they are precisely like our sailors.”

“In addition to these Islanders, the vessel had two English sailors, who acted as boatswains over the Islanders, and took care of the rigging.” (Dana, 1840)

Historians suggest “that young Hawaiian males left Hawai’i as workers on whaling ships and traveled to China, Europe, Mexico, and the U.S. mainland. In addition, many ventured into the Pacific Northwest territory, worked in the fur trade, and ended up settling in those areas.” (pbs-org)

“Hawaiian sailors were known for their seamanship and swimming abilities and made desirable recruits for the whaling captains, so much so that the Hawaiian government began to regulate this recruitment and passed laws requiring bonds to ensure the sailors’ return to the islands as early as the 1830s.”

“The demographic decline due to foreign diseases (an additional import of the early western whalers) made it all the more important to ensure the return of local sailors to Hawai‘i. Nonetheless, the role of Kānaka maoli in the American whaling fleet continued to increase. By 1871, Kanaka sailors made up almost half of the entire whaling crews in Alaska.” (Van Tilburg, NOAA)

Other Native Hawaiians landed in Nantucket, New Bedford, and nearby ports. By the 1830s, Nantucket whalers employed about fourteen hundred seamen, including Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders. Four or five hundred men arrived or departed annually.

At least six sailor boarding houses operated during the 1820 to 1860 period when Native Hawaiian seamen frequented Nantucket.

At least one house, near Pleasant Street in Nantucket’s New Guinea section, primarily or exclusively boarded Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders, and a sign identified William Whippy’s establishment as the “William Whippy Canacka Boarding-House.”

These whalers, on countless other New England voyages with Hawaiian crews, contributed to the economic and social history there. They shared their cultural traditions, languages, skills and knowledge with New England’s citizens and with each other aboard the whaleships. (Lebo)

“Hawaiians also migrated to Yolo County, California to participate in the Gold Rush and created their own Kanaka Village. There is evidence that Hawaiians settled across California in the late-1800s and even intermarried with Native Americans.”

“Many scholars speculate that Hawaiians migrated to the mainland in order to gain more economic opportunity and to flee from the dramatic Westernization that was changing the face of Hawai’i.” (pbs-org)

The American Civil War, the discovery of petroleum, and the decimation of the whales ended the reign of the whalers in the Pacific by about 1876. Whaling had been ‘an economic force of awesome proportions in these Islands for more than forty years’. (NPS)

Of course, this summary only highlights some of the early outmigration of Hawaiians from Hawaiʻi. Recent decades have seen a flurry of movement of Hawaiians (and others) from Hawaiʻi to the continent. (Some areas on the continent show over 100% increases decade-by-decade in the number of Hawaiians living there.)

January 25, 2025 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Mutiny on the Globe

Hawai‘i’s whaling era began in 1819 when two New England ships became the first whaling ships to arrive in the Hawaiian Islands. At that time, whale products were in high demand; whale oil was used for heating, lamps and in industrial machinery; whale bone was used in corsets, skirt hoops, umbrellas and buggy whips.

Formerly whales were principally taken in the North Seas, the largest were generally found around Greenland, some of them measuring ninety feet in length. (Lay & Hussey, 1824)

However, rich whaling waters were discovered near Japan and soon hundreds of ships headed for the area. The central location of the Hawaiian Islands between America and Japan brought many whaling ships to the Islands. Whalers needed food and the islands supplied this need from its fertile fields.

So plentiful were the whales, and taken with such facility, that the ships employed were not sufficient to carry home the oil and bone, and other ships were often sent to bring home the surplus quantity. (Lay & Hussey, 1824)

Among the early whalers it was customary to have six boats to a ship and six men to a boat, besides the harpooner. What at that time was considered an improved method in killing whales consisted in hurling the harpoon. (Lay & Hussey, 1824)

The ropes attached to the harpoon used to be about 1,200 feet long and in some cases all the lines for the six boats were fastened together and ran out by one whale, the animal descending in nearly a perpendicular line from the surface. (Lay & Hussey, 1824)

Initially, it was customary to bring only the blubber, and instead of boiling the oil out and putting it into casks on board, the fat of the whale was cut up into suitable pieces, pressed hard in tubs carried out for the purpose, and in this situation was the return cargo received at home. (Lay & Hussey, 1824)

One such whaler, the ship “Globe” of Nantucket, sailed out of Edgartown, Massachusetts, on December 20, 1822, on a whaling voyage around Cape Horn.

With a complement of 21 men under the command of Captain Thomas Worth, she set sail on a whaling expedition to the Pacific. After finding success in the “off Japan” whaling grounds the Globe arrived in Honolulu for provisioning.

There, “six men ran away in the Sandwich Islands, and one was discharged.” Captain Worth took on seven new crew, four of whom were Silas Payne, John Oliver, William Humphries and Joseph Thomas.

After two years out on that whaling voyage, on the night of January 25, 1824, four of the crew, mutinied near Fanning Island, 900 miles south of the Hawaiian Islands.

Samuel B Comstock, a 22-year-old harpooner, was the instigator of the mutiny. Sometime prior to the mutiny, he had major quarrels with Captain Worth.

After murdering the captain and first mate, who were both asleep at the time of the assault, the mutineers proceeded to attack the second and third mates, who were in the cabin. Then they took the ship into Badu Island (Mulgrave Island, north of Queensland, Australia.)

On February 14, the mutineers took the Globe to Mili Atoll in the Marshall Islands. A few of the mutineers started to suspect Comstock intended to destroy the Globe and kill the rest of crew.

Within days of settling on Mili Atoll, Comstock was murdered by his fellow mutineers.

In an atmosphere of distrust existing between the mutineers, Payne and Oliver made an error in judgment of sending Gilbert Smith to secure the Globe.

Smith and 5 other crew (not part of the mutiny) seized the Globe and escaped (included in this group was George Comstock, Sam’s younger brother,) eventually arriving at Valparaiso, Chile, where they were brought into custody by the American consul. The Globe was fitted out and returned to Nantucket, arriving in November 1824.

Back on the Atoll, repeated injuries to the natives on the part of Silas Payne (the second in command of the mutineers at the time of the outbreak, and the murderer of his associate conspirator, Comstock,) so incensed them that one after another of the crew were slain (one of the mutineers, William Humphries, was hung by the others.)

Out of ten castaways on Mili Atoll, only Cyrus M Hussey and William Lay survived. Half-prisoners and half-adoptees of the natives these two survived for twenty-two months; they were rescued on November 21, 1825 by US schooner Dolphin, commanded by Lieutenant John Percival.

(You may recall that besides bringing the mutineers to justice, Percival (aka “Mad Jack” Percival) had been sent to the Pacific to enforce the settlement of debts owed by Hawaiʻi’s ruling chiefs to American sandalwood dealers. He caused an incident after his arrival there on January 16, 1826, the chiefs had not only forbidden the women to swim out to the ships, but had restricted the sale of alcohol – it became known as the Battle of Honolulu.)