Economy | Page 123 | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

August 13, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Sailors

“The longer a man is out of his own country, the more he feels the need of support. To a Parisian, then, every Parisian is a relative; to a Frenchman all Frenchmen are friends; to a European, any European Is a compatriot, a fellow citizen.”

“And a sailor extends even further this community of feeling. Any man whose name is inscribed on the master roll of a ship is a child of the same great family, almost a brother.”

“The sailor greets him, defends him, makes sacrifices for him, and, above all, will consider it shameful to be made use of in any way harm a man of his own craft.”

“It is in the months of October and November that the English and American whaling ships, having spent the summer off the coast of Japan, come to the Sandwich Islands to refresh their crews and put their vessels in shape to go back to sea …”

“… either to return home if their whaling is finished or to continue the work if they do not yet have a full cargo. And in fact there arrived many such ships belonging to these two nations.”

“One cannot help noticing a great difference between the one and the other.”

“The Americans do not use ships of more than four hundred tons; they all arrive here in a state of uncleanness and disrepair1hat indicates a lack of discipline and care.”

“The English ships, much larger and more difficult to maintain since they are almost all renovated warships, appear on the contrary pleasingly neat and orderly.”

“We saw American whalers that remained a week in the harbor without loosing their wet sails to dry and others that let them Rap in the wind for several days without furling them.”

“On the English ships the oil casks are stowed away as they are filled and not touched until arrival In England. The Americans have to heave theirs onto the deck at least once in order to reseal them; without this precaution they would lose half their contents.”

“The English have perfected their casks , while the ship owners of Boston and Nantucket follow an old practice that they do not wish to change.”

“But if the English show more order and capacity to manage their ships, once the whalers have reached the Sandwich lslands the two groups compete with each other in dissipation.”

“English and American officers and sailors, all display the same manners. As soon as set foot on land, the streets are full of drunken men, nothing is to be heard but quarrels and bickering.”

“What a spectacle for the islanders, you see them run shouting toward the places where the Yankees and Jhn Bulls dispute their differences.”

The Captains arrive, sometimes more drunk than the men, and would send them back on board; the latter resist; the captains strike, and sometimes the sailors strike back; all shout at the same time; the God damns and damnation are Iike thunder; kicks and blows of the fist come down like hail; black eyes shine like lightning.”

“It is late at night before the storm abates only to blow up again the next day.”

“Few of these ships complete their voyages without some kind of mutiny or revolt, but there is good reason to believe that if the captain and officers were more sober, the sailors would be more obedient and peaceable.”

“Every day the English consul finds it necessary to have some of them flogged.”

“In general and with very exceptions the foreigners who have settles in the Sandwich Islands are the dregs of all countries, and they have brought their vices with them.”

“There are always a number of them around the young king, corrupting and giving bad counsel. Among them are several who have escaped from Botany Bay having been branded for crimes in England.”

“The consul is aware of this situation but has no way to prevent It. For the honor of his country, however, he would not suffer the executioner (flogger) to be a compatriot of his.”

“The season that brings English and American whalers to this archipelago attracts also those ships that trade furs on the Northwest Coast of America, few of which wish to pass the winter on those frozen shores.”

“During the month of October there arrived four of them, all of which had failed to prosper in this business. One of them, the Louisa, out of Boston, staying through a winter and two summers, had been able to procure only eight hundred beaver pelts and one hundred twenty otter skins, and the latter had cost eight times what they were worth ten years before.”

“It appears that this commerce, formerly so rich, is now quite done for, and the natives have turned sour in their relations with the whites.”

“Continually at war among themselves, they have become more savage and intractable than ever; they now hunt the otter only for their own needs.”

“During the years 1827 and 1828 ten vessels have traded for fewer than half the otter skins that a single ship could once have done in three months, and the ones they did obtain have cost them four or five times as much.”

“All the ships that came to the Sandwich Islands during my stay in Honolulu were obliged to sell at public auction what remained of their trading goods. …”

“One cannot deny, however, that (the) American missionaries have contributed much to the civilization of the archipelago as we understand that word, and if the pure Christian doctrine is not the basis of their instruction, they have at least enabled these people to enjoy some of the benefits of Christianity in teaching them the ethics of the Gospels.”

“They have been able to adapt the English alphabet or a part of it to the Sandwich Island idiom and they have succeeded in teaching these people to read and write their own language. There is a printing shop where they print in the Sandwich language the works judged proper for the people to read. …”

“Through the influence of Kaahumanu they receive kapus from the king for everything they want: to build their churches, their houses, their cloisters, their walls, and the like. At such times all the people are required to perform the prescribed tasks. “

“Another kapu fills the schools. In addition to these kapus for the benefit of the missionaries others are used by the king, the queen and the chiefs to get work done for themselves.” (All from French sea captain Auguste Dehaut-Cilly who made round-the world travels between 1826 and 1829.)

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August 8, 2019 by Peter T Young 2 Comments

Hawai‘i State Library

The earliest libraries in Hawaiʻi appear to have been reading rooms provided for ships officers and crews. In Lāhainā, the Seamen’s Chapel and Reading Room was built in 1834 following an appeal by William Richards and Ephriam Spaulding (it was built two years later.)

In Honolulu, the Sandwich Islands Institute, organized in November 1837, fitted up a room at the Seamen’s Bethel in downtown Honolulu as a library and a museum of natural history and Pacific artifacts.

A newspaper article in October 1840 referred to this as a “Public Library, three to four hundred volumes” and also listed a “Reading Room for Seamen,” presumably at a different location.

A decade later, in 1850, residents of Honolulu organized the Atheneum Society, which for a year or two maintained a reading room and library. The Atheneum was succeeded in 1853 by the Honolulu Circulating Library Association.

In 1879, a group of men founded the Honolulu Library and Reading Room Association. In the local newspaper, the Commercial Pacific Advertiser, editor JH Black wrote, “The library is not intended to be run for the benefit of any class, party, nationality, or sect.”

Some of the founders wanted to exclude women from membership, but Alexander Cartwright disagreed, writing to his brother Alfred: “The idea keeps the blessed ladies out and the children. What makes us old geezers think we are the only ones to be spiritually and morally uplifted by a public library in this city?”

It wasn’t long before the committee changed the wording of the constitution to make women eligible for membership.

Early in its history, the organization had established a solid economic foundation, and over time it was able to obtain the moral and financial support of both the Hawaiian government and wealthy citizens.

King Kalākaua, Queen Kapiʻolani, Queen Emma, Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop, Regent Lili‘uokalani, Minister of the Interior F. W. Hutchinson and Charles R. Bishop were just a few of its notable and highly influential supporters.

From 1879 to 1912, library service was provided by the Honolulu Library and Reading-Room Association.

In 1909, Governor Frear helped pass the “Act to Provide for the Establishment of the Public Library of Hawaii”. On May 15, 1909 the Honolulu Library and Reading Room and the Library of Hawaiʻi signed an agreement by which the former agreed to turn over all books, furnishings and remaining funds to the latter.

A few months later, the Honolulu Library and Reading Room, Library of Hawaiʻi and the Historical Society jointly signed and submitted a letter to Andrew Carnegie requesting a grant for the construction of the Library of Hawaiʻi.

The request to Carnegie was for funds to build the new Library; Carnegie responded that the sum of $100,000 would be made ready as soon as a site was selected and plans drawn up.

The building’s final location, though, was not immediately settled. Several possible sites were considered. Ultimately, Governor Frear made a lot available on the corner of King and Punchbowl streets.

He picked a site that in 1872 had been purchased by the Government of Prince Lunalilo and transferred its control to the Board of Education.

The site was the location of Hāliʻimaile, the residence of Boki and Liliha and later Victoria Kamāmalu and her father and brothers before they ascended Kamehameha IV and Kamehameha V.

In 1874, the government-supported Pohukaina School for Girls was started. Just up the street was the Royal School for Boys.

In order to accommodate the new Library of Hawaiʻi, after 36-years at King and Punchbowl, Pohukaina School was moved to Kakaʻako; the new school opened in 1913.

Ultimately, the Library of Hawaiʻi was completed at a cost of $127,000, with the local legislative funding providing the difference.

The building opened its doors on February 11, 1913, and Hawaiʻi at last joined those states of America that offered free library services to their communities. The library, now known as the Hawaiʻi State Library, still stands today.

Greco-Romanesque columns in front mark it as a Carnegie library, and within its lobby, a bust of Andrew Carnegie, the man who made it possible is on the grounds.

In 1921, the County Library Law established separate libraries on the islands of Kauaʻi, Maui and Hawaiʻi, under minimal supervision by the Library of Hawaiʻi, which restricted its services to Oʻahu. Even so, the latter quickly outgrew its quarters.

In 1927, the Territorial legislature approved funding to expand and renovate the building. Construction was completed in 1930. Architect CW Dickey tripled its size by adding new wings to create an open-air courtyard in the center.

After statehood in 1959, the Hawaiʻi State Legislature created the Hawaiʻi State Public Library System, the only statewide system in the United States, with the Hawaiʻi State Library building as its flagship branch.

My grandmother worked at the State Library, from 1920 to 1948; she retired after serving as Assistant Head Librarian and Director of the Extension Department. Part of her duties included the expansion of the Library to the Neighbor Islands in 1921. My mother received a degree in Library Science and was archivist at Punahou School.

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Home_of_the_Library_of_Hawaii,_before_1910

Bethel_Church,_Honolulu,_Hawaii

The_Seaman’s_Bethel_Church

Pohukaina School-hhs3049gs-1875

Hawaii_State_Library_from_King_and_Punchbowl

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HawaiiStateLibrary

Lahaina-Master’s Reading Room

August 6, 2019 by Peter T Young 4 Comments

Waimānalo Sugar Plantation

High Chief John Adams Kuakini Cummins was born on Oʻahu on March 17, 1835, the son of High Chiefess Kaumakaokane Papaliʻaiʻaina and Thomas Jefferson Cummins, Jr. His mother was a cousin of King Kamehameha I. His father was a wealthy and aristocratic Englishman, born in Lancashire and reared in Massachusetts, who came to the Islands in 1828.

Thomas Cummins first acquired interests in land in Waimānalo (meaning potable water) on March 27, 1842, when High Chief Paki leased Cummins a parcel of land on which to build a house (that he named Mauna Loke, or Rose Mount)

On November 25, 1850, Cummins leased 970 acres in the same vicinity from King Kamehameha III. This property extended from Popoʻokaʻala Point to the hills of Kaʻiwa and Kaʻakaupu of the Koʻolau district. Over the years more land was acquired. In 1890, Cummins leased nearly 7,000-more acres for his sugar operation.

The land was first used as cattle pasture and horse breeding ranch. After attending the Royal School, Cummins worked on his father’s ranch, becoming manager in 1855.

One of the goals in horse breeding related to racing, an item of interest to the royalty and elite in Honolulu. Cummins had one of the largest stocks of race horses (and introduced some blooded stock to the islands) and was a promoter of horse racing. In about 1872, a horse racing track was laid out at Kapiʻolani Park. He was a Charter member of the Hawaiian Jockey Club in 1885.

John Cummins was elected representative for his Koʻolau district in 1873 and assisted in the election of King Lunalilo that same year. The following year, he aided in the election of King Kalākaua.

Cummins was instrumental, in helping King Kalākaua effect a reciprocity treaty with the United States in 1874, after which the sugar industry prospered.

Cummins conceived the idea of converting the ranch into a commercial sugar venture in 1877, two years after King Kalākaua had concluded a reciprocity treaty with the United States, greatly enhancing the sugar industry in the kingdom. Its first mill started grinding cane in January 1881.

The mill stood near Poalima Street behind present-day Shima’s Market on Kalanianaʻole Highway. Homes were on both sides of the highway. Rail tracks were laid out and three locomotive engines were brought in to haul cane to the mill and the wharf.

The sugar industry became a huge success.

The sugar plantation required more water than was easily available and a ditch was built to divert water from Maunawili Stream to Waimanalo. Two million gallons of water per day was pumped through a 2-mile long tunnel through Mount Olomana and into a reservoir where it was tapped to Waimanalo Sugar Company until the 1950s.

In the 1870s, Waimānalo Sugar Company built a 700-foot pier, Waimānalo Landing (near what is now the intersection of Huli Street and Kalaniana’ole Highway,) to use to transport the sugar, as well as serve as a landing for inter-island steamers (it was dismantled in the early 1950s.)

The railroad tracks from the mill culminated at a long wooden pier; at the end of the pier, winches and cranes lifted the bags of sugar onto the vessel alongside. Today, the line of broken pilings and all the landing’s machinery and crane and rigging, lies submerged beneath 12-15 feet of water at Waimānalo Beach Park.

The 86-foot ocean steamer “SS Waimānalo” (later renamed “SS John A. Cummins” or “Kaena”) owned by John Adams Cummins of the Waimanalo Sugar Plantation Company, made trips twice a week between stops in Koʻolaupoko (Heʻeia and Waimānalo) and Honolulu, exporting sugar and returning with supplies and goods.

Control of the plantation passed to W. G. Irwin and Co. in 1885, with Cummins continuing as manager. Cummins was ahead of the time in adopting a sort of “social welfare” plan for his employees, building a large structure containing a reading room and a section for dances and social gatherings for the plantation laborers.

It was decorated with Chinese and Japanese fans on the ceiling and pictures of King Kalākaua and other members of the royal family on the walls, and contained books, tables, an organ and singing canaries.

John Cummins left the sugar business to William G. Irwin, agent of Claus Spreckles, and developed a commercial building called the Cummins Block at Fort and Merchant streets in Downtown Honolulu.

In 1889 he represented Hawaiʻi at the Paris exposition known as Exposition Universelle. On June 17, 1890 he became Minister of Foreign Affairs in Kalākaua’s cabinet, and thus was in the House of Nobles of the legislature for the 1890 session.

He died on March 21, 1913 from influenza after a series of strokes and was buried in Oʻahu Cemetery.

Due to security concerns, an Executive Order from President Woodrow Wilson in 1917 significantly changed Waimānalo and Waimānalo Sugar Company – more than 1,500-acres belonging to the Waimānalo Sugar Company were converted to a military reservation.

In 1947, the plantation was shut down.

One lasting remnant of those plantation days is the Saint George Catholic Chapel. It is among the oldest parishes in Waimānalo. Built in 1842, it still has a sizable congregation, many of them descendants of the Portuguese and the Filipinos who worked for the sugar company.

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Waimanalo Sugar Plantation c1890s

1941_01_00 – Waimanalo sugar? SB BW photo.

Small flat cars piled high with sugarcane-(Smithsonian)

Plantation field worker hauling sugar cane up a handmade ramp onto the 4-wheel flat car-(Smithsonian)

‘Olomana’ and ‘Pokaa’ (Chloe) at work in Oahu on the Waimanalo Plantation

Locomotive ‘Thomas Cummins’ at Waimanalo

Hauling sugarcane to mill-(Smithsonian)

Engineer guiding train over temporary tracks-(Smithsonian)

Cars being hauled over temporary track-(Smithsonian)

14-1-14-38 =waimanalo plantation mill j.a.cummins photog- Kamehameha Schools Archives

John Adams Kuakini Cummins’ 80-foot steamer ‘Waimanalo’ anchored off the Waimanalo Sugar Company’s pier

Aerial_view_BellowsField_(note_sugar_cultivation)-1942

The old St George Church, ca. 1933 (StGeorgeChurchWaimanalo)

July 30, 2019 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Thomas Square

On January 22, 1850, the King’s Privy Council addressed “Another suggestion to set apart a day for marking out the boundaries of the square on the Plains of Waikiki to be called by the name of Admiral Thomas was also approved of by vote.” (Privy Council Minutes, January 22, 1850)

Then, on the anniversary of sovereignty restoration that year, “At sunrise a gun was fired, His Majesty’s large standard was hoisted at the Palace, the Hawaiian ensign on the Fort, on the Hill, and on all Hawaiian vessels.”

“At eight o’clock all the Foreign Consuls displayed their flags. The foreign vessels in port hoisted their ensigns, and some of them were beautifully decorated with flags, private signal, pendants, &c.”

“Amongst them all, was conspicuous HBM’s schooner Cockatrice, being dressed out with great taste, and having the Hawaiian ensign flying from the fore, during the day.”

“The merchant’s offices, warehouses, stores, and shops were more generally closed, than during any preceding anniversary.”

“It being generally known that it had been the King’s intention, had health permitted, to have ridden out in state, to the plain, and there given the name of Thomas Square, to the exact spot on which the gallant admiral of that name, restored his Flag, numerous parties on horseback, during the day, visited the spot.” (Polynesian, August 3, 1850)

“The restoration of the Hawaiian Monarchy in July 1843 – ending the five-months-long illegal seizure and occupation by the Englishman, Lord George Paulet – created the chief, and indeed the only, notable site in Kulaokahu‘a.”

“The exact locale – the future Thomas Square – leaped into history with, literally, a bang. On the morning of July 31, two pavilions decorated with greens and a flagstaff stood on the plain east of town.”

“On the street line to the west, tents from warships in port punctuated their arid surroundings. A thick mat of rushes paved the line of march. Thousands waited for the ceremonies of the day.”

“At 9:30, Rear Admiral Richard Thomas of the British navy called on the King to sign official documents. A half hour later, several companies of English sailors and marines were drawn up on a line facing the sea, with an artillery corps on their right.”

“Admiral Thomas and his staff arrived in the King’s state carriage, while the Monarch himself came on horseback, accompanied by the household troops. The artillery honored His Majesty with a 21-gun salute.”

“At a given signal, the British flag officer bowed his colors; the British flag was then lowered and the Hawaiian flag raised amid salvos, first from Thomas’s HMS Carysfort, then from English and American warships, merchantmen and whalers, and finally from the Honolulu fort and the Punchbowl battery.”

“A great cheer arose as the wind caught the folds of the Hawaiian flag. Admiral Thomas read a long declaration, after which marines, sailors, and artillery passed in a review witnessed by Commodore Lawrence Kearney and officers of the USS Constellation. Hawaii’s sovereignty had been restored.” (Greer)

Later, the Kingdom was looking for ways to replenish a budget shortfall. “In its search for additional funds, the official eye rested on Kulaokahu‘a, also called the Waikiki Plain or just The Plain.”

“This unpalatable stretch of real estate sprawled between the American mission and Makiki Stream. An area which an overheated promoter might have referred to as one of sweeping vistas, Kulaokahu‘a was best known for dust storms and impressive nothingness.”

“It was so empty that after Punahou School opened in July 1842, mothers upstairs in the mission house could see children leave that institution and begin their trek across the barren waste. Trees shunned the place; only straggling livestock inhabited it.” (Greer)

The government proposed to raise funds by selling lots in Kualokahu‘a and placed an advertisement in the Polynesian, “Building Lots – The Minister of the Interior is prepared to sell or lease Building Lots between Honolulu and Waikiki, on application being made according to law. [Nov. 14,1846]”

“In advance of this announcement, the government had built three roads with arched stone bridges. The former were extensions of King, Young, and Beretania Streets; the bridges spanned Makiki Stream. At about the same time certain lots were surveyed and numbered”.

“These preliminary sales hardly constituted a stampede. At this rate, great civilizations might have waxed and withered away ere the Waikiki Plain became a blooming, peopled suburb.” (Greer)

“Hoping to project a more urban image of The Plain, government decreed that after May 4, 1850 no horses, cattle, or other animals could run at large there. The creatures thus addressed could not decipher this message, and more than 30 years later agents were being appointed to take up strays.”

“As 1853 ended, the lots were ‘not in demand,’ a phrase repeated by Bishop in April 1855. Apparently Kulaokahu‘a’s desert environment transmitted dry rot to land values there.”

“Bishop wrote in 1856 that he had sold his two lots at auction for $25 each. Kulaokahu‘a plots were in mid-1858 almost worthless, only two or three of all sold having been improved.”

“In the early 1850s, some ceremonies celebrated the Restoration, but the practice faded away. As a recreational mecca, the dusty waste of the Square had the pull of a sauna in the Sahara. The Pacific Commercial Advertiser in 1864 called for a public park.”

“The unfenced and unimproved Thomas Square could have been made into an ornament of the city and a lever to raise property values around it. But this decorative hoist did not materialize. Nine years later, some small prospect of a park appeared.” (Greer)

“Honolulu now had a paper park in a paper subdivision.”

“But events move slowly in this Kingdom, except in the way of contracting debt, and for a long time Thomas Square was only a name.”

“In 1882 the Legislature appropriated a small sum of money for the improvement of Thomas Square, and every session since then money, in scant supply, has been voted for the same object.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, April 7, 1887)

“Very fortunately the control of Thomas Square was given to the Hon. A. S. Cleghorn, whose knowledge of landscape gardening is only equalled by his desire to beautify all public parks and grounds about Honolulu.”

“In the sixties little or no attention was paid to it, and it was soon overgrown with weeds. About 1875 I took charge and had the Square laid out and piped for water, and also had a band stand erected.” (Cleghorn; Thrum 1909)

“The Banyans now growing there are from ‘Ainahau,’ while most of the other trees are from the Government Nursery. There were crotans planted round the band stand and also in clusters about the grounds.” (Cleghorn; Thrum 1909)

“The square of seven acres had been laid out to scale in circles and half circles by the Hon. Robt. Stirling, and Mr. Cleghorn worked upon these plans.”

“Walks were laid out; valuable trees, flowering shrubs and flowers were planted, and an untiring supervision was given to the work, until today Thomas Square, at a trifling expenditure of money, is one of the most agreeable places of public resort to be found anywhere in the world compressed into the same limited space on a dead level.”

“But this did not suffice. Mr. Cleghorn, when the grounds had been sufficiently improved, went around among his friends in the city and raised sufficient money to build a grand stand for the band and provide seats for several hundred people in the grounds.”

“The grand stand was erected by Mr. F. Wilhelm, and is in every respect an improvement upon that in Emma Square. It is about double the size of the latter, and has a ceiling and sounding board.”

“There are thirty-four seats on the ground, ten of which are iron, recently imported from England. The remainder are of wood and were made to order here. They are fixtures.”

“The seats were placed in position yesterday. Hon. Mr. Cleghorn personally superintended the distribution of the seats, which afford shade during the day and an opportunity of enjoying the music by night. As a convenient and agreeable resort for all classes of citizens Thomas Square will be found unrivalled.”

“A wide path, close to the outer fence on its four sides is being opened, so that pedestrians may enjoy the luxury of an agree able promenade instead of walking along the dusty road.”

“The Royal Hawaiian Band, as already stated, plays at Thomas Square for the first time this evening. We bespeak a large and enthusiastic attendance.”

“Only one word of warning: do not touch plant or flower. These are grown for public gratification and should be held sacred. Let persons in charge of children remember this.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, April 7, 1887)

In 1925, a Joint Resolution of the legislative session set aside Thomas Square as a public park and placed it under the management of the Park Board of the City and County of Honolulu. It remains this today. It was recently refurbished by the City and a statue of Kamehameha III erected.

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Kulaokahua_Lots-Lawa-Reg1100-1885

Kulaokahua_GoogleEarth

No._2._View_of_Honolulu._From_the_Catholic_church._(c._1854)-Honolulu_to_Waikiki

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No._2._View_of_Honolulu._From_the_Catholic_church._(c._1854)-Honolulu_to_Waikiki-Detail

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Kawaiahao Church in 1885-Look towards Diamond Head

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Thomas Square-StarAdv

Thomas Square-Historic Hawaii Foundation

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1843 (July) – May 1845 Early version of the present flag

July 25, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Simon Metcalfe

Simon Metcalfe (sometimes spelled Metcalf) (1735-1794) was an American fur trader. He traded furs from the Pacific Northwest for goods from China.

Reportedly, Simon Metcalfe was the first American captain to take sea otters on the Northwest Coast and the first American to trade those skins in China.

Traders used Hawai‘i as a trading and provisioning site; they would take on food and water from Hawai‘i on their way across the Pacific.

Metcalf was, by all accounts, a snappish, irritable, harsh individual, who believed in strong and immediate punishment for infractions of his rules.

Two actions by Simon Metcalfe at the end of the 1700s set in motion a series of events that, without which, the history of Hawai‘i could have been very, very different.

In 1789, Simon Metcalf (captaining the Eleanora) and his son Thomas Metcalf (also a trader, captaining the Fair American); their plan was to meet and spend winter in the Hawaiian Islands.

Because of some infraction, Metcalf mistreated and insulted Kame‘eiamoku (some reports say Metcalfe had Kame‘eiamoku flogged – by the way, Kame‘eiamoku is one of the twins embossed on the Royal Coat of Arms.)

Metcalf then sailed to the neighboring island of Maui to trade along the coast (and ultimately initiated the Olowalu Massacre.)

Kame‘eiamoku vowed revenge on whatever American ship next came his way; the next one happened to be the Fair American. He overpowered the ship and turned it (and its weapons) and its only survivor, Isaac Davis, over to Kamehameha.

Unaware of the events and fate of the Fair American, the Eleanora returned from Maui and arrived at the Big Island; Captain Simon Metcalf sent his boatswain, John Young, ashore to see the country.

That evening, as Young attempted to return to his ship, Kamehameha’s forces detained him (Kamehameha had placed a kapu on anyone going on the ship.) Young was captured and Metcalf, unaware, was puzzled why Young did not return.

Metcalf waited two days for Young to return; finally, sensing danger or becoming frustrated, Metcalf departed and set sail for China (abandoning Young,) not knowing that his son had been killed not far away.

It’s not clear what happened right after Metcalfe left Hawai‘i in 1790.

It was reported, however, that, in 1794, after apparently friendly trading with the Haida natives in Canada, he and his ship were captured (there was only one survivor.)

Looking back at Metcalfe’s two significant events of 1790, it makes you wonder, what would Hawai‘i’s history be like after 1790 if (1) Metcalfe hadn’t insulted Kame‘eiamoku, who later sought revenge and (2) John Young had not gone ashore on their return from Maui.

As it turns out, Kamehameha befriended Young and Davis, who became respected translators and his close and trusted advisors. Their skill in gunnery, as well as the cannon and other weapons from the Fair American, helped Kamehameha win many battles.

With these two men and the weapons, Kamehameha’s military was successful in his eventual conquest and unification of the Hawaiian Islands; first to Maui in 1790 and then O‘ahu in 1795. (Art by Herb Kane.)

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