Lucy Thurston | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

July 28, 2024 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Sereno Edwards Bishop

Sereno Edwards Bishop was born at Kaʻawaloa on February 7, 1827; he was son of Rev. Artemas and Elizabeth (Edwards) Bishop (part of the Second Company of missionaries to Hawaiʻi (arriving April 27, 1823) and first stationed at Kailua, on the Big Island.)

Mrs Bishop had been a girlhood friend of Mrs Lucy G Thurston, who had preceded her to Hawaii as a missionary, some four years earlier. Mrs Bishop died February 28, 1828 at Kailua, the first death in the mission.

Mr. Bishop, Sr subsequently married Delia Stone, who was a member of the Third Company of missionaries (December 1, 1828.)

The missionaries’ house was usually in a thickly inhabited village, so the missionary and his wife could be close to their work among the people; the missionary children were typically cooped up in their home.

With hundreds of children all about them, missionary children had no playmates except the children of other missionaries, most of whom were scattered over the Islands, meeting only a few times a year. (Thurston)

“In the early-(1830s,) Kailua was a large native village, of about 4,000 inhabitants rather closely packed along one hundred rods of shore (about 1,650-feet,) and averaging twenty rods inland (about 330-feet.)”

“Near by stood a better stone house occupied by the doughty Governor Kuakiui. All other buildings in Kailua were thatched, until Rev. Artemas Bishop built his two-story stone dwelling in 1831 and Rev. Asa Thurston in 1833 built his wooden two-story house at Laniākea, a quarter of a mile inland.”

“The people had ample cultivable land in the moist upland from two to four miles inland at altitudes of one thousand to twenty-five hundred feet. It is a peculiarity of that Kona coast that while the shore may be absolutely rainless for months gentle showers fall daily upon the mountain slope.” (Bishop)

Sereno Bishop was sent to the continent at age 12 for education (he graduated from Amherst College in 1846 and Auburn Theological Seminary in 1851,) he married Cornelia A Session on May 31, 1852 and returned to Hawaiʻi on January 16, 1853.

His observation of Honolulu at the time noted, “The settled portion of the city was then substantially limited by the present
Alapaʻi and River streets and mauka at School street. There was hardly anything outside of those limits and the remainder was practically an open plain.”

“Above Beretania street, on the slopes and beyond Alapaʻi street, there was hardly a building of any nature whatever.”

“At that time there was a small boarding school for the children of the missions at Punahou, under direction of Father Dole. This little structure alone intervened between the city and Mōʻiliʻili, where about the church there were a few houses.” (Bishop)

Bishop assumed the position of Seaman’s Chaplain in Lāhainā. The Bishops remained nine years at Lahaina, where five children were born to them (two of the boys died at a young age.)

After 10-years in Lāhainā, he moved to Hāna and later returned to Lāhainā and served from 1865 to 1877 as principal of Lahainaluna. Mr. Bishop considered the work which he did among the native students at Lahainaluna was among the most fruitful of his life.

He left his mark at Lahainaluna, physically, in the shape of the grand avenue of monkey pods on the road to Lahaina, which he personally planted. (Thurston)

Bishop had a reputation as an amateur scientist with interests particularly in geology. Bishop’s contributions as an atmospheric scientist were sufficiently prominent to be mentioned in the Monthly Weather Review. (SOEST)

Rev. Sereno Bishop, a missionary in Hawaiʻi, was the first to provide detailed observations of a phenomenon not previously reported – he noted his observation on September 5, 1883. It was later named for him – Bishop’s Ring (a halo around the sun, typically observed after large volcanic eruptions.)

Bishop’s observations followed the eruption at Krakatoa (August 23, 1883.) His findings suggested the existence of the ‘Jet Stream’ (this used to be referred to as the ‘Krakatoa Easterlies.’)

“It now seems probable that the enormous projections of gaseous and other matter from Krakatoa (Krakatau) have been borne by the upper currents and diffused throughout a belt of half the earth’s circumference, and not improbably, as careful observation may yet establish, even entirely around the globe.” (Sereno Bishop)

Bishop made other volcanic observations; a hundred years ago, he noted Diamond Head was made in less than a hour’s time and is “composed not of lava, like the main mountain mass inland, but of this soft brown rock called tuff.” (Bishop, Commercial Advertiser, July 15, 1901)

In 1887, he moved to Honolulu and became editor of “The Friend,” a monthly journal, founded in Honolulu in 1843, “the oldest publication west of the Rocky Mountains.”

Bishop was identified as “the well-known mouthpiece of the annexation party” and criticized by royalists for his comments. He remained in Honolulu and died there March 23, 1909.

June 23, 2024 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Friday Female Meeting

The missionaries led busy lives, and the wives worked from dawn to well after dark. Their first and perhaps most monumental task was recording the Hawaiian language so that the scripture could be translated, and Hawaiians could be taught to read Hawaiian. (Fullard-Leo)

Before becoming members of the church, folks needed to be prepared. Those who belong to the po‘ahā are brought, in some degree, under the watch and care of the church, and, so far as they are conscientious, they are bound to correct principles and practices. (Missionary Herald)

Po‘ahā – Thursday – a reference to these Bible study meetings, held on Thursdays at Kawaiaha‘o Church in Honolulu, that prepared one for baptism and membership in the church congregation.

“The numbers of the natives, both men and women, who desired admission to the church, multiplied, and some were formed into classes which met weekly, on Thursday, for prayer, inquiry, and instruction, and from which candidates were, from time to time, selected, propounded, and received to fellowship.” (Bingham)

Then, “Under the direction of the missionary females, an association of women to meet weekly for prayer and improvement, was commenced on Friday of that week.”

“It embraced, at first, twelve or fifteen native females, among whom there appeared some evidence of sincere love to the truth, and of understanding the duty and privilege of prayer.” (Bingham)

Lucy Thurston, wife of Asa Thurston, and Elizabeth Bishop, wife of Artemas Bishop, “conceived the idea of endeavoring to lift our female population, by meeting with them every Friday PM.”

“We were each to sustain the responsibility of the thing, by alternately presiding at the meetings.” (Elizabeth (Edwards) Bishop had been childhood friend of Lucy (Goodale) Thurston; both became missionary wives who came at separate times, but were reunited in Hawai‘i.)

Lucy tells us, “For many months they have been attended. At first, I think, there was not an individual who had learned to say ‘Our Father.’ Now they can lead in prayer with great propriety, and think it a great privilege.”

“In acquiring this gift, they exhibit the greatest simplicity and freedom, never neglecting to exercise one talent, because they have not ten. With great freedom, and seriousness too, they express their religious convictions.”

“We read to them a portion of scripture. But Bible leaves in the Hawaiian language have been very scarce. Once I was driven to extremity, being obliged to take the first chapter of Matthew, the only portion remaining. That was the way they rehearsed the names of their own kings, and preserved them by simply retaining them in memory.”

“Two women of cultivated tenacious memories, came up to our house after meeting, and wished me to read that chapter again. After I did so, they assisted each other, and began by repeating the line of names from Abram to David, to the captivity, to Jesus. They went through successfully only asking aid in recalling two names.”

“One more subject was brought up in these meetings. This people were in a state of nature. There was only one point where I ever saw them exhibit shame. Both men and women were disposed and allowed to move around in public in a state of perfect nudity.”

“But if they appeared so without having one hand become a substitute for an apron of fig leaves, it would among themselves be severely condemned.”

“Childhood was ever taught to press in and be present at the birth of children. In all social acts, they too were taught to be alike skilled with those of adult years.”

“They divided and subdivided this knowledge, laid it up on their tongues, and then scattered it right and left to vaunt their own knowledge or promote their pastimes. Impurity of speech with both parents and children had become a giant in the land, stalking everywhere. We could not defy it in its native element.”

“But we were moved to drive it from our retired sitting rooms, the homes of our children. Whoever wished the privilege of crossing the thresholds to those apartments, consecrated to purity, must be subject to criticism. Whatever was there uttered which we disapproved, we penned, and read in the Friday meeting.”

“Thus we tried to give them a standard of what was right, and began by endeavoring to form a healthy moral atmosphere in two rooms, eighteen feet square, where natives were allowed to tread.”

“I carried my little manuscript book and pencil in my pocket, and used them on the spur of the occasion, and thus prepared notes for a future meeting.”

“I had a severe struggle with my own feelings in establishing these things, and passed painful, sleepless hours, lest I had offended. But it proved the reverse. For heavenly dews had prepared the soil to receive seed as into good and honest hearts.”

“Mr. Thurston has only been able to command time for his meals. From morning till night he has been in his study chair, with an individual or a cluster at his feet; sometimes a company of fifty or sixty, which entirely filled the room. Some days we have received calls from several hundreds.”

“I devote as much time to the instruction of the women as I can redeem from my family. My labors are more particularly directed to the members of the Friday Female Meeting.”

“Two years ago their names were enrolled and a discipline introduced. A moral standard was raised. Whoever wished to join the Society must forsake all their former vile practices, and pay an external regard to the Word and Worship of God.”

“They must uniformly have a full covering for their persons, both at home and abroad, and follow whatever is lovely and of good report. Such has since been the change in public opinion, that scenes which were then familiar to the eye, would now be scouted out of the village as shameful indecencies.”

“This Society has prospered; meetings were all divided into classes, and each class has a particular teacher to whom to look for instruction. The number of female teachers has risen to twenty, all hopefuly pious. This is my class. I teach them what I wish them to teach others.”

“The men’s society is conducted on the same plan. Two large thatched houses have been erected for the accommodation of these societies.” (Lucy Thurston, Life of Lucy Thurston)

Elizabeth (Edwards) Bishop died February 28, 1828, after a lingering and painful illness, the first adult death in the mission family. (Wagner)

The ‘Friday Female Meeting’ began in 1827, which in two years grew from 70 to 1,500 members, then by 1830, 2,600 women attended the weekly classes. (Zwiep)

“That organization being increased from time to time, has doubtless, in the course of twenty years, tended not only to call into healthful action many of its regularly entered members, and to incite others to the important duties which it was designed to encourage, but also in some measure to call down successive showers of spiritual blessings upon the nation.” (Bingham)

As noted by Lucy Thurston in 1830, “Mr. Thurston is entirely devoted to works of a public nature. My duties are of a more private character. I am the housekeeper, the mother, and the domestic teacher.”

“What time I can redeem from family cares, I give to our native females. Twenty-six hundred have been gathered into our Friday meetings. This society is in a very flourishing state.”

“As I cannot see them all at our house, I teach them by proxy, selecting from the most intelligent ones a class of teachers to come under my instructions.”

“When night closes upon me, and there is a suspension of maternal and domestic duties, I take my chosen season to meet the natives. I pass from a hushed nursery to the long dining room, where a table is extended for the accommodation of twenty-five.”

“It is lighted up and the women are in their seats. Our governor’s wife attends. It is on the whole a social interview. But one theme is before us in everyone’s hand. We turn over together the pages of Holy Writ, as it is issued from the press. The Word of God is powerful.”

“I have lived to see both sides of the picture. I saw this neglected portion of our race, groping along in all the darkness of nature, listening to messages from Heaven with indifference and contempt, and for a long time hearing as though they heard not.”

“Man can speak only to the ear. I looked again, and a secret energy was transforming their moral characters. Those very beings who were once bowing down to stocks of wood and stone, worshiping sharks and volcanoes, and slaves to all the sins which degrade human nature, are now sitting at the feet of Jesus, learning and doing his will.” (Lucy Thurston, October 30, 1830 letter)

February 16, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Kapa Moe

Hawaiian bark cloth was originally called kapa which literally translates to “the beaten thing.” Kapa was used for clothing, bed covers, items of trade and gift items, indicators of wealth and status and objects of ceremonial or religious events. (Romanchak)

Clothing consisted of three main items of apparel: the pāʻū or skirt for the women, the malo or loincloth for men and the Kihei or shawl for members of both sexes. (Romanchak)

Most kapa was made from the inner bark of the wauke plant (paper mulberry) because it made soft, white kapa. The bark is stripped, soaked, and then compressed into sheets with special patterned wooden beaters and finally dyed and decorated.

To make kapa, Hawaiian women used wooden mallets to pound the strips of bark together to form sheets of various sizes, textures, and thicknesses.

The kapa sheets were then decorated with stamps and painted with brushes made from the seed of the hala (pandanus) tree; kapa was colored by native dyes and decorated with block printing. (Arthur)

For bed covers, Hawaiian women made kapa moe consisting of five sheets of kapa. The top sheet was decorated, but the four sheets underneath were plain white kapa. The set of five sheets were sewn together on one side with thread made with strips of kapa. (Arthur)

The top layer was known as the kilohana, it was colored and decorated with pigments; the collective name for the inner kapa sheets was ‘iho.’ (Brigham) The loose-leaf design allowed the user to choose how many layers needed on a given night.

“(T)apa moe (sleeping cloth), made principally for the chiefs, who use it to wrap themselves in at night, while they sleep. It is generally three or four yards square, very thick, being formed of several layers of common tapa, cemented with gum, and beaten with a grooved mallet till they are closely interwoven. The colour is various, either white, yellow, brown or black according to the fancy of its owner.” (Brigham)

“During the ordinary summer weather along the coast the native use of the kapa moe in a close grass house would have been impossible to a white man, so warm is this covering. Sleeping in an open cave on the summit of Mauna Loa (13,675 ft) …”

“… I could not bear a kapa moe over my ordinary clothes, although water was freezing in the calabashes at my feet. In the morning the bedmaking in a native house consisted in carefully folding the kapa moe and putting it in a safe place.” (Brigham)

A notable kapa moe belonging to Princess Kaʻiulani was installed at the Art of the Pacific gallery at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (not currently on public view.) it is described as an unusually large five-layer kapa moe.

Kaeppler noted that the design of Kaʻiulani’s kapa moe may metaphorically incorporate the saying, “He aliʻi ke aloha, he kilohana e paʻa ai,” “Love is like a chief, the best prize to hold fast to,” in honor of Kaʻiulani. One corner of an underside white layer of the kapa is signed “Kaiulani.”

Kapa moe were gradually replaced by blankets. Later, another bed cover, the Hawaiian quilt, came into regular use.

The wives of American missionaries introduced the patchwork quilts and their construction to Hawaiians. The first missionary women arrived in 1820, and were warmly welcomed by some of the highest-ranking Hawaiian men and women.

Lucy Thurston, the wife of Asa, one of the first missionaries, recorded in her journal: “Monday morning, April 3rd (1820,) the first sewing circle was formed that the sun ever looked down upon in his Hawaiian realm. Kalākua, queen-dowager was directress.”

“She requested all the seven white ladies to take seats with them on mats, on the deck of the Thaddeus. Mrs. Holman and Mrs. Ruggles were executive officers to ply the scissors and prepare the work….The four native women of distinction were furnished with calico patchwork to sew – a new employment to them.” (Thurston)

November 4, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Finding a Bride

The Prudential Committee of the ABCFM announced that all overseas missionaries were required to have a wife before departure; their reason, the temptations for inappropriate relations were too great on the Polynesian islands.

Stories circulated about failed London Missionary Society stations where single male missionaries “went native” among South Sea islanders. (Brown)

Of the seven men in the Pioneer Company of missionaries to Hawai‘i, only Daniel Chamberlain was married; the other the six men had a little over a month to find brides before the October departure date.

Fortunately for the awkward seminarian men unaccustomed to courting women, the American Board kept an informal list of potential female candidates – all of them in their twenties – who expressed interest in missionary work in the past. (Brown)

At first, Hiram Bingham thought he had the hand of Sarah Shepard … but her father, the Rev Samuel Shepard, refused to allow his daughter to go to the Islands.

To which Sarah asked, “Is not this a plain intimation that providence desires to employ another and not me in the good work of Owhyhee?” (Shepard; Wagner)

Now, finding a wife was an unexpected obstacle.

A fellow missionary, Levi Parsons, had been engaged to a teacher – Miss Sybil Moseley … they were headed for a mission in Palestine.

However, at the last minute the ABCFM decided it was not safe for women there; so, Levi had to leave alone. Levi heard of Hiram’s dilemma and mentioned her to him.

On September 29, 1819, Hiram and Asa Thurston were ordained as missionary ministers. However, the occasion was more than just church protocol – as noted by Reverend Thompson, “there was a touch of romance. … … when Hiram met Sybil lingered most vividly in the recollections of the people in which they rightly regarded as a marked interposition of God’s good providence.”

He met Sybil there; “I gave her some account of myself, put into her hands a copy of my statement to the Prudential Committee in offering myself to the work, asked her to unite with me in it, and left her to consider till the next day whether she could give me encouragement, or not.”

Hiram then states, “the result you know”. Hiram and Sybil were married October 11.

“Asa Thurston’s early marital career, like his collegiate career, paralleled that of Hiram Bingham.” (Andrew) He thought he was to marry Miss Clapp … however, he notes in a September 7, 1819 letter to Rev Worcester of the ABCFM:

“In compliance with your request I send you a short statement of the business which called me to this place. I handed the letter which I brought with me to Mrs Clapp early on Wednesday morning & left her to reflect on the subject till afternoon when I had some further conversation with her on the question which was before her.”

“It appears, sir, that the good woman is decidedly opposed to have her daughter engage in the mission to Owhyhee. She seems to think it improper for females to go to the heathen as missionaries at all. No reasons however were offered except such as were stated in that letter which you read.”

“Mr Clapp was not at home though I inquired respecting his opinion on the subject, & Mrs Clapp observed that his opinion was if possible more decided that hers that females should not engage in missions to the heathen.”

“I did not this it proper to urge the matter. I found that the letter from yourself & Dr Woods had no influence to change her opinion on the subject. She seemed to think that if Dr Wocester or Dr Woods was placed in her situation, that they would decide as she had done. – I think, sir, I can cheerfully say respecting this whole affair, ‘The will of the Lord be done.’”

“PS I shall make proposals to no other on without some degree of certainty as to success.” (Asa Thurston to Rev Samuel Worcester, September 7, 1819)

Asa Thurston eventually married Lucy Goodale Thurston from Marlborough, Massachusetts, and graduate of Bradford Academy. Years later, Lucy remembered their first family-arranged meeting as a shy-yet-playful occasion, “Then one by one the family dispersed, leaving two of similar aspirations, introduced at sunset as strangers, to separate at midnight as interested friends.”

The Thurstons proved to be a devout couple that famously grew old and died together on the desolate missionary station of Kailua and were fondly remembered as the “grandparents” of the Hawai‘i mission by Americans and Hawaiians alike.

The marriages of the assistant missionaries were equally hasty, yet oddly fitting and felicitous. Samuel Ruggles found a bride in Nancy Wells Ruggles from East Windsor, Connecticut, while Dr. Holman, the physician, conveniently married Samuel’s attractive older sister, Lucia Ruggles Holman.

Samuel, who suffered a long bout of seasickness on the Thaddeus, thanked God for the pairing: “Dear girl she has been severely tried with her sick husband…I cannot forbear to mention how greatly the Lord has favored me in a companion. She is all and more than I could reasonably ask.”

Samuel Whitney joined in matrimony with Mercy Partridge Whitney from Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Halfway through the journey on the Thaddeus, Mercy pledged in her journal:

“He is worthy of my sincere and lasting attachment. It shall ever be my constant study to make his life pleasant and useful. And should I be a means of lightening his cares or contributing in any measure to his happiness, I shall be doubly compensated.”

The youngest Elisha Loomis found a bride in Maria Theresa Sartwell Loomis from Hartford, New York, who was three years older than the teenager. (Brown)

On October 23, 1819, the Pioneer Company of American Protestant missionaries from the northeast US set sail on the Thaddeus for Hawai‘i. With the missionaries were four Hawaiian students from the Foreign Mission School, Thomas Hopu, William Kanui, John Honoliʻi and Prince Humehume (son of Kauai’s King Kaumuali‘i.)

Over the course of a little over 40-years (1820-1863) (the “Missionary Period”,) about 184-men and women in twelve Companies served in Hawaiʻi to carry out the mission of the ABCFM in the Hawaiian Islands.

This is just a summary; click HERE for more information.

Follow Peter T Young on Facebook

Follow Peter T Young on Google+

Follow Peter T Young on LinkedIn

Follow Peter T Young on Blogger

Hiram_and_Sybil_Moseley_Bingham,_1819-head of Pioneer Company

August 3, 2018 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Barque Flora

Francis Allyn Olmsted took a voyage to Hawai‘i, to which he noted, “During the latter part of my collegiate course, my health became very much impaired by a chronic debility of the nervous system, and soon after graduating, the cold air of Autumn admonished me to seek a milder clime for spending the winter.”

“While deliberating upon what would be most desirable in accomplishing the purposes I had in view, a favorable opportunity was offered me to go out as passenger in the whale-ship ‘North America,’ which was fitting out at New-London for a voyage to the Pacific.” (Olmstead)

He sailed as a passenger on the whale-ship ‘North America,’ that sailed from New-London, Connecticut, leaving on October 11, 1839 and arriving at O‘ahu on May 22, 1840, “having sailed more than five thousand miles in a leaky ship, with the pumps going night and day.”

After spending a little over 3-months in the Islands, on August 3, 1840, Olmstead, “bade a long adieu to many kind friends at Honolulu, and established myself in my quarters aboard the barque ‘Flora,’ Captain Spring, bound for New York.” (Olmstead)

“The Flora, is a barque of about two hundred and ninety-three tons burden, nearly a hundred tons smaller than the ‘North America’, and in many other respects is her inferior. She is a merchant vessel, and arrived at Honolulu a short time since, with stores for the Exploring Expedition (Wilkes Expedition).”

“The Flora, is chartered by one of the mercantile houses at Honolulu, and is principally freighted with sugar and molasses, novel exports from the Hawaiian Islands to the United States, a distance of eighteen thousand miles. …”

“The cabin of the Flora is very small, having three state-rooms, one of which belonging to the captain is the only one whose dimensions were intended, for comfort.”

“As the other two are situated upon each quarter of the ship, they are conformed to the shape of the vessel, and are somewhat triangular in their outlines, which renders them very inconvenient; for with the large sea chest I am obliged to admit into mine, there is hardly room enough left to stand up securely.”

“There are twenty passengers in all, who, with the exception of two or three that are to be left at the Society Islands, are to constitute a community by ourselves for many a month, while roving the ocean, in the long voyage to our native land. …” (Olmstead)

Among the passengers were Hiram and Sybil Bingham (and family); Mrs Lucy Thurston and children; and Caroline Armstrong, 9-year-old daughter of missionaries Richard and Clarissa Armstrong).

“The character of the passengers, gives the fairest promises of a happy and profitable voyage. Mr. and Mrs. Bingham, after a residence of twenty years at these remote isles of the sea, during which, amid toils and privations of which we have no adequate conception …”

“… they have seen the christian religion established among a race of idolaters, and have given permanency to a language existing but from generation to generation, have now embarked with their family of three young children, to revisit the land of their fathers, for the recovery of their health …”

“… and then to return again to these islands, after bidding farewell forever to their children, and committing them to the care of a benevolent public.”

“The tide of contending emotions that agitate their hearts can only be imagined. With the thousand perplexities and cares attendant upon making preparation for so long a voyage …”

“… and in separating themselves perhaps forever from a people that had grown up under their instruction, and to whom they had become tenderly attached, they were almost exhausted, and it seemed like a renewal of that depressing sorrow that attended their departure from their native land.”

“The poor natives accompanied them in crowds as they came down to the ship, and thronged the dock, with sorrow depicted in their countenances.”

“Soon the voice of wailing, which had been heard from one or two, became general, and a note of wild lamentation burst forth in a deafening chorus, until by the efforts of two or three of the missionaries, the sorrow of the people was restrained to a more quiet demonstration of their grief.”

“I could not but admire the heroic fortitude with which Mrs. Thurston tore herself away from her affectionate husband, to voyage with her family, consisting of two sons and three daughters, to a far distant country, which had almost become a foreign land, after an exile of twenty years.”

“Poor Mr. Thurston! When he returns to his home upon the rocky shore of Hawaii, how heavily must the lonesome hours pass by, which are no longer enlivened by the presence of his beloved family.”

“There are a father and mother too, who with bursting hearts, commit their little daughter (Caroline Armstrong), of only nine years of age, to the care of Mrs. Bingham, to be borne far away from their presence to a land of strangers.” (Olmstead)

Caroline Armstrong, looking at her father on the shore, the distance between them widening every moment … “Oh, father, dear father, do take me back!” (Judd)

Her plea echoed in the hearts of the community. In June of that year the mission voted to establish a school for the missionary children at Punahou. (Emanuel)

“Such are some of the heart-rending scenes that are often exhibited in the missionaries’ rife, who not only exile themselves from all they hold dear in their native land, but are ready to sunder every tie of affection, if required by a sense of duty.” (Olmstead)

“We stood alone in thus making the experiment of retaining children on heathen ground. At this time, when the mission was in its twentieth year, more than forty missionaries’ children have been conveyed away by parents, that have retired from this field of labor.”

“Eighteen have been scattered about in the fatherland without parents.” (Lucy Thurston) She was on the trip with her children to provide them with educational opportunities.

“Divine Providence seemed to indicate that one or both of the ordained pioneers of the mission should leave the ground temporarily, at least, though both could not well be spared at once.”

“Mr. and Mrs. Thurston, who thought it their duty to convey their children to the United States, myself, and Mrs. B., with health much impaired had permission to visit our native land. Mrs. B. was too much worn out to go without her husband.”

“Mr. T. chose to stand at his post at Kailua, and send his family with mine, and trusted the arrangement for their children with Mrs. T., the Board, and private friends. Mr. Armstrong took my post at Honolulu.” (Hiram Bingham)

They first headed to Tahiti, then headed to Cap Horn – Friday, January 1, 1841. Land ho! At four bells in the forenoon watch, the dim outline of the coast of South America, was just discernible through the gloom resting upon it, the first sight of terra-firma that has greeted our eyes since leaving Tahiti, a period of three months.”

Then, Wednesday, February 3. At daylight, this morning, the low outline of the coast of the United States, was seen stretching along to the westward of us, not more than ten or twelve miles off. … (February 4, 1841) we came to anchor off Sandy Hook, in six months from the Sandwich Islands.” (Olmstead) (Image shows the North America.)

Follow Peter T Young on Facebook

Follow Peter T Young on Google+

Follow Peter T Young on LinkedIn

Follow Peter T Young on Blogger

North America