Missionaries | Page 24 | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

January 12, 2018 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Not the Foreign Riffraff

“The coming of the missionaries was the real beginning of civilisation in the Islands. Up to 1820 the outside world had given the Hawaiians little beside trinkets, firearms, rum, and more expert methods of deceit.”

“Now it was to give to them their part in the civilisation of Western nations, to teach them that this involved the acceptance of new and higher ideals of conduct, of a religion to replace their outworn superstitions; that it meant a life regulated according to civilised law.”

“The missionaries undoubtedly went to Hawaii fired with the desire to save souls in danger of eternal damnation. They seem very quickly to have realised that wholesale baptism, misunderstood, was less important than a general quickening of spirit, a training in the decencies of life.”

“They never neglected the religious side of their teaching, but they also never neglected the secular side. They learned the Hawaiian language; they reduced it to writing and imported printing presses; they did their best as doctors and taught the elementary rules of health.”

“At first only permitted to land on sufferance, they soon became of prime importance to the chiefs, and were their advisers on almost all questions.”

“It is fair to them to say that if this function seemed an undue extension of their religious duties – and their severest critics never accuse them of anything else …”

“… they were the only foreigners in the Islands who would advise the chiefs impartially, and the only ones, moreover, who would have advised in such fashion as to save the dwindling remnants of the Hawaiian race.”

“They were pioneers seeking results in better men, not in riches for themselves; they were trying to give the people their own standards of decency and honour.”

“This soon resulted in bitter opposition from the foreign riffraff who infested the Islands, and especially from the ships that called more and more frequently.”

“It was the fixed belief of ship captains in those distant days that no laws, whether of God or man, were in force west of Cape Horn.”

“The call at Hawaii for water and provisions was most of all an opportunity for debauchery and unchecked crime. Hawaiian women were often captured and carried off on cruises to the North.”

“When a whaler appeared off the coast many of the native women fled to the mountains as their only sure protection. It is easy to understand, therefore, that when the King promulgated laws against immorality, laws evidently intended to be enforced …”

“… the whaling crews considered themselves cheated out of their rights and turned with rage against the missionaries, whom they correctly held to be responsible. In more than one instance brutal attacks were made on missionaries in isolated stations, who were saved only by the devoted natives.”

“It is sad to think that the commander of a United States frigate was among the most insolent in the demand for the repeal of these laws against vice, and that he permitted his men to attack both the house of a chief and the mission premises in Honolulu for the purpose of frightening the Government into submission.”

“Drink was carrying off the Hawaiians by hundreds, and when, in recognition of the danger, a heavy duty was laid on spirits, it was the commander of a French frigate who gave the King a few hours to decide whether he would abolish the duty or undertake a war with France.”

“These outrages and many others of a similar kind directed against efforts really to uplift the country were seconded by a party in Honolulu, a party, unfortunately, headed by the British consul who was for years allowed to retain his post in spite of repeated protests and requests for his removal on the part of the Hawaiian Government. …”

“(Kawaiaha‘o Church) is the impressive monument of the early missionary labour. It was dedicated in 1842 and was the royal chapel until the coming of the English Mission twenty years later.”

“Built of blocks of coral, it is in shape a rectangle. Over the main entrance is a low, square tower, which used to have an inappropriate wooden spire.”

“White, surrounded with huge algaroba trees, through the filmy leaves of which perpetual sun light plays, it typifies in its Puritanic dignity and rigorous simplicity the lasting work of its founders.”

“Behind it, in a cemetery as unpretentious as they were themselves, most of these founders are buried. Beyond, in the section of the town formerly known as the Mission, what remain of their houses are clustered.”

“One of these, the Cooke homestead, which was the first frame house built in the Islands, is now a missionary museum. The Castle homestead, greatly enlarged from the original, one-story plaster cottage”.

“Whatever one may think of missionary work in general, whatever absurd tales one may hear of the self-seeking of these particular missionaries …”

“… the imagination and the heart must be touched by this plain old church and these pathetic little old houses where, nearly a hundred years ago, a band of devoted men and women, desperately poor, separated by six months from home and friends, gave up their lives to what they believed was God’s work.”

“That their children and their grandchildren chose, most of them, to remain in this land of their birth and to enter secular life; that they have largely guided politics and business, has been a lasting blessing to the Islands.”

“Their presence only has made the people capable of becoming normally and naturally American citizens.” (All here is from Castle, 1913)

Jon Yasuda, who worked on the translation of the Ali‘i Letters Collection noted,

“The missionaries, when they came, they may have been the first group who came with a [united] purpose. They came together as a group and their purpose was to spread the Gospel the teachings of the Bible. …”

“But the missionaries who came, came with a united purpose … and literacy was a big part of that. Literacy was important to them because literacy was what was going to get the Hawaiians to understand the word of the Bible … and the written word became very attractive to the people, and there was a great desire to learn the written word. … Hawai‘i became the most literate nation at one time.”

Puakea Nogelmeier had a similar conclusion. In a remarks at a Hawaiian Mission Houses function he noted, “The missionary effort is more successful in Hawai‘i than probably anywhere in the world, in the impact that it has on the character and the form of a nation. And so, that history is incredible; but history gets so blurry …”

“The missionary success cover decades and decades becomes sort of this huge force where people feel like the missionaries got off the boat barking orders … where they just kind of came in and took over. They got off the boat and said ‘stop dancing,’ ‘put on clothes,’ don’t sleep around.’”

“And it’s so not the case ….”

“The Hawaiians had been playing with the rest of the world for forty-years by the time the missionaries came here. The missionaries are not the first to the buffet and most people had messed up the food already.”

“(T)hey end up staying and the impact is immediate. They are the first outside group that doesn’t want to take advantage of you, one way or the other, get ahold of their goods, their food, or your daughter. … But, they couldn’t get literacy. It was intangible, they wanted to learn to read and write”. (Puakea Nogelmeier)

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Hawaiian Mission Houses

December 29, 2017 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

John Fawcett Pogue

Maria Kapule Whitney was born October 19, 1820 to the Pioneer Company missionaries/teachers, Samuel and Mercy Whitney.

She was “the first haole girl to be born in the Hawaiian archipelago,” and named for Kauai Chiefess Kapule, wife of Kauai’s King Kaumualiʻi. Maria went to the mainland at the age of six to be educated. She graduated class of 1840 from Mt. Holyoke College.

John Fawcett Pogue son of William and Ruth Pogue, was born in Wilmington, Delaware on December 29, 1814. He graduated from Marietta College, 1840, and Lane Theological Seminary, 1843.

Ordained as a missionary minister on November 6, 1843, he was part of the 11th Company of American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, sailing from Boston Harbor on December 4, 1843, arriving in the Islands on July 15, 1844. Maria Kapule Whitney was also part of the 11th Company and served as an educator.

Pogue, an active, eager young associate, first served at Kōloa, Kauai, until July, 1847, then he went to Kealakekua Bay.

John and Maria married on May 29, 1848. (They eventually had four children, Samuel Whitney 1849-1902; Jane Knox 1851-1932; Emily Elizabeth 1853-1910 and William Fawcett 1856-1952.)

Pogue was later assigned to lead Lahainaluna Seminary; he followed prior principals, Rev Lorrin Andrews, Rev Sheldon Dibble, Rev John S Emerson, Rev William P Alexander and Rev Timothy D Hunt. (Alexander)

The school had been established in 1831 by the American Protestant missionaries of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.

It was dedicated to three major principles: 1) to train native men to become assistant teachers of the Christian religion; 2) to spread sound knowledge of literature and science to elevate the Hawaiian people from their present ignorance of these subjects; and 3) to qualify Hawaiians to be school teachers to their own people.

The school began with one teacher, the Reverend Lorrin Andrews, who was also its principal and a member of its board of directors. Four other ordained ministers made up the board.

The school followed the pattern of education in Head, Heart and Hand, with instruction in secular subjects, religious and moral training and also to teach technical subjects such as printing and methods of agriculture.

Not long after its opening, the school became a boarding school and began to earn a reputation as Hawaii’s most educational institution. It was called the Mission Seminary and one of its important objectives was to train Hawaiians for the ministry. (Joerger)

The pupils of the seminary were the most promising youth from fourteen to twenty years of age who could be selected from the schools of the islands. Tuition was free; but the pupils were obliged to provide their own food, which they did by cultivating a fine tract of taro land.

To the Hawaiian people this institution was a university, completing their education for school-teaching, for law practice and civil service, and for the ministry. (Alexander) Graduates of Lahainaluna began to fill their places in Hawaiian society.

In time the graduates of this one institution made up the Hawaiian Christian ministers, scholars, politicians, lawyers, government officials, and the like, who were directing much of the course of Hawaiian life in the Kingdom.

In 1849 the mission decided that it could no longer support completely Lahainaluna. In that year, the school came under the control of the government of the Hawaiian Kingdom. But the mission still preserved its influence over the curriculum and the selection of teachers.

Moreover, the school began to concentrate on secular subjects and to decrease its training for the ministry. This change was primarily undertaken because other seminaries then existed for the training of Hawaiians for the ministry.

Instead the curriculum continued to teach both academic subjects such as literature and science and theology and practical subjects such as bookkeeping and in the manual arts such as agriculture.

Reverend Pogue spent ten years as the principal of Lahainaluna, after he had spent many previous years there as a teacher. During his administration the main building was destroyed by fire.

And it is to the credit of the school and its standing in the Islands that while the Government provided the main support in money, the community responded with donations for the rebuilding project. Three new and elegant, convenient buildings were completed while the Reverend Pogue was still principal.

In 1865, a further change in the status of the school occurred when it was placed under the direction of the Board of Education. Lahainaluna then became an ordinary, government school. In 1866 Reverend Pogue ended his years as principal of the school. (Joerger)

Pogue then went to Waiohinu (1866-69) then later served as Secretary to the Hawaii Evangelical Association. Rev John F Pogue died suddenly of Bright’s disease (chronic inflammation of the kidneys), December 4, 1877, at Laramie, Wyoming, while on a trip to the US; in 1882 Maria and her family relocated to California. She died in Santa Clara on April 20, 1900.

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Pogue, John Fawcett-1875

December 26, 2017 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

The Aliʻi, the Missionaries and Hawaiʻi

On October 23, 1819, the Pioneer Company of American Protestant missionaries from the northeast US, led by Hiram Bingham, set sail on the Thaddeus for the Hawaiian Islands.

Over the course of a little over 40-years (1820-1863 – the “Missionary Period”,) about 180-men and women in twelve Companies served in Hawaiʻi to carry out the mission of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) in the Hawaiian Islands.

Collaboration between native Hawaiians and the American Protestant missionaries resulted in, among other things, the introduction of Christianity, the creation of the Hawaiian written language, widespread literacy, the promulgation of the concept of constitutional government, making Western medicine available and the evolution of a new and distinctive musical tradition (with harmony and choral singing).

By the time the Pioneer Company arrived, Kamehameha I had died and the centuries-old kapu system had been abolished; through the actions of King Kamehameha II (Liholiho,) with encouragement by his father’s wives, Queens Kaʻahumanu and Keōpūolani (Liholiho’s mother,) the Hawaiian people had already dismantled their heiau and had rejected their religious beliefs.

The kapu system was the common structure, the rule of order, and religious and political code. This social and political structure gave leaders absolute rule and authority. In addition to the abolition of the old ways, Kaʻahumanu created the office of Kuhina Nui (similar to premier, prime minister or regent) and would rule as an equal with Liholiho – this started the shift from absolute rule to shared rule.

Introduction of Christianity

Within five years of the initial arrival of the missionaries, a dozen chiefs had sought Christian baptism and church membership, including the king’s regent Kaʻahumanu. The Hawaiian people followed their native leaders, accepting the missionaries as their new priestly class. (Schulz)

Kamakau noted of her baptism, “Kaʻahumanu was the first fruit of the Kawaiahaʻo church … for she was the first to accept the word of God, and she was the one who led her chiefly relations as the first disciples of God’s church.”

Creation of the Hawaiian Written Language

When Captain Cook first made contact with the Hawaiian Islands in 1778, Hawaiian was a spoken language but not a written language. Historical accounts were passed down orally, through oli (chants) and mele (songs.)

After Western contact and attempts to write about Hawaiʻi, early writers tried to spell words based on the sound of the words they heard. People heard words differently, so it was not uncommon for words to be spelled differently, depending on the writer.

In addition to preaching the gospel, one of the first things Bingham and his fellow missionaries did was begin to learn the Hawaiian language and create an alphabet for a written format of the language. The 12-letter we use today was established by the missionaries on July 14, 1826.

Widespread Literacy

The missionaries established schools associated with their missions across the Islands. This marked the beginning of Hawaiʻi’s phenomenal rise to literacy. The chiefs became proponents for education and edicts were enacted by the King and the council of Chiefs to stimulate the people to reading and writing.

By 1831, in just eleven years from the first arrival of the missionaries, Hawaiians had built over 1,100-schoolhouses. This covered every district throughout the eight major islands and serviced an estimated 53,000-students. (Laimana)

The proliferation of schoolhouses was augmented by the missionaries printing of 140,000-copies of the pī¬ʻāpā (elementary Hawaiian spelling book) by 1829 and the staffing of the schools with 1,000-plus Hawaiian teachers. (Laimana)

By 1853, nearly three-fourths of the native Hawaiian population over the age of sixteen years were literate in their own language. The short time span within which native Hawaiians achieved literacy is remarkable in light of the overall low literacy rates of the United States at that time. (Lucas)

Constitutional Government

King Kamehameha III asked missionary William Richards (who had previously been asked to serve as Queen Keōpūolani’s religious teacher) to become an advisor to the King as instructor in law, political economy and the administration of affairs generally.

Richards gave classes to King Kamehameha III and his Chiefs on the Western ideas of rule of law and economics. His decision to assist the King ultimately resulted in his resignation from the mission, when the ABCFM board refused to allow him to be in the mission while assisting the King.

Of his own free will, King Kamehameha III granted the Constitution of 1840, as a benefit to his country and people, that established his Government upon a declared plan. (Rex v. Booth – Hanifin)

That constitution introduced the innovation of representatives chosen by the people (rather than as previously solely selected by the Aliʻi.) This gave the common people a share in the government’s actual political power for the first time.

Western Medicine

Judd, a doctor by training, had originally come to the islands to serve as the missionary physician. While in that role, Judd set up part of the basement in the Mission House as a Western medicine pharmacy and doctor’s office, beginning in 1832.

Judd wrote the first medical book in the Hawaiian language and later formed the first medical school in the Islands. Ten students were accepted when it opened in 1870, all native Hawaiians (the school had a Hawaiians-only admissions policy.)

Later (when Richards was sent on a diplomatic mission to the US and Europe to recognize the rights of a sovereign Hawaiʻi,) King Kamehameha III asked missionary Gerrit P Judd to resign from the mission and serve as his advisor and translator.

Distinctive Musical Tradition

Another lasting legacy left by the missionaries in the Islands related to music. Some songs were translations of Western songs into Hawaiian; some were original verse and melody.

Oli and mele were already a part of the Hawaiian tradition. “As the Hawaiian songs were unwritten, and adapted to chanting rather than metrical music, a line was measured by the breath; their hopuna, answering to our line, was as many words as could be easily cantilated at one breath.” (Bingham)

Missionaries used songs as a part of the celebration, as well as learning process. “At this period, the same style of sermons, prayers, songs, interrogations, and exhortations, which proves effectual in promoting revivals of religion, conversion, or growth in grace among a plain people in the United States, was undoubtedly adapted to be useful at the Sandwich Islands. … some of the people who sat in darkness were beginning to turn their eyes to the light”. (Bingham)

“In view of the fact that the best modern Hawaiian music, now known the world over, owes much to the musical form of these early hymns, one wishes that history had been less restrained. Yet, even in default of any direct, consecutive record, one may piece out quite a little of the story of Hawaiian hymns from references in early letters and accounts of their printing.”

“And when one has the good fortune to touch with one’s own hands many of the early songbooks printed in Hawaiian, the search toward a complete account of them becomes a fascinating pursuit.” (Wilcox; Damon The Friend, March 1935)

“When our Protestant missionaries came to hymnody in Hawaiian – as they very soon did – they reared a natural superstructure upon this rich and rhythmical foundation of the Bible. It was a veritable treasure house.”

“But strangely, too, another very deep-seated source of balance and rhythm and figured speech flowed in the cultural consciousness of the Hawaiian people to whom these new Christian messages were being brought. Instinct in the Hawaiian mode of thought was the impulse and the act of prayer, of supplication, of praise.” (Wilcox; Damon The Friend, March 1935)

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MISSION-HOUSES-drawing-by-James-P.-Chamberlain-LOC-ca-1860

December 20, 2017 by Peter T Young 2 Comments

Seeds to the Hawaiian Mission

American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) had its origin in the desire of several young men in the Andover Theological Seminary to preach the gospel in the heathen world. (The term ‘heathen’ (without the knowledge of Jesus Christ and God) was a term in use at the time (200-years ago.))

“The Board has established missions, in the order of time in which they are now named at Bombay, and Ceylon; among the Cherokees, Choctaws, and the Cherokees of the Arkansaw ….” (Missionary Herald)

The following are portions of a December 20, 1809 letter written by Samuel J Mills to the Rev. Gordon Hall, then a student in the Theological Seminary at Andover (he was later a Missionary in the island of Bombay.)

It speaks of ‘Ōpūkaha’ia and his influence in establishing the Hawaiian Islands Mission.

“Very Dear Brother, I received your kind letter, and feel much indebted to you. I have been in this place about two months. When I came, I found my worthy friend E. Dwight here …”

“… I roomed with him about two weeks, and then removed my quarters to the Rev. Mr. Stewart’s, with whom I have lived to the present time. As every day is not so singularly spent by me as this has been, I will notice something not a little extraordinary.”

“To make my narrative understood, you must go back with me to my first arrival in this place. Mr. Dwight, I then found, was instructing a native Owhyean boy. Two natives of this island arrived here five or six months ago, and this was one of them.”

“As I was in the room with Mr. Dwight, I heard the youth recite occasionally, and soon became considerably attached to him. His manners are simple; he does not appear to be vicious in any respect, and he has a great thirst for knowledge.”

“In his simple manner of expressing himself, he says, ‘The people in Owhyhee very bad – they pray to gods made of wood. Poor Indians don’t know nothing.’”

“He says, ‘Me want to learn to read this Bible, and go back then, and tell them to pray to God up in heaven.’ (Not having a place to stay,) I told him he need not be concerned; I would find a place for him. …”

“I told him he might go home with me, and live at my father’s, and have whatever he wanted. He then came with me to my room. I heard him read his lesson, and attempted to instruct him in some of the first principles of Christianity, of which he was almost entirely ignorant. …”

“I told him further, that as my father was one of the Missionary Trustees, he would no doubt obtain for him a support, if it was thought best to educate him, which is my intention to attempt so far as that he may be able to instruct his countrymen, and, by God’s blessing, convert them to Christianity. To this he could hardly object. …”

“He had been talking with the President of the College, and I told him I would see him on the subject … (and I) related to him a part of my plan, which was that Obookiah should go with me to my father’s, and live with him this winter …”

“… and be instructed in the first principles of reading and writing, as well as of Christianity, where he would be abundantly furnished with the means of acquiring both. …”

“The President came fully into the opinion that this was the most eligible course which could be pursued, if Obookiah was willing to go. Obookiah is his Indian name, and he is seventeen years old, I told him he would be glad to go; he was without a home – without a place to eat, or sleep.”

“The poor and almost friendless Owhyean would sit down disconsolate, and the honest tears would flow freely down his sunburn face; but since this plan has been fixed upon, he has appeared cheerful, and feels quite at ease.”

“I propose to leave town in two weeks, with this native of the South to accompany me to Torringford, where I intend to place him under the care of those whose benevolence is without a bond to check, or a limit to confine it. Here I intend he shall stay until next spring, if he is contented. Thus, you see, he is likely to be firmly fixed by my side.”

“What does this mean? Brother Hall, do you understand it? Shall he be sent back unsupported, to attempt to reclaim his countrymen?”

“Shall we not rather consider these southern islands a proper place for the establishment of a mission?”

“Not that I would give up the heathen tribes of the west. I trust we shall be able to establish more than one mission in a short time, at least in a few years; and that God will enable us to extend our views and labours further than we have before contemplated.”

“We ought not to look merely to the heathen on our own continent, but to direct our attention where we may, to human appearance, do the most good, and where the difficulties are the least. We are to look to the climate – established prejudices – the acquisition of language – the means of subsistence, &c. &c.”

“All these things, I apprehend, are to be considered. The field is almost boundless; in every part of which, there ought to be Missionaries.”

“In the language of an animated writer, but I must say, ‘he is of another country – O that we could enter at a thousand gates, that every limb were a tongue, and every tongue a trumpet to spread the Gospel sound!’”

“The men of Macedonia; cry, Come over and help us. This voice is heard from the north and from the south, and from the east, and from the west.”

“O that we might glow with desire to preach the Gospel to the heathen, that is altogether irresistible! The spirit of burning hath gone forth. The camp is in motion. The Levites, we trust, are about to bear the vessels, and the great command is, Go Forward.”

“Let us, my dear brother, rely with the most implicit confidence, on those great, eternal, precious promises contained in the word of God: …”

“‘And Jesus answered and said, verily I say unto you, There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake and the Gospel’s, but he shall receive an hundred fold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come, eternal life.’”

“Be strong, therefore, and let not your hands be weak, for your work shall be rewarded. ‘Gird thy sword upon thy thigh, O most mighty, with thy glory and thy majesty; and in thy majesty ride prosperously, because of truth, and meekness, and righteousness; and thy right hand “shall teach thee terrible things.’” Let us exclaim with the poet:

Come then, and added to thy many crowns,
Receive yet one, the crown of all the earth.
Thou who alone art worthy! It was thine
By ancient cov’nant, e’er nature’s birth,
And thou hast made it thine by purchase since,
And overpaid its value with thy blood.”

By 1816, contributions to the ABCFM had declined. There were several reasons including post-War of 1812 recession and the fact that India and Ceylon (Sri Lanka) were too remote to hold public interest. (Wagner)

Folks saw a couple options: bring Indian and foreign youth into white communities and teach them there, or go out to them and teach them in their own communities. They chose the former. They formed the Foreign Mission School in Cornwall CT.

The school’s first student was Henry ʻŌpūkahaʻia (Obookiah,) a native Hawaiian from the Island of Hawaiʻi who in 1808-1809 (after his parents had been killed) boarded a sailing ship anchored in Kealakekua Bay and sailed to the continent. In its first year, the Foreign Mission School had 12 students, more than half of whom were Hawaiian.

At the beginning of the school’s tenure, ‘Ōpūkaha‘ia was considered a leader of the student body, excelling in his studies, expressing his fondness for and understanding of the importance of the agricultural labor, and qualifying for a full church membership due to his devotion to his new faith.

ʻŌpūkahaʻia was being groomed to be a key figure in a mission to Hawai‘i, to be joined by Samuel Mills Jr. Unfortunately, ʻŌpūkahaʻia died at Cornwall on February 17, 1818, and several months later Mills died at sea off West Africa after surveying lands that became Liberia.

ʻŌpūkahaʻia, inspired by many young men with proven sincerity and religious fervor of the missionary movement, had wanted to spread the word of Christianity back home in Hawaiʻi; his book inspired missionaries to volunteer to carry his message to the Hawaiian Islands.

On October 23, 1819, a group of northeast missionaries, led by Hiram Bingham, set sail on the Thaddeus for the Sandwich Islands (now known as 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 Kauaʻi’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 American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) in the Hawaiian Islands.

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Henry_Opukahaia,_ca. 1810s

December 18, 2017 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

‘Ā‘īoeoe

“The advent of the white man in the Pacific was inevitable, and especially in Hawaii, by reason of its size, resources, and, most important, its location at the crossroads of this vastest of oceans, rapidly coming into its own in fulfilment of prophecies that it was destined to become the chief theater of the world’s future activities.”

Years before the westward land movement gathered momentum, the energies of seafaring New Englanders found their natural outlet, along their traditional pathway, in the Pacific Ocean.

Practically every vessel that visited the North Pacific in the closing years of the 18th century stopped at Hawai‘i for provisions and recreation. (Frear, 1935)

“During the forty-two years from Cook’s discovery to the arrival of the first missionaries, and long afterwards, there came this way thousands of whites beach-combers, Botany Bay convicts, fur-traders, whalers, and others, including black-birders in the South Seas, who, with noteworthy exceptions …”

“… lived up to the then-prevailing motto that ‘there was no God this side of Cape Horn,’ or, when they rounded the Cape, ‘hung their consciences on the Horn,’ as it was said, and who, bent solely on their own profit and pleasure, brought muskets, alcohol, and infectious and contagious diseases, promoted licentiousness and exploited the natives, without a thought for their rights or welfare.” (Frear, 1935)

“The natives were quick to imitate the white man, whether as to clothes, liquor, tobacco, cards, or other things.” (Frear, 1935)

On October 23, 1819, the Pioneer Company of American Protestant missionaries from the northeast US set sail on the Thaddeus for the Sandwich Islands (now known as Hawai‘i.) There were seven American couples sent by the ABCFM to convert the Hawaiians to Christianity in this first company.

“In this the hand of God was seen preparing for the introduction of his word among the people. The vessel sailed to Kailua (and anchored there on April 4, 1820), and the chiefs went on board to see the missionaries and their wives – the ‘long necks’ as they were called.” (Judd)

“White women were, as might have been expected, objects of great curiosity to the chattering natives, who thronged around them, as they walked along, to gaze at their costume …”

“… their white hands and faces, running before them and peering under their projecting bonnets, laughing, shouting, trotting around with bare feet, heads and limbs, men, women and children, and singing out occasionally, ‘A-i-oe-oe’ a phrase signifying long, protruding neck.”

“This term they doubtless applied from the appearance occasioned by the large, projecting fore-parts of the bonnets, in the fashion of 1819, so widely different from that of Hawaiian females, whose heads were usually bare, but occasionally ornamented with a simple chaplet of natural flowers, or small feathers.” (Hiram Bingham)

“For three weeks after going ashore, our house was constantly surrounded, and our doors and windows filled with natives. From sunrise to dark there would be thirty or forty at least, sometimes eighty or a hundred.”

“For the sake of solitude, I one day retired from the house, and seated myself beneath a shade. In five minutes I counted seventy companions.”

“In their curiosity they followed the ladies in crowds from place to place, with simplicity peering under bonnets, and feeling articles of dress.”

“It was amusing to see their efforts in running and taking a stand, that so they might have a full view of our faces. As objects of curiosity, the ladies were by far the most prominent.”

“White men had lived and moved among them for a score of years. In our company were the first white women that ever stepped on these shores.”

“It was thus the natives described the ladies: ‘They are white and have hats with a spout. Their faces are round and far in. Their necks are long. They look well.’ They were called ‘Long Necks.’ The company of long necks included the whole fraternity.” (Lucy Thurston)

In a summer of 1822 letter to Kamāmalu (telling her of her marriage to Kaumuali‘i), Ka‘ahumanu notes, “Here is a letter from your aunt and your uncle, from your new uncle, my new husband. …”

“Here is my word to you, there you are among the longnecks, so send letters here. There are many people, but few letters. I want [you] to send eight hundred Hawaiian letters. We want literacy, it may make us wise. Give our affection to Mr. and Mrs. Bingham and all the longnecks.” (Ka‘ahumanu)

“She, and some others, much wish to have bonnets – this is a pleasant circumstance to us. The inquiry has sometimes been made, in our letters, what could be sent as presents that would please these waihines.”

“Indeed, I have hinted to the queen, that perhaps some of the good ladies in America since she was attending to the palapala, would probably send her one.”

“Considering that, I would here request, that if it could easily be done, one, at least, might be sent by an early conveyance. As soon as I can have a green one, I shall present mine where I think it will do the most good”. (Sybil Bingham Journal, October 4, 1822)

Collaboration between native Hawaiians and the American Protestant missionaries resulted in, among other things, the introduction of Christianity; the creation of the Hawaiian written language and widespread literacy; the promulgation of the concept of constitutional government; making Western medicine available; and the evolution of a new and distinctive musical tradition (with harmony and choral singing.)

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1820s Bonnett