The existence of the Hawaiian Islands became generally known to the world soon after the final departure of the Resolution and Discovery, but it was not until 1786 that vessels began to visit the group. The first to arrive after the death of Captain Cook were the English ships King George and Queen Charlotte, and the same year a French exploring squadron touched at Maui. In 1787 several trading vessels visited the group, and the natives began to barter provisions and sandal-wood for fire-arms and other weapons of metal.
In 1792, and again in 1793, Captain Vancouver, of an English exploring squadron, touched and remained for some time at the islands. He landed sheep, goats and horned cattle, and distributed a quantity of fruit and garden seeds. His memory is gratefully cherished by the natives, for his mission was one of peace and broad benevolence. Thenceforward trading-vessels in considerable numbers visited the group, and during the concluding wars of Kamehameha the rival chiefs had secured the assistance of small parties of white men, and to some extent had learned the use of muskets and small cannon, readily purchased and paid for in sandal-wood, which was then quite abundant on most of the timbered mountains of the islands. The harbor of Honolulu was first discovered and entered by two American vessels in 1794, and it soon became a favorite resort for the war, trading and whaling vessels of all nations.
In the midst of these new and trying conditions Kamehameha managed the affairs of his kingdom with distinguished prudence and sagacity. He admonished his people to endure with patience the aggressions of the whites, and to retain, as far as possible, their simple habits. With his little empire united and peaceful, Kamehameha died on the 8th of May, 1819, at the age of about eighty; and his bones were so secretly disposed of that they have not yet been found.
Liholiho, the elder of his sons by Keopuolani, the daughter of his cousin Kiwalao, succeeded his warlike father with the title of Kamehameha II. Some knowledge of the Christian religion had reached the natives through their white visitors, but the old chief died in the faith of his fathers.
The death of Kamehameha was immediately followed by an event for which history affords no parallel. In October, 1819—six months before the first Christian missionaries arrived on the islands—Liholiho, under the inspiration of Kaahumanu, one of the widows of his father, suddenly, and in the presence of a large concourse of horrified natives, broke the most sacred of the tabus of his religion by partaking of food from vessels from which women were feasting, and the same day decreed the destruction of every temple and idol in the kingdom. He was sustained by the high-priest Hewahewa, who was the first to apply the torch; and within a few weeks idols, temples, altars, and a priesthood which had held prince and subject in awe for centuries were swept away, leaving the people absolutely without a religion.
But all did not peacefully submit to this royal edict against their gods. In the twilight of that misty period looms up a grand defender of the faith of Keawe and Umi and the altars of the Hawaiian gods. This champion was Kekuaokalani, a nephew, perhaps a son, of the first Kamehameha, and a cousin, perhaps a half-brother, of Liholiho. In his veins coursed the royal blood of Hawaii, and his bearing was that of a king. He was above six and one-half feet in height, with limbs well proportioned and features strikingly handsome and commanding. He was of the priesthood, and, through the bestowal of some tabu or prerogative, claimed to be second in authority to Hewahewa, who traced his lineage back to Paao, the high-priest of Pili. His wife, Manono, was scarcely less distinguished for her courage, beauty and chiefly strain.
The apostasy of Hewahewa left Kekuaokalani at the head of the priesthood—at least so he seems to have assumed—and the royal order to demolish the temples was answered by him with an appeal to the people to arm and join him in defence of their gods. He raised the standard of revolt on the island of Hawaii, and was soon at the head of a considerable army. A large force was sent against him, and every effort was made to induce him to lay down his arms. But he scorned all terms, refused all concessions.
A battle was fought at Kuamoo, at first favorable to the defenders of the gods; but the fire-arms of the whites in the service of the king turned the tide of war against them, and they were defeated and scattered. Kekuaokalani was killed on the field, and Manono, his brave and faithful wife, fighting by his side, fell dead upon the body of her husband with a musket-ball through her temples. A rude monument of stones still marks the spot where they fell; and it is told in whispers that the kona, passing through the shrouding vines, attunes them to saddest tones of lamentation over the last defenders in arms of the Hawaiian gods.
Four or five months before the death of Kekuaokalani, Kalaimoku, the prime minister of Liholiho, and his brother Boki, were baptized under the formula of the Roman Catholic Church by the chaplain of a French corvette on a passing visit to the islands. They scarcely knew the meaning of the ceremony, and it is safe to say that, at the time of the destruction of their temples and the repudiation of their gods, the Hawaiian people knew little or nothing of any other religion. The abolition of the tabu, which had made them slaves to their chiefs and priests, and held their fathers in bondage for centuries, was hailed with so great a joy by the native masses that they did not hesitate when called upon to consign the priesthood and their gods to the grave of the tabu.
On the 30th of March, 1820—some months after this strange religious revolution—the first party of Christian missionaries arrived at the islands from Massachusetts. They were well received. They found a people without a religion, and their work was easy. Other missionary parties followed from time to time, and found the field alike profitable to the cause in which they labored and to themselves individually. They acquired substantial possessions in their new home, controlled the government for the fifty or more years following, and their children are to-day among the most prosperous residents of the group. This is not said with a view to undervalue the services of the early missionaries to Hawaii, but to show that all missionary fields have not been financially unfruitful to zealous and provident workers.
And now let it be remarked with emphasis that the value of missionary labors in the Hawaiian group should not be measured by the small number of natives who to-day may be called Christians, but rather by the counsel and assistance of these thrifty religious teachers in securing and maintaining the independence of the islands, and by degrees establishing a mild and beneficent constitutional government, under which taxation is as light and life and property are as secure as in any other part of the civilized world. They were politicians as well as religious instructors, and practical examples of the value of Christian discipline when prudently applied to the acquisition of the needful and inviting things of life, and the establishment of a civil system capable of protecting the possessor in his acquired rights.
In 1824 Liholiho and his queen died while on a visit to England, and their remains were sent back to the islands in an English man-of war. Kauikeaouli, a youth of ten years, and brother of the deceased king, was accepted as the rightful heir to the throne under the title of Kamehameha III., and Kaahumanu, one of the wives of Kamehameha I., acted as regent and prime minister.
In 1827, and ten years later, Roman Catholic missionaries arrived, and were sent away by order of the government; but in 1839 the priests of that denomination were finally landed under the guns of a French frigate and allowed to remain. Meantime churches, schools and printing-presses had been established, the Hawaiian had become a written language, and the laws and decrees of the government were promulgated in printed form.
In 1840 the first written constitution was given to the people, guaranteeing to them a representative government. In February, 1843, Lord Paulet, of the English navy, took formal possession of the islands, but in the July following their sovereignty was restored through the action of Admiral Thomas. In November of the same year France and England mutually agreed to refrain from seizure or occupation of the islands, or any portion of them, and the United States, while declining to become a party to the agreement, promptly acknowledged the independence of the group.