Historical Collections of The Hawaiian Islands -  Part 7 - The Ancients

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Historical Collections of Hawaii
Keepers of the Culture
Influence of Foreigners on the Ancients
Part 7 - Foreign Relations and Kamehameha.
The Russians and Dr. Scheffer.
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Part 7.

In his foreign relations, Kamehameha adhered to the policy shadowed in
the so called cession of the island of Hawaii to Great Britain. In a
letter he sent in 1810 to King George III, he spoke of himself as being
" subject to " the British King. The British governement did not commit
itself to much more that the maintenance of a cordial friedship with the
island government; but naval officers of other foreign nations who
visited the islands recognized the existence of a special
relationship,which they spoke of as a protectorate or alliance between
Hawaii and Great Britain. But while Kamehameha undoubtedly felt a
greater interest in the British people and in British ships, he treated
the people and the ships of all nations with sincere and cheerful
friendlinss. Necessarily, he learned of the rivalries which existed
among the different
foreigners who came to Hawaii; during the war of 1812 between the United
States and Great Britain, he had ocular proof on this point, for armed
vessels of both beligerents visited Hawaiian waters ad several American
ships were captured there by the British warship Cherub. One of the
local legends attributes to Anglo-
American rivalry the design of the Hawaiian national flag, which came
into existence during the war period.

Immediately after that period, the tranquillity of the islands was
distrurbed by intrigues and activities of an agent of the Russian
Amerian Company. Russian interests in the north Pacific, based on the
fur resources and fisheries of the Aleutian Islands and Alaska,
developed rapidly after the second voyage of Bering (1741 ) and were
consolidated by the formation of the Russian American Company, to which
an imperial charter gave a monopoly of the trade, just at the close of
the eighteen century. The field base of the company was located at New
Archangel ( Sitka ) in Norfolf Sound. The most difficult and persistant
problem confronting the company was that supplying its posts and its
personnel with things necessary to sustain life and keep the trade
going. The plan worked out and followed during the erly years included
several features. 
(1 ) Ships were sent by the long water route from Russian ports to the
Baltic Sea aound to the posts and settlements in the north Pacific. (2)
Goods were purchased from American and other traders who visited the
bleak northern region in quest for furs. (3)  An Agricultural settlement
was established on the Coast of California just north of San Francisco (
Fort Ross, 1812 ). (4) An atempt was made to tap resources of the
Hawaiian islands, and this is the point which we are now concerned.

From American and British traders who visited both the Russian
settlements and Hawaii, the governor of the Russian company, Alexander
Baranov, learned something about the resources and convenient location
of the islands, and Kamehameha learned something about the needs of the
Russians. The general situation was obviously favorable to a useful
commerce between the two places. Russian ships first visited the islands
in 1804, but were not seen by Kamehameha.
A year or two afterwards, the latter made known to Baranov that he would
gladly send a ship every year with swine, salt, sweet potatoes
(batatas), and other articles of food, if the Russians would in exchange
let him have sea-otter skins at a fair price. In 1807, a small Russian
vessel. on a voyage from California to New Archangel, visited the
islands, obtained supplies, and was treated well by Kamehameha. In the
following year, Baranov sent the Neva, Lieutenant Hagemeister, to the
islands for a cargo of salt. This was the ship on which Archibald
Campbell arrived at Honolulu in January, 1809. Campbell understood that
the Russians intended to form a settlement at the Hawaiian islands, but
no steps were taken at that time and it is quite possible that he was
misinformed on the subject. The next five years are a blank in
Russo-Hawaiian relations, partly no doubt because of Baranov's attention
was taken up with the organization and founding of the Fort Ross
settlement in California. The latter enterprise developed slowly and in
1814 Baranov thought again of Hawaii and to obtain from there a cargo of
supplies, sent the Bering, which he had recently purchased from a group
of American traders. A cargo was obtained at Oahu, but on the night of
January 31, 1815, the Bering was driven ashore in a storm at Waimea,
Kauai. The Yankee skipper, Captain Bennett, gave the wrecked ship to
King Kaumualii in return for assistance in saving the cargo. The cargo
was left in the not very watchful care of the Kauai king and Captain
Bennett returned at the first opportunity to New Archangel with the news
of the disaster.

Baranov wished to recover the cargo left on Kauai and to make some
arrangeents for a regular trade between Hawaii and the Russian
settlements; he probably contemplated the setting up of a permanet
Russian trading post or agency at some point in the group,and he may
even had had in view the acquistion of one or more of th islands if
condidtions proved to be favorable for such an undertaking. To carry out
his plan, he made use of a German Doctor, Georg Anton Scheffer, who had
gone to New Archangel as surgeon on one of the ships of the Russian
American Company. Scheffer sailed fron New Archangel, October 17, 1815,
on the Isabella, an American trading vessel, and arrived at Kailua,
where Kameameha was residing, in the early part of December. At first he
represented himself simply as a naturalist, who wished to do some
research in the islands; but then, having gained the favor of the king
by his skill as a physician, he made known the mission entrusted to him
on Kauai and obtained from Kamehameha an order requiring Kaumualii to
deliver to him the cargo of the Bering or pay him for it.

On many points the different accounts of Scheffer's activities  are
vague and conflicting and it is therefore impossible to be quite sure
about all the details of his movements. He remained at Kailua until
sometime in January, 1816, possibly longer, and then traveled to the
leeward islands. He may have first gone to Kauai, but a visitor to the
islands in April met him in Oahu still playing the role of naturalist,
collecting plants and minerals. During the spring of 1816, three Russian
vessels, the Ilmen, the Kadiak ( Myrtle ), and the Otkrytic ( Discovery
), arrived at the islands, the latter two at least having been sent by
Baranov to enable Scheffer to carry out the mission entrusted to him.
With one or more of these vessels, Scheffer sailed to Kauai where he
readily ingratiated himself into the favor of Kaumualii, by his
professional skill and by working on the king's desire to be free from
the overlordship of Kamehameha, he succeeded in making himself virtual
ruler of the island and entangling Kaumualii in a treasonable design. By
a written document signed on May 21, 1816, the latter sought to place
himself and his kingdom under the protection of the Russian emperor and
as a sign of loyalty accepted a Russian flag. He then entered into four
agreements with the agent of the Russian Ameican Company. By the first
he granted the company the exclusive right to export sandlewood from
Kauai and the privilege of building factories and establishing
plantations on the island; by the second he gave the company half the
island of Oahu. but as that island was in the possession of Kamehameha
the company was to furnish Kaumualii five hundred men to aid in bringing
it under his control; by third agreement the company was obligated to
supply Kaumualii with an armed vessel, for which, however, the latter
was to pay in sandlewood and other products; and by fourth agreement the
company was to have complete control of four harbors in the island of
Oahu.

From the meager data available it appears likely that, after getting
Kaumualii's signature on these agreements, Scheffer returned with the
ships to Oahu in order to make use of the pretended rights granted to
the company on that island. At Honolulu he built a blockhouse and raised
the Russian flag, and it is said to have laid out the ground plan of a
fort. He or his subordinates aroused the hostility of the natives by
entering one of the heiaus in violation of the Kapu. Kamehameha,
informed of these preceedings, sent several of his chiefs with an order
" that the Russians should quit the islands instantly, and if they did
not depart quietly that force must be used. The Russians not finding
themselves strong enough to resist went peacefully off. The islanders
then built a fort under the direction of John Young. When Kotzebue was
at Honolulu about the end of November, 1816, the fort had not been
entirely completed. An Englishman, Captain George Beckley, who had been
for several years in Kamehameha's service, was appointed as its first
commandant.

Scheffer retired to Kauai and proceeded to consolidate with the king of
that island. He bought a ship and delivered it to Kaumualii; the latter
gave Scheffer the valley of Hanalei and some other valueable tracts of
land. On the bluff overlooking Hanalei on its eastern side, an earthen
fortification was built and some cannons mounted. In the spring nd
summer, of 1817, a substancial and well designed fort was built at
Waimea in a commanding position on the east side of the river, and the
Russian flag was raised over it.

By his high handed doings, Scheffer arrayed against himself not only
Kamehameha but the foreign traders, principally American, who were
interested in the Hawaiian sandlewood trade and in the islands as a
factor in the more general north Pacific trade. Kamehameha ordered
Kaumualii to expel the Russians; the traders beseiged him their
arguments; perhaps Kaumualii found the yoke of Scheffer more galling
than that of Kamehameha. At any rate, he was finally convinced that the
ambitious doctor was not his friend but a dangerous enemy. he orderde
the Russians to depart and when they resisted, drove them off by force,
Scheffer escaped in a leaky ship to Oahu and from there made his way to
Canton and in 1819 returned to St. Petersburg.

While on Kauai, Scheffer sent reports of his proceedings and his
agreements with Kaumualii to Barnov and to the directors of the Russian
American Company in St. Petersburg. Tikhmenev states that Barnov
virtually repudiated what Scheffer had done, because he understood that
the islands were under the protection of England. In far away St.
Petersburg, the directors of the company were wholly un-
acquanted with the situation in the islands but they were intrigued by
the bright picture that Scheffer held before their eyes and hopefully
referred the subject to the Russian government. Czar Alexander I,
however, refused to be drawn into the affair and instructed the company
itself
" to the maintenance of peaceful commercial relations with the islands."
As a token of his good will, Alexander sent to Kaumualii a gold medal
with the inscription," To Tomari, chief of the Sandwich Islands, in
recognition of his friendship for the Russians," and in addition a
beautifully mounted sword and a scarlet cloak with golden tassels and
lace. But these presents were never delivered to Kaumualii. After his
return to St. Petersburg, Scheffer presented a memorial calling
attention to the strategic and commercial advantages of the Hawaiia
islands and tried to induce the Russian government to adopt a more
agressive policy; but the czar simply reiterated the descision which he
had previously made.

While Scheffer was at the height of his power on Kauai, the other
principle islands of the group were visited by the Russian ship Rurick,
which had come into the Pacific on a voyage of discovery under the
command of Lieutenant Otto von Kotzebue of the Russian imperial navy.
The Rurick arrived off the coast of Hawaii in the latter par of
November, 1816, and was viewed with great uneasiness by the Hawaiians
until they learned that its mission was a peaceful one. Kamehameha, with
much bitterness, told the Russian officer about the ungrateful and
hostile acts of Scheffer. Kotzebue assured the king tht Scheffer's
conduct was altogether contrary to the policy of the Russian emperor.
When Kamehameha had satisfied himself of the friendly disposition of
Lieutenant Kotzebue and his associates, he treated them with his
customary generosity and good will. At Honolulu, the Rurick was the
first foreign ship to exchange salutes with the new fort, a fact which
gave Kotzebue much pleasure. The Rurick visited the islands again in the
fall of 1817; at Honolulu, in the early part of October, Kotzebue was
told about the expulson of the Russians from Kauai and that Scheffer had
sailed for Canton only a few days before the arrival of the Rurick. This
exploring expedition did not touch at Kauai either in 1816 or in 1817.
The conduct of Kotzebue and his officers was such as to offset a great
measure the ill effort of Scheffer's acts. The visits of the Rurick are
of special interest because the artist attached to the expedition, Louis
Choris, made several portraits of Kamhameha, which have come down to
all, from which we are able to see what the king Kamehameha looked like
in the later years of his life. 

A year later after Kotzebue's final departure, another Russian naval
officer, Captain Golovnin, visited the islands
( October, 1818 ) and received a friendly welcome from Kamehameha, who
was then in the last year of his life. In regard to the old king,
Golovnin wrote:

" He is still strong, active, temparate and sober. He does not use
liquor or eat to excess. We can see in him a combination of childishness
and ripe judgement. Some of his acts would do credit to a more
enlightened ruler. His honesty and love of justice have been shown in
numerous cases.

The petty faults which we may find in the old King will not obscure his
great merits. He will always be considered as an enlightener and
reformer of his people. One fact which shows his good sense is this.
None of the foreigners visiting his country enjoy any exclusive
privileges, but can trade with his subjects with equal freedom.
Europeans are not allowed their own land. They receive it on condition
that after death it shall be returned to the King, and during their
lifetime it is not transferable from one to another."

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Continued in Part 8.