Historical Collections of The Hawaiian Islands - The Royal Women of Hawai'i - Part 4 ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/hi/hifiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: by Darlen6 E. Kelley December 11, 2006 http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00026.html#0006374 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Historical Collections of Hawai'i Keepers of the Culture The Royal Women of Hawai'i - Part 4 Lydia Kamaka'eha/ Lili'uokalani Victoria Ka'iulani ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Part 4 -- Lili'uokalani / John Owen Dominis / through cessation. In 1862, Lili'uokalani, married at the age of 24, John Owen Dominus , on Setember 16, 1862. He was the son of Captain John Dominis of Shenectady, N.Y., an American of Italian ancestry, who sailed into Honolulu, bring with him his wife and small son. Captain Dominis was an affluent sea-captain, and proceeded to build the finest residence in Honolulu for his son and wife. But on a voyage to China in 1846 to obtain furniture for his newly completed house, he disappeared at sea. His son, John Owen Dominis grew up in the elegant home his father had built and took his bride, Princess Lili'uokanlai, there to live. It became her pesonal home for the rest of her life, and after her death was purchased by the Territory of Hawa'i as the governor's mansion. It still contains many of the articles of Lydia and John Dominis family. Located on Beretania Street near the Capitol and E'lolani Palace, it bears the name of Washington Place. John Owen Dominis was a businessman of prominence, received King Kalakaua's appointment as governor of the island of O'ahu, and then, upon his wife's ascention to the throne, became Prince Consort of the Kingdom of Hawai'i, living comfortably in the shadow of his royal wife, who reled upon his vice council. He sired a son, John Owen Dominis, Jr. through Mary Purdy Lamika Aimoku of Honolulu. He was one of the few non-Hawaiians to be buried in the Royal Mausoleum in Nu'uanu Valley. After the marriage - Lili'uokalani, devoted herself with the duties of a loyal wife and princess. They often entertained in their magnicent home, where she often played for her guests the beautiful melodies she composed. Lili'uokalani had become an accomplished pianist, as well as a composer, while studying at the Royal School as a child. Thus she not only learned to play the piano, but was equally accompished in all instrauments such as the Ukelele, banjo, piano, and etc. She composed well over 165 songs and chants in her life time. But this story will be a later article. Her brother, King Kalakaua, chose her to succeed him when their brother, Leleiohoku died in 1877. Strong willed and well informed, she came to the throne prepared to rule. The first thing she did was to disolve the cabinet and appoint a cabinet of her own with then fifeen year old Princess Kaiulani as heir to the throne. She wanted Hawai'i to be ruled by the Hawaiians and the "Bayonet Constitution" forced on her brother fueled her resentment. She continued to appoint her people to key positions with a plan to eventually delegate the administration of the Hawaiian government back to the Hawaiians. Economically, the islands were depressed primarily because of the McKinley Tariff Act allowing foreign sugar into the United States duty free while charging two cents a pound for sugar grown locally. Annexing Hawai'i to the U.S. would benefit the sugar growers/businessmen immensely. The idea of annexation did not make relations between the Queen and the Americans any better! Lili'uokalani's remedy was a new constitution. This gave the businessmen the excuse they needed for a revolt. The American businessmen formed an Annexation Club which did not hide its contempt for the crown. Their position was the Queen's attack on the present constitution was treason. To " protect the government " they formed the " Committee of Safety," which created a provisional government and a militia. John L. Stevens, the American foreign minister, had 162 troops march through downtown Honolulu to I'olani Palace from the U.S.S. Boston. Soon things deteriorated into violance and armed citizens in the militia stormed government buildings while members of the Committee of Safety took possession and control, and later deposed the Queen. Queen Lili'uokalani sadly surrendered her throne on January 17, 1893. She wrote a letter in which she yielded to " ........ the superior forces of the United States ,,,,," She pleaded with the U.S. Govenement to ".... undo the actions of the represntatives and reinstate her in the authority I claim as the Constitutional Sovereign of the Hawaiian Islands....." Meanwhile, the provisonal govnment sent represenatives to Washington, D.C. to apply for annexation where they drew up a treaty. President Harrison signed it and submitted it to Congress. Before the Senate could approve the treaty, President Grover Cleveland took office. He had reservations about taking over an independant country and withdrew the treaty. He sent a special commissioner, Colonel James Blount, to Hawai'i to investigate the revolution. Blount reported Minister Stevens transpired with a small group of revolutionaries to overthrow the government and Cleveland replaced Stevens with a new minister. The new minister told the Queen that if she would grant amnesty to the revolutionists the throne would be restored to her. Some accounts say that she was intent on havng them beheaded. Lili'uokalani's own book ( Hawai'i's Story by Hawai'i Queen written while she was confined in I'loni Palace as prisoner ] says that she never asked for that or had it ever been practiced by the monarchy as a form of punishment. Hawaiian Law did however prescribe death for traitors which she officially rescinded. President Dole ( for the provisional goverment ) flatly refused to give the government back to the Hawaiians. e told President Cleveland that the U.S. had no right to meddle in Hawai'i's internal affairs. Congress agreed, and it adopted a " hands off " policy. Dole's new governemnt created an army and held a constitutional convention on July 4, 1894, and then unveiled the completed constitution and declared Hawai'i the Republic of Hawai'i. Despite Lili'uokalani's pleas for help, other governments quickly recognized the new republic. In desperation, supporters of the queen colected weapons and made secret plans to overthrow the republic and restore the monarchy. They planned to strike on the morning of January 7, 1895, but informers told the provisional governement. At dawn, the rebels slipped ashore Waikiki, and government solders opened fire. A few rebels fell dead or wounded, others surrenderd and the government declared martial law. During the next few days, government troops defeated the disorganized rebels in a series of brief but deadly skirmishes. Within two weeks, they completely suppressed the uprising and captured its followers, including Queen Lili'uokalani. Lili'uokalani and the prisoners were tried for treason and Lili'uokalani was forced to sign a document in which she finally renounced all claims to the throne and her land. She was then placed uder house arrest in I'olani Place. After her release, she was allowed to live out her days, as citizen under the new government and resided at her home at Washington Place From being known as " Lili 'u Loloku Wailania Paki Kamaka'eha at birth, to " Queen Lili'uokalani " ( Kalakaua renamed her after he made her heir to the throne ) to simply " Mrs Lydia Dominis " ( the missionaries thought it appropriate to give Lili'u a Christian name, Lydia Paki ), she remained a queen in her peoples eye's even after she died of a stroke at her home in 1917, Her death marked the end of old Hawai'i. The Queen Lili'uokalani Children's Center ( placing and rehabilitating negected children ) remains her legacy. But perhaps her best known legacy was in her music and her arts. +++++++++++++++++++ VICTORIA KA'IULANI ( 1875 -1899 ) Princess Victoria Ka'lulani, daughter of Lili'uokalani's younger sister, Mariam Likelike. She was born October 16, 1875, one year after Kalalakua was elected to the throne. Ka'iulani was treasured from the start, both for her beauty and for what she represented as the sole royal off-spring of her generation. The blood of two peoples ran through Ka'iulani's veins; Hawaiian ali'i on her mother's side, and Scottish from her father, Archibald Cleghorn. Ka'iulani was born one year into their marriage, and inherited her royal title at birth. Her linage linked her to the House of Keawe. She was a great-great-great- granddaughter of Kamehameha's father, Keoua Kupuapaikalaninui, and his wife Kame'eiamoku. Her creditials were further strengthened when Ruth Ke'elikolani, heiress of the Kamehamehas, was named god mother to the newborn princess. She brought a sense of the Hawaiian past into Ka'iulani's life. In her first three years, she lived with her parents on Queen Emma Street not far from 'Iolani Palace. In 1878, the family moved to a ten acre country Victorian estate called 'Ainahau ( cool place ) in Waikiki, built on land given to Ka'iulani at birth by Princess Ruth. Here she spent most of her childhood, becoming proficient at horseback riding, swimming, and surfing. Leading a sheltered childhood, she was confronted by tragic realities early in life, starting with the loss of Princess Ruth in 1883, when Ka'iulani was eight years old. That was followed by the sudden death of her mother three years later. In the years to come, her older half-sister, Annie Cleghorn, played a companion's role, supplimenting the attention paid by the princess's father and her young English governess, Gertrude Gardiner. By nature somewhat withdrawn, Ka'iulani nonetheless made lasting friendships from the flow of guests welcomed at 'Ainahau. British writer Robert Louis Stevenson, befriended by King Kalakaua, spent many hours with Ka'iulani. Shaing time with her at ' Ainahau, he penned sweet lines about the impressionable princess, captivated, as were many, by her innocent, melancholy spirit. " A tribute to a Princess " Robert Louis Stevenson honored Ka'iulani with this short poem whn she departed for England. " Forth from her land to mine she goes, the Island maid, the Island rose. Light of heart and bright of face, The daughter of a double race. Her Islands here in southern sun Shall mourn their Ka'iulani, And I, in dear banyan's shade, Look vainly for the little maid. But Scots Islands far away Shall glitter with unwonted day, And cast for once their tempest by To smile in Ka'iulani's eye." Robert Louis Stevenson. Delicate in temperment and body, refined, introspective, and possessed of intelligence and integrity, Ka'iulani was custom made for the Victorian Age into which she was born. As highest born ali'i of her generation, she was destined for Hawai'i's throne. With Likelike's death in 1887, she was made second in line to succeed Kalakaua, behind her Aunt Lili'uokalani. She was sent to boarding school in Europe, to be groomed for her future reposibilities as queen. On Friday May 10, 1888, she set sail for San Francisco aboard the USS Umatilla to the strains of Hawai'i Pono'i. It was the first leg of the journey that would eventually see her settled in the baronal beauty of Great Harrowden Hall, and English country boarding school for young ladies. Popular and lovely in high necked Gibson Girl garb, she adjusted well to her life abroad despite bouts of loneliness, occasional headaches, and colds. Unfortunately, the news from Hawai'i grew progressively more disturbing with revolutionary forces working to transform the Hawai'i she left behind into an American territory. When her uncle, David Kalakaua, died, Queen Lili'uokalani named the sixteen year old princess next in line to Hawai'i's throne. Ka'iulani was still in school in England when the telegram arrived on January 30, 1893, telling of the Queen's overthrow. her father had tried to save the monarchy by proposing the politically passive Ka'iulani as a royal substitute for Lili'uokalani. But the revolutionary Committee of Safety was no longer interested in compromise, and the proposal was politely but firmly rejected by an uncharacteristically pleasant Lorrin Thurston: " You know my regard for Princess Ka'iulani.I think very highly of her ...... but matters here have prceeded too far for your plan to be an adequate answer to the situation. We are going to abrogate the monarchy entirely. " Fearful of self repoach and mindful of te responsibities of her ali'i status, Ka'iulani left London for the United States to plead for a restoration of the monarchy. She was welcomed in New York, Boston, and Washington, where she was received by President Grover Cleveland. Her intelligence and exotic beauty helped move President Cleveland to send James Blount to Honolulu to recommend a course of action for the American government concerning the restoration of the monarchy. With events in Hawai'i unsettled, her father resisted her wish to return to the Islands. So she returned to Great Harrowden Hall, where in isolated counrtyside, her education continued. We all know the outcome of the visit to Washington, D.C, with President McKinley and she joined the family to plead the royal case. Although her reunion with her family was a happy one, the outcome of their efforts, saddened them. Even with Ka'iulani's attempts to gain support for the monarchy, the United States Congress voted for annexation, and on August 12, 1898, Hawai'i officially became an American territory. The future seemed uncertain for the princess when she headed to the Island of Hawai'i for the wedding of her friend Eva Parker, Disillusioned by life in Americanized Honolulu, saddened by the injustice of cicumstance, she expressed herself in letter to Lili'uokalani, written as 1898 drew to a close, feelings alive in most Hawaiian hearts. " They have taken away everything from us and it seems there is left but a little, and with that little our very life itself. We live now in such a semi retired way, that people wonder if we even exist any more. I wonder too, and to what purpose? " Caught in a rainstorm while out horseback riding in the hills above Waimea on the big island, she contracted a fever. Cleghorn, fearing for his daughters health, headed for the Big Island accompanied by a doctor. Within several weeks she seemed well enough to return to Honolulu. Bedridden, she lingered for two months. Then at 2 a.m. on March 6, 1899, Victoria Ka'iulani, the Princess of Hawai'i's heart, died at age twenty-three. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++