The first Polynesians, believed to be from the Marquesas, settled on this island chain some time between 500 and 600 AD. They lived a rather peaceful life until, in 1000 AD, the Tahitians arrived and introduced their customs, religion and a strict social order. The first known Westerner to visit the islands was British explorer Captain James Cook who arrived in 1778. Cook named the Hawaiian archipelago the Sandwich Islands, in honor of the Earl of Sandwich. At first, Cook was heralded as the legendary Lono, god of fertility and peace, but a freakish turn of events led to his fatal stabbing at Kealakekau Bay on the Big Island.

See also: The 3rd and Final Voyage, Discoveries in America, The Search of a Northern Passage and The Death of Capt.Cook.

A witness to Cook's slaying was a fierce warrior, known as King Kamehameha or Kamehameha the Great, who was to unify the Hawaiian islands and establish the Hawaiian monarchy. Kamehameha engaged in lucrative trade with American sea captains interested in Hawaii's sandalwood forests. As more ships found their way to this new port of call, a foreign presence began to establish itself on Hawaiian shores. In the 1820s, Yankee whaling ships began calling on Hawaiian ports in search of wine, women and song, and for the next 50 years Hawaii was the center of the Pacific whaling industry, bringing big money to the islands. The social excesses of the whalers were curtailed by the presence of Christian missionaries who befriended the Hawaiian royalty and introduced more 'refined' Western social mores.

In the mid-1800s, descendants of the missionaries established Hawaii's sugar industry. The declining native population meant plantation owners soon began to look overseas for a labor supply. Laborers were recruited from China, then Japan, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Korea and finally from the Philippines. As Hawaii's sugar industry grew, the USA became more integral in the affairs of the Hawaiian islands. As a means of eliminating tariffs, the plantation owners announced a provisional government which eventually led to the overthrow of the monarchy and established Hawaii as a territory of the USA in 1900. Hawaii's importance to the USA grew as the US Navy established a huge military base at Pearl Harbor.

US intrest

With the exception of a few unfortunate episodes, American prestige tended to increase in the islands. One of these was the affair of Lieut. John Percival in 1926 which illustrates some of the high-handed tactics of that time. When his ship, the USS Dolphin, had arrived in Honolulu an ordinance had just been passed, inspired by the missionaries, placing restrictions on the sale of alcoholic liquors and the taking of women aboard vessels in the Honolulu Harbor. Lieut. Percival and members of his crew felt that the new vice laws were unfair and with more than a mere threat of force had them rescinded. This act, it must be said, was later renounced by the United States and resulted in the sending of an envoy to King Kauikeaouli. When Captain Thomas A.P. Catesby Jones arrived, in command of the USS Peacock, he was the first naval officer to visit Hawaii armed with instructions to discuss international affairs with the Hawaii King and Chiefs, and to conclude a trade treaty.

In spite of the Percival incident, American influence in the islands was steadily increasing. Throughout the twenties and thirties of the Nineteenth Century, many American warships visited Honolulu. In most cases the commanding officers carried letters with them from the U.S. Government; all sympathetically friendly toward the Hawaiian sovereign and, as a rule, giving advice concerning the conduct of governmental affairs and of the relations of the island nation with foreign powers. In 1841, the weekly periodical, Polynesian, printed in Honolulu, advocated editorially that the U.S. establish a naval base in Hawaii. Its pretext was the protection of the interest of American citizens engaged in the whaling industry. The pro-British Hawaiian minister, R.C. Wyllie, remarked in 1940 that ". . . my opinion is that the tide of events rushes on to annexation to the United States."

When France commenced her agitations for special concessions in the 1850's, the King, under the influence of his American advisors. drew up a deed of cessation to the United States. The commanding officer of the USS Vandalia had his ship stand by to prevent the intervention of any foreign power during the interim before Washington's reply. With the death of the king, the retirement of the French forces, and the foreign policy of the Fillmore administration, the cessation idea fell into discard. The Navy Department received orders, however, to keep the naval armament of the U.S. in the Pacific to guarantee the safety of the Hawaiian Government.

With the conclusion of the Civil War, the purchase of Alaska, the increased importance of the Pacific states, the projected trade with the Orient and the desire for a duty free market for Hawaiian staples, the islands were irresistibly drawn into the centripetal whirlpool of expansion. In 1865, the North Pacific Squadron was formed to embrace the western coast and the Sandwich Islands.¹ The USS Lackawanna in the following year was assigned the task of cruising among the islands, "a locality of great and increasing interest and importance."² This vessel surveyed the islands and reefs, northwest of the Sandwich Islands toward Japan.³ It was as a result of these surveys that the United States established its claims to Midway. The Secretary of the Navy was able to write in his annual report of 1868, with a feeling of great pride and exhilaration, that in November, 1867, forty-two American flags flew over whaleships and merchant vessels in Honolulu to only six foreign flags.⁴ This increased activity caused the permanent assignment of at least one warship to Hawaiian waters. This same report praised the possibilities of Brooks, or Midway Island, which had been discovered in 1858, as possessing a harbor surpassing that of Honolulu.⁵ In the following year, Congress approved an appropriation of $50,000 on 1 March 1969, to deepen the approaches to this harbor.

Since 1868, when the Commander of the Pacific Fleet visited the islands to look after "American interests," naval officers have played an important role in internal affairs. They served as arbitrators in business disputes, negotiators of trade agreements and defenders of law and order. Periodic voyages among the islands and to the mainland aboard U.S. warships were arranged for members of the Royal family and important island government officials. When King Lunalilo died in 1873, negotiations were underway for the cessation of Pearl Harbor as a port for the exportation of sugar in to the U.S. duty free. With the election of a new king, King Kalakaua in March, 1874, anti-American factions helped to precipitate a number of riots which were regarded as sufficiently disturbing to have bluejackets landed from the USS Tuscorora and the USS Portsmouth. The British warship, HMS Tenedos, also, landed a token force. It was during the reign of King Kalakaua that the United States was granted exclusive rights to enter Pearl Harbor and to establish "a coaling and repair station."

After the WW2

The following years saw the development of Hawaii as a major tourist destination with numerous resorts, golf courses and shopping centers being built. To combat the increasing development, a number of state parks, wilderness sanctuaries and marine reserves have been established. In the 1970s, a Hawaiian cultural renaissance reasserted local cultural values in the face of tourist-brochure parodies. In the past few years, sovereignty has become a key political issue. While some Hawaiian groups favor the restoration of the monarchy, other native groups are calling for a Hawaiian nation within the USA and the return of crown lands taken during annexation. In November 1993, US President Bill Clinton signed a resolution apologizing for the overthrow of the Hawaiian kingdom 100 years earlier.

For more information on the history of Hawaii, go to:

• War Comes: Prewar Situation in the Pacific
• Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor
• War in the Pacific
  • The Battle of Midway (WW2 History - part 1)
    • The Battle of Midway - part 2
    • The Battle of Midway - part 3
    • The Battle of Midway - part 4
  • The Defence of Wake (WW2 History - part 1)
    • The Defence of Wake - part 2
    • The Defence of Wake - part 3
    • The Defence of Wake - part 4
  • Fighting at Saipan in WW2 (untill 1940)
    • History 2 (WW2 begin)
    • History 3 (US invasion)
    • History 4 (atomic bomb)
    • History 5 (sinking USS Indianopolis)
    • History 6 (Survivors of USS Indianpolis)
    • History 7 (WW2 end & after)
  • The Battle of Truk
  • Allied Invassion of Guadalcanal
    • Air Force Campaign
    • Army Campaign
    • Marine Campaign
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