The Shining Sea

by George C. Daughan

  Porter urged the Hapa’a to cease hostilities with the Taiohae while he was on the island. If they did not, he promised to crush them. He added that if they had hogs or fruit to exchange he would welcome trade. He also promised them that as long as they remained peaceful he would protect them from the Taiohae. At the same time, he warned the Taiohae to put aside their weapons, so that he could tell them apart from the Hapa’a. He cautioned them not to appear in his presence with weapons. He pledged that if they followed his dictates, he would defend them against the Hapa’a, or any other tribe.

  While the messenger to the Hapa’a was away, Porter looked at possible places to build a defensible encampment so that work on the Essex would not be interrupted. He picked a plain in back of the sandy beach where the frigate could be safely anchored in the crystal-clear water nearby. Situated on a prominent hill, the plain was shaded by breadfruit and other trees, and commanded the entire bay. It was also uninhabited. The high ground separated the inhabited parts of the valley from each other. It was something of a no man’s land between tribes.

  After selecting his strongpoint, Porter unbent the Essex’s sails and brought them ashore. He then landed numerous water casts, using them to form an enclosure. When that was completed, he hauled the ship closer to the beach and continued with the repairs. Crews from all the boats were put to work. The men labored hard every day until four in the afternoon. The rest of the day was given over to repose and amusement. One-fourth of the crew was allowed after that hour to go on shore, where they remained until daylight the next morning.

  Gattanewa soon paid a visit, coming on board the Essex for a chat accompanied by John Maury. The seventy-year-old chief was practically naked, clothed only with a palm leaf about his head and a clout about his loins. He was in a semi-stupor from imbibing too much kava, the island’s intoxicating drink made from a root. He impressed on Porter that the two of them were bound together in the most intimate way, that Gattanewa’s mother was Porter’s mother, and Gattanewa’s wife and children were Porter’s as well, including conjugal rights. Gattanewa evinced a great interest in whale’s teeth, which the Taiohae valued more than any other article.

  Gattanewa was more of a patriarch than a chief, an indulgent father among his children. He asked for help against the Hapa’a, but Porter told him that he wanted only peace between the two tribes. He soon changed his mind, however, when the following morning, while his men were hard at work, a large body of Hapa’a descended from the mountain and destroyed two hundred breadfruit trees—the mainstay of the islanders’ diet. The Hapa’a then made threatening advances on the camp, moving at one point to within a half mile of the perimeter. Porter ordered everyone back to the Essex and fired a few guns that halted the Hapa’a. When Taiohae turned out to oppose them, they retreated.

  Porter’s messenger to the Hapa’a soon arrived back. He reported that the tribe had ignored his peace overture and threatened an attack in the near future. Porter remained on guard. He ordered that one-fourth of each ship’s company be landed each evening with their arms to guard the camp. Despite being on guard duty, he allowed the men, in turns, to stroll about the valley and amuse themselves with the women who had assembled in great numbers outside the enclosure. They went off with any man who gave them a tie tie, or present. Porter was astonished to see with what indifference fathers, husbands, and brothers saw their daughters, wives, and sisters fly from one lover to another, as long as they were paid. Porter had a tent erected on shore for himself to better oversee operations and to better enjoy his woman.

  While all this activity was going on, the Hapa’a continued to be a threat. Porter became convinced that the only way to have peace with them, and, indeed, with the Taiohae, was to defeat the Hapa’a warriors in battle, and he began to prepare. Additional measures were taken to guard the camp, and enlist the help of the Taiohae. Porter asked Gattanewa, who had been continuously pleading for help against his enemy, to have the tribe bring a cannon to the Taiohae fort on the mountain. It would be quite a task, since the cannon weighed some fifteen hundred pounds. Porter planned to begin his attack on the Hapa’a from there. The old chief was delighted.

  On October 28, Gattanewa, accompanied by several warriors, reported to Porter that the six-pounder was in place. Porter was amazed. The terrain looked too difficult to move anything that heavy by hand, but Gattanewa had succeeded rather easily. His men had lifted the cannon up the steep hill slowly on two long poles. When Porter later ascended the mountain himself and saw how treacherous the ground was, he was even more impressed.

  With the six-pounder in place, Porter organized a party of forty men and a larger number of Taiohae to climb the mountain, demonstrate his power, and teach the Hapa’a a lesson. Lieutenant Downes was to lead the attack. The Taiohae were to accompany him, carrying, not only their own spears, slings, and arrows, but the weapons of the sailors and marines as well. Downes did not think his men—most of whom were from Essex Junior—could climb the mountain with their guns.

  Downes was ready to move on October 29, but at the very last minute, there was a hitch. As he was about to march out of the encampment, Gattanewa appeared unexpectedly and told Porter that one of his daughters, who was married to a Hapa’a chief, had come down from the mountain with a peace proposal. Gattanewa urged Porter to take it seriously, but Porter thought some treachery was afoot. He refused to change his mind, and went ahead with the raid, keeping Gattanewa in the compound as a hostage until it was over. The Taiohae were now in possession of valuable weapons that Porter wanted back, and he thought that having their chief in his hands would guarantee that the weapons entrusted to them would not be stolen. Gattanewa was apprehensive about his safety and wanted to know if Porter intended to kill him. Porter assured him that he was safe, but the old man continued to be nervous.

  Lieutenant Downes now departed with his men, and began the hard ascent up the mountain. Porter followed his movements with a telescope. As Downes’s column crawled slowly forward, the Hapa’a retreated, luring Downes higher and higher. Mouina, the chief warrior of the Taiohae, led the party, but the other Taiohae stayed behind Downes’s column.

  Mouina was barefoot; his entire body ornately tattooed. Each tribe on the island had their own distinctive tattoos. Acquiring them was extremely painful—begun at age eighteen and continuing until age thirty-five. Women wore tattoos only on their lips, arms, legs, and hands. Lips were done very thinly, and even on the inside to a slight degree. In addition to his striking tattoos, Mouina had the long tail feather of a huge tropic bird attached to the top of his forehead. A large whale’s tooth hung from a necklace around his neck and smaller whale’s teeth dangled from each ear.

  Porter continued to follow Downes’s movements as the Hapa’a retreated, taunting the Americans, urging them to follow. By eleven o’clock in the morning, Porter lost sight of the column, and reluctantly put down his glass. While waiting, he received a warning that a large party of Hapa’a was about to attack the camp. Porter had only ten men immediately available to defend it. The alarm sounded; everyone grabbed weapons and took up positions behind the water casks. But nothing happened. Porter sallied forth to examine the territory around the camp but found no Hapa’a warriors. When he returned, he noticed Hapa’a nearby, and used a six-pounder to scatter them.

  By four o’clock that afternoon, Downes and all his men were back in camp, dead tired, but victorious. They had ascended the mountain with enormous difficulty. None of them were accustomed to climbing. When they reached the summit they found the retreating Hapa’a assembled in a fortress, ready to make a stand. Downes estimated their number to be three or four thousand. Before he could make a move, a stone suddenly struck him in the belly, knocking him down and halting the whole operation. He recovered quickly, however, and using the cannon that had been so laboriously hauled up the mountain, he blasted open the fort’s huge gate. Downes and his men then rushed forward, but a shower of stones and spears rained down on them, slowing their advance. Miracul
ously, no one was killed, although several were wounded. When they reached the fort, they forced their way in, firing at anyone they met, killing five immediately, whereupon, resistance ceased and a general exodus commenced.

  Downes had won an easy victory. The Taiohae collected the five dead bodies and brought them, together with all the booty they could find—drums, mats, calabashes, household utensils, hogs, coconuts, other fruit, and large quantities of a valuable plant they made cloth from—and proceeded back down the mountain to the camp.

  When they arrived, Porter released Gattanewa. The old man was now totally convinced of Porter’s strength. He was no longer ambivalent about his relations with the Americans. He assumed that the Hapa’a, having been given evidence of Porter’s superiority, would establish peaceful relations as well.

  Porter was interested in what the Taiohae were going to do with the five bodies they had taken from the fort and carried home. Wilson told him, and this was confirmed by Gattanewa, that sometimes they ate the bodies of their enemies after performing an elaborate ceremony—often days after the warriors were dead and their corpses putrid. Gattanewa said he had never eaten any, nor had anyone in the history of his family. Porter attended the ceremony the Taiohae performed with the bodies, but did not witness any cannibalism.

  On November 1, peace talks began. Mowattaeeh, a chief of the Hapa’a and Gattanewa’s son-in-law, came to the American camp with other tribe members carrying a white handkerchief, indicating his wish to talk. Porter welcomed them and agreed to peace, provided they would trade hogs and fruit, which he was in constant need of, for iron and other valuables. Gattanewa was pleased with the terms and so were the Hapa’a. Shortly, both tribes brought peace offerings to the encampment in great quantities—hogs, coconuts, bananas, breadfruit, sugarcane, and roots of kava.

  Mowattaeeh noticed the tents in the enclosure and remarked how useless they were in keeping rain out. Porter agreed, as did Gattanewa. The Taiohae and the Hapa’a promised to build more suitable houses for the Americans, and a special residence for Opotee (the name they gave Porter). Soon, the other tribes on the island, with the exception of the Taipi and the most distant tribe, the Hatecaahcattwohos in the valley of Hannahow, made peace with the Americans. Porter thought the Taipi decision not to participate was based on confidence in their arms, and the Hatecaahcottwohos in the remoteness of their territory.

  Supplies from the natives continued to be brought to the camp in great abundance. In exchange, Porter presented harpoons to the chiefs of each tribe, as well as iron articles for their communities. He was amazed at how harmoniously they divided the iron he gave them. And this was indicative of how they handled all their affairs, as far as he could tell. They appeared to live in the utmost harmony, like affectionate brethren of one family, and the authority of their chiefs appeared to be only that of fathers among children. Porter also noticed that there was no thievery—either inside or outside the encampment—by any of the Taiohae who came in daily contact with Porter’s men.

  On November 3, an amazing event occurred. Porter had drawn up a plan for housing his men, and was astonished when four thousand natives from different tribes unexpectedly assembled at the camp with building materials. Before night they had built a dwelling house for Porter and another for the officers, a sail loft, a coopers’ shop, and a place for the sick, a bake house, a guardhouse, and a shed for the sentinel. The two houses were fifty feet long, connected to each other by a wall twelve feet long and four feet high. The construction was crescent shaped and followed the line laid out by the water casks, which were removed when the sturdy wooden and cane buildings were completed.

  Porter was struck by the work ethic he witnessed. “Nothing can exceed the regularity with which these people carried on their work,” he wrote in his journal, “without any chief to guide them, without confusion, and without much noise; they performed their labor with expedition and neatness; every man appeared to be master of his business, and every tribe appeared to strive which should complete their house with the most expedition and in the most perfect manner.”

  As the days went by, Porter and his men came to have a higher and higher regard for the island people. Porter wrote,

  They have been stigmatized by the name savages; it is a term wrongly applied; they rank high in the scale of human beings, whether we consider them morally or physically. We find them brave, generous, honest, and benevolent, acute, ingenious, and intelligent, and their beauty and regular proportions of their bodies, correspond with the perfections of their minds: they are far above the common stature of the human race, seldom less than five feet eleven inches, but most commonly six feet two or three inches, and every way proportioned: their faces are remarkably handsome.

  Their sexual behavior was of great interest to Porter. He wrote:

  Go into their houses, you might there see instances of the strongest affection of wives for their husbands and husbands for their wives, parents for their daughters, and daughters for their parents; but at the camp they met as perfect strangers: all our men appeared to have a right to all their women; every woman was left at her own disposal, and everything pertaining to her person was considered as her own exclusive property. Virtue among them, in the light which we view it, was unknown, and they attached no shame to a proceeding which they not only considered as natural, but as an innocent and harmless amusement, by which no one was injured. Many parents considered themselves honored by the preference given to their daughters, and testified their pleasure by large presents of hogs and fruit. . . . With the young and timid virgins, no coercive measures were used by their parents to compel them to make any sacrifices, but endearing and soothing persuasions enforced by rewards, were frequently used to overcome their fears. . . .

  The young girls of this island are the wives of all who can purchase their favors, and a handsome daughter is considered by her parents as a blessing which secures to them, for a time, wealth and abundance. After they have advanced in years and have had children, they form more permanent connections, and appear then as firmly attached to their husbands as the women of any other country. . . . But the girls, from twelve to eighteen years of age rove at will . . . unrestrained by shame or fear of consequences.

  He convinced himself that venereal disease did not exist in the islands. Actually, venereal disease, brought originally by westerners, was well established in the Polynesian islands. Over thirty percent of the Bounty’s crew, for instance, had contracted syphilis and other ailments from their contact with Tahitian women. Nuku Hiva, although it did not have the traffic with westerners that Tahiti did, certainly had venereal infections spread widely among the population.

  In spite of enjoying the remarkable sex provided by the islanders and allowing his men the same privilege, Porter, at the same time, regretted that the Marquesans had come in contact with white men at all. Viewing them as people in a state of nature, he was saddened that they could not remain so. And well he might have been, for contact with people like Cook and Porter ultimately brought disaster. In their wake came fatal diseases, heartless exploitation, and heartrending depopulation. In less than fifty years, the remarkable Polynesian society that Porter so admired would be completely gone.

  BY THE TIME THE TAIOHAE AND HAPA’A HAD COMPLETED Porter’s village, all the provisions, stores, and ammunition had been transferred from the Essex to the prizes in preparation for the hardest work on the ship. Killing the rats was the first order of business. Hatches were closed and fires lit in large tubs. Thick smoke soon filled every crevice, choking even the tiniest critter. When the hatches were opened, the crew found over fifteen hundred dead rats, many of them collected around the pots. Hands gathered up the gruesome little bodies and threw them overboard.

  After the rats had been removed and the ship cleansed, an oven made of bricks from the prizes was fired up, and it made wholesome baked bread every day for the entire command. Carpenters then set to work caulking seams, while other repairs went ahead expeditiously. Coopers t
ook the best water casks from the prizes and threw out nearly all of the Essex’s, which had become rotten. The main topmast was rotted as well, but easily replaced with a spare. The ship’s bottom was cleansed of barnacles, grass, and moss. Marquesans helped—diving down and scrapping the bottom with the outer shell of coconuts. The coppering also needed fixing; it was much injured just below the water’s surface. The ship was careened slightly so that these repairs could be made. The prizes provided the copper.

  The boatswain stripped off all the frigate’s rigging so that it could be overhauled and refitted. A rope walk was established at the compound, where a good supply of strong cordage was created from whale line and small pieces of rope. While the work went forward, Porter allowed the men sufficient time for amusement and relaxation, but, curiously, he observed, or thought he observed, that there was less frenzy about the women, who formerly had engrossed the whole free time of the crew. Perhaps he was talking more about himself than the others.

  Whatever his feelings about the women, Porter was more than a little pleased with how well his plans were working out. The Essex and her prizes would soon be in excellent condition, and he could look forward to a glorious showdown with the British hunters who were still searching for him.

  CHAPTER

  17

  ANNEXATION AND WAR

  WITH REPAIRS GOING WELL AND RELATIONS WITH THE tribes friendly, Porter had achieved the great objects for which he had come to the Marquesas. Regrettably, this was not enough for him. He was fixated on crushing the Taipi as well, even though they had left him in peace. The other tribes in their separate valleys had been impressed enough with his strength to be on friendly terms. Only the twelve tribes of the Taipi remained unconquered. Why he felt the need to attack them was not immediately apparent. He claimed that if he did not, relations with the other tribes would be put in jeopardy, although it’s hard to see why. Friendly relations with the other tribes were more than sufficient for his stated purposes. If he had come to the island just to repair his ships, enjoy the women, and relax, he would be gone soon. The other tribes would continue to be friendly for another few days. He had no need to crush the Taipi. Nonetheless, plans went ahead to enlist the Taiohae and Hapa’a in a war against the Taipi.