by John Demos
Almost without exception gradually retrograded.… The irregularity of all the native members who were admitted in America. That would, in fact, become the dominant view, one that persisted for decades. Long afterward, the author of a general history of the islands rendered the following verdict on the various “youth [sic] who had been educated at Cornwall.… Too much had been expected of them.… They were exceedingly ignorant—far more so than was imagined by their friends in the United States.… Many of the ideas they had gained were confused and incorrect. They were … miserable interpreters and very poor teachers. They were often found teaching doctrines and practices altogether opposed to the precepts of the Bible.… One of them [Tenooee] soon fell into sin and was excommunicated.… Another [Hopoo] was more correct at first but afterwards became wayward.… A third [Honoree] was a man naturally of weak mind and frail body and could not be of much service.” So much for the first group—and those who came later “proved to be no better assistants”; indeed, “they were certainly a hindrance in the work [of the mission] rather than a help.” The process of returning to their native land was more than “their weak brains and unstable minds could … endure.” As an overall result, “they soon made shipwreck of the hopes of their friends, and it is to be feared also, in most cases, of their own souls.”23 (The metaphor of “shipwreck” seems especially resonant here. All of them had traveled to the school on long ocean voyages—with “hopes” and “souls” directly at stake.)
If the reports from Hawaii were largely unfavorable, those from the Cherokee heartland were little better. For example: “Many of the young men, on whom the missionaries bestowed unwearied pains, are great enemies to those to whom they are indebted for their instruction.” In particular, it was “a painful fact, that no one of those Indians that were educated at Cornwall, from this nation, have done, or are likely to do, anything for their people, except David Brown & Steiner.” Brown, of course, was the one whose speaking tour with Evarts had produced such remarkable results. His subsequent return to the Nation had raised great hopes. He had assisted the missionaries in various ways, as well as working on a project to translate the Bible into Cherokee. But later he would turn to “mercantile business,” at which point (Evarts noted) “his religious state has doubtless suffered for want of congenial society & from worldly views & cares.” Steiner had served for a time as a translator and occasional preacher, and seemed “a more determined opposer of vice” than any of his fellow returnees. But then he became embroiled in a jealous dispute with one of the missionaries over a certain Cherokee girl. He was said to have uttered death threats and “acted like a madman”; eventually he acknowledged as much and repented, but his “usefulness” thereafter was compromised. (Evarts charged him more than once with a conspicuous “want of zeal.”)24
Another of the Cornwall returnees was “frequently guilty of intemperance, rarely goes to church, and will likely be excommunicated.” Still another became “very cold respecting religion” and had, by some reports, engaged in even “greater evils.” To all this, Elias Boudinot remained at least a partial exception. His one significant “fall”—the ball-play incident—was swiftly regretted; thereafter, he applied himself to teaching, translating work, and preaching tours.25
In fact, these were exactly the years of the famed Cherokee “renascence.” Yet the American Board’s missionaries at work in the Nation barely noticed anything of the sort; indeed, they went in the opposite direction. Stories of sin—intemperance, pride, and, above all, sexual promiscuity—filled the letters and official reports they sent to their superiors in Boston. Steiner’s “madman” behavior was a case in point; discussion of that went on and on. A separate episode, recounted in detail by missionary Moody Hall, involved “criminal intercourse…[between] a Cherokee girl whom we had taken into our family and John Sanders [yet another Cornwall returnee].” The offending pair was removed from the family and expelled from the church; then, “to show our utter abhorrence of such crimes we had the beds whereon they laid & the cabin [in] which they slept consumed by fire.” Such “decisive measures are thought necessary,” Hall wrote, “because the Cherokees think so lightly of such abominable crimes.” At the very least, these actions were “making much talk in the Nation”; perhaps they might yet implant the lesson that “the souls of fornicators will burn in hell.” One of Hall’s colleagues was led by this and similar “outrages” to conclude that “the justice of God may be more strikingly displayed in their [the Cherokees’] extermination. Certain it is that…[many] are ripening for destruction.”26
These, of course, were no more than anecdotal reports of success and failure—mostly failure—involving former Cornwall scholars. It does not seem that anyone in a position of authority at the American Board thought to appraise the entire “experiment” (as they now preferred to call it). But today, even from a distance of almost two centuries, that task can be attempted by pulling together the experience of all the individuals involved. The information is incomplete, and in some cases quite fragmentary; still, it does add up.
As best one can determine, the total of scholars ever present at the Mission School was ninety-five. (There may well have been a few more, whose stay was so brief as to have left little or no trace in the surviving records.) Of this number, the largest group was composed of Native Americans: forty-two in all, representing fourteen different tribal affiliations. The second-largest was Pacific Islanders: twenty-four, including nineteen from the Hawaiian archipelago. There were also eleven from East Asia (China, India, the Malay Peninsula), five from Europe, one from Mexico, and twelve “Yankees” (white Anglo-Saxons of American birth). At the time of their arrival, they ranged in age from ten to thirty; the median age was eighteen. They are thought to have spoken a total of twenty-one different languages. Their curricular focus covered a broad span from English grammar and vocabulary to natural philosophy, geometry and trigonometry, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, astronomy (including the calculation of lunar eclipses), and “advanced” surveying and navigation. Approximately twenty-five of them attained religious “conversion,” just over one-fourth of their total number.
Comparison between the different ethnic and racial groups shows some interesting differences. First, the Native Americans were significantly younger than the Pacific Islanders and Asians. (The median ages at time of arrival were approximately fifteen versus twenty-one, respectively.) Second, by all reports the native scholars achieved the best level of academic performance. (Daggett and others repeatedly complained of the difficulties the Pacific Islanders encountered in mastering the English language. By contrast, most of the Indians arrived with at least some prior knowledge of English and thus had a good head start with the more “academical” subjects.) Third, the islanders were more than twice as likely as others to undergo a religious conversion and thus to become members of the local church. Fourth, discipline problems arose in equal measure with Native Americans and islanders—and most frequently with the East Asians. Fifth, the East Asians were least successful overall (with four out of eleven subject to expulsion). Sixth, there was no discernible difference in the matter of short-term outcomes. All groups proved disappointing in that respect, to more or less the same degree. The idea that they would go right back to their own people and become missionary workers themselves—if not actual leaders, then valuable “assistants”—simply wasn’t realized on any considerable scale.
Reports about the long term would be no better. One young man from China returned home, became an “outside chop man [petty merchant]” and teacher of English, but died “a besotted heathen.” Another, the Oneida Indian who attended Dartmouth for two years, went on to serve as an interpreter for several tribal chiefs; however, he became an alcoholic, abandoned his young family, went to Canada, and died there in 1837. A third, a Stockbridge Indian, was a “notorious drunkard,” but then he “reformed and gave a temperance address,” which was printed in the missionary press; his later doings are not known. Drink was a recurrent theme
in these reports; thus, “ruined by whiskey,” “died in a drunken row,” “made dissolute by demon rum,” and so on. To be sure, the reports themselves may be suspect, coming, as they generally did, from disappointed and disapproving missionary sources. But the same sources had some incentive also to describe the successes of former scholars—and there were at least a few of those. For example, a Delaware Indian youth concluded his four-year stay at the Mission School by going south to become a schoolmaster and occasional preacher among the Choctaws in Georgia; he was also active for many years as a speaker and fund-raiser on behalf of the American Board. And the young Portuguese scholar whom Evarts had described as “anxious to study medicine” did, in fact, go on to a long, much-appreciated career as a physician in southern Canada. (When he died in 1897, he was the last survivor among the school’s former members.)27
Among the more meritorious post–Mission School careers was that of Photius Fisk (né Kavasales), one of the Greek boys who had arrived with such fanfare not long before the “crisis” period began. His story merits a longer telling.28
After Photius and his young compatriot Athanasios Karavelles are pushed out of the Mission School—where their “delicate sensibility” has rendered them “unsuitable” to continue—they are sent south to New Haven. There they are received into the homes of prominent local citizens (a Yale professor, a judge) and enrolled at the Hopkins Grammar School (then and now one of the nation’s oldest private academies). After a short and relatively uneventful stay, they are transferred yet again—this time to Amherst Academy in central Massachusetts. Soon Photius falls into trouble by absenting himself without permission—something he had done previously at the Mission School—and is summarily expelled. He is “remanded to the custody of the American Board,” and a decision is made “to return him to his own country.” (He has, by this time, worn out his original welcome; moreover, he has not experienced, as his sponsors hoped, a religious conversion.)
In the spring of 1827, the board puts him on a ship bound for Greece. His arrival there includes a meeting with the newly installed president of the country, John Capodistrias; indeed, by some accounts, he serves briefly as the president’s personal secretary. (Athanasios, meanwhile, has remained at Amherst Academy. In time, he will graduate to—and then from—Amherst College. After that, he will gain legal training, return home to Greece, and begin a law practice.)
But Greece is not where Photius wants to make his life. Thus, in short order, he begins planning a return to the United States. He takes passage on a French brig back to New York, arriving in the spring of 1828. He finds employment first in a pharmacy, then in a hardware store. He attends revival meetings, attains conversion—precisely what he never achieved at the Mission School—and joins the Congregational Church. Indeed, he decides to study for the ministry, and secures admission to a theological seminary in Auburn, New York; he completes a three-year course and is ordained in 1839. He becomes pastor of a village church in Vermont, but dislikes the cold winters there.
After another a year or two, he returns to New York, and then makes a further move to Washington, D.C. He has an entrée to political leaders, including former president John Quincy Adams, whom he had met long before as a boy newly arrived from Greece. (Two presidential connections, Greek and American, within a scant few years. How many others could claim as much?) This enables him to secure appointment as a chaplain in the U.S. Navy. His first assignment, aboard the frigate Columbia, takes him across the Atlantic to the coast of Africa. In the course of the voyage, he makes himself unpopular with fellow officers by openly espousing the cause of antislavery. (This will become an enduring, and deeply held, commitment. According to his biographer, “in his view, slavery was the sum of all abominations.”) The return trip encompasses both South America and the Mediterranean; he takes the opportunity to visit Greece and Malta, where he renews old family connections. When finally back in Washington, he is granted shore duty. And now he has another cause in view—abolition of the practice of flogging (sailors) on ships at sea. His political contacts, especially his friendship with Adams, provide an opening for direct involvement with Congress; when, in 1850, antiflogging legislation is finally passed (after several failed efforts), he can claim at least a small part of the credit.
Eventually, he is ordered back to sea duty, serving aboard the frigate Raritan, headed for the Pacific. His role in the antiflogging campaign has made him especially controversial; thus “he was denounced and hated among the officers, admired and loved among the men.” The Raritan’s voyage lasts nearly three years, with stops at many South American ports. Photius has various adventures along the way, including a risky encounter with revolutionaries in Chile, and an expedition into the interior to collect rare botanical specimens for the Smithsonian Institution. (Botany is another of his interests.)
Returning home, he resumes shore duty, now in the office of the Navy Department. It is the mid-1850s, and the issue of slavery dominates public life. As his thoughts lead him in an increasingly radical direction, he wrestles with his religious faith; he concludes that if the Bible seems to sanction slavery, its authority must be rejected. He is on his way to what contemporaries call “free thought.” He is transferred to Boston, where he becomes closely acquainted with abolitionist leaders William Lloyd Garrison and Wendell Phillips. He also meets John Brown, soon to lead the notorious raid on Harpers Ferry, and donates money for Brown’s work in “bleeding Kansas.” No longer a Christian, he must resign his chaplaincy; officially, the navy will count him as retired. Thanks to his “frugal habits” and secure investments in government bonds, he has, through many years, accumulated a considerable fortune. (One estimate puts his total wealth at between $30,000 and $40,000, the equivalent of perhaps $1 million today.) As the years pass, he extends the range of his charity, contributing to the personal upkeep of less fortunate neighbors.
He lives for a time on a farm in the Massachusetts countryside. But in the 1870s, he moves back to Boston, takes a small suite of rooms in a hotel, and begins a series of extensive travels in Europe. He continues his philanthropic efforts, now including the women’s suffrage and temperance movements, colleges in the South founded for the benefit of “colored people,” the Perkins School for the Blind, tornado relief in Iowa, victims of the great Chicago fire, and the poorhouse in Athens, Greece. By the 1880s, he has become “one of Boston’s characters, known and loved by many.” He is described as “a little old man,” frequently seen “in the streets of Boston,…moving rapidly along with a quick, elastic step.” He has “nervous gray eyes, thin face, sharp features, something between a saffron and a bronze complexion, and long, white locks … drawn up on either side over a head bald on top.”29
In his last years, he becomes the subject of numerous encomia—in the public press, in official pronouncements by the many organizations he has aided, and in personal testimonies of every sort. Said one: “He lives not for himself, but for the cause of humanity.” Said another: He is “a true friend, a noble citizen of the world, a large-hearted philanthropist.” In December 1889, he contracts a severe case of influenza; after lingering for several weeks, he dies in the following February. His estate of nearly $30,000 is probated in a Boston court; his will directs it—all of it—to a host of his favorite charities.30
At the opposite extreme stood the later career of George “Prince” Tamoree.31
His brilliant homecoming in April 1821—including his father’s effusive welcome, his rapid assumption of power and place in island society, and the widespread admiration he inspires in local “commoners”—casts a glow that will rapidly dim. The missionaries, for their part, are wary of him from the start; they are quite familiar with his erratic record at the Mission School. (In addition, they look askance at his sudden marriage to a virtual stranger—the “half-breed” daughter of a resident Englishman—in a traditional native ceremony on one of the “lower” islands, even before his arrival in Kaua’i.)
Within scant weeks, he
takes up the cultural ways of the native people, shedding his “civilized” garments in favor of the traditional malo (loincloth), and moving to an entirely native diet (breadfruit, poi, raw fish); he also hosts “a native dance at his house.” Though his father expresses strong interest in the work of the mission, Humehume—his birth name, now restored—stands apart. Business, not religion, is his focus; in July, he writes to a Cornwall friend of having “much to do fitting out several vessels with sandalwood.”32 He is “found in drink” with some frequency. At one point, he makes off with a visitor’s boat, which he promptly wrecks on a reef; at another, he is suspected of setting fire to a neighbor’s house. As a result of all this, the missionaries grow more and more disapproving; indeed, they can “scarcely suppose he had ever seen civilized societies, much less dwelt among them.” Moreover, “his conduct of late has been such that his father has given up hope of him [and] says he is no better than any kanaka [ordinary islander].”33
Letters from Rev. Daggett and others in Cornwall arrive for him, full of earnest moral exhortation, but are unavailing to halt his slide.34 Meanwhile, too, he finds himself at the center of an increasingly complex political drama. His expectation of succeeding to his father’s kingship runs afoul of competing claims made for a half brother who is linked on the mother’s side to the island elite. (Humehume’s own mother is said to be “of ordinary rank.”) Within another year or two, both his father and the same half brother are married to the dowager queen of all the islands to the south. This is a matter of diplomacy, not romance; the goal is to bind Kaua’i closer to its neighbors. And it means that Humehume is marginalized even further; Hiram Bingham, leader of the missionary group, writes that he is now no more than “chief of his own little valley.” In the summer of 1824, Bingham pays a personal visit and finds him “living … in a dingy, dirty thatched house,” attended by “two or three worthless white men [renegade sailors]” and a few dozen “poor, ignorant, and comfortless … natives.” Ominously, he voices “a restless determination to resist the ruling powers or to take revenge on some by whom he fancied … he had been wronged,” a stance that appears to foretell open rebellion.35 At stake now is island autonomy; his opponents wish to force Kaua’i into the same pattern of rule that prevails elsewhere in the archipelago.