Pearl Harbor
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Of the years following the arrival of Captain James Cook, Pearl Harbor was not considered a suitable harbor due to shallow water. The interest of the United States Government in the Sandwich Islands followed the adventurous voyages of its whaling and trading ships in the Pacific. As early as 1820, an “Agent of the United States for Commerce and Seamen” was appointed to look after American business in the Port of Honolulu. With the cementing of commercial ties with the American continent, another factor to be considered was the endeavors of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. This was particularly true when the American missionaries and their families became an integral part of the Hawaiian body politic.
With the exception of a few episodes, American prestige tended to increase in the islands. One of these was the affair of Lieutenant John Percival in 1826 which illustrates some of the high-handed tactics of that time. When his ship, 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. Lieutenant 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and members of his crew felt that the new vice laws were unfair and with more than a mere threat of force had them rescinded.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 ap 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 1820s and 1830s, 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 1840 that “. . . my opinion is that the tide of events rushes on to annexation to the United States.” This trend was in no way hampered by the over-anxious endeavors of the English and the French governments to gain favorable trade concessions in the islands. On 13 February 1843, Lord George Paulet, of HMS Carysfort, attempted to annex the islands for alleged insults and malpractices against British subjects. Although an American warship, USS Boston, was in the harbor at the time, its commanding officer did not protest this threatened use of violence. Official protest was made a few days later, however, by Commodore Kearney of USS Constellation. Fortunately, before the matter became an international incident, the actions of Lord Paulet were dis-avowed by Lord Aberdeen in London. The results of this incident led to the formulation of a self-denying declaration by France and Britain to any act interfering with the Sandwich Islands as an independent state. The United States, although invited to become a member of this concert of nations, declined to take part in the convention because the time had not arrived for her “to depart from the principle by virtue of which they had always kept their foreign policy independent of foreign powers.”
When France commenced her agitations for special concessions in the 1850s, the King, under the influence of his American advisors, drew up a deed of cessation to the United States. The commanding officer of USS Vandalia had his ship stand by to prevent the intervention of any foreign power during the interim before Washingtons 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.
Satellite image of Pearl Harbor. Hickam AFB and Honolulu International Airport occupy the lower right cornerWith 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. USS Lackawanna in the following year was assigned the task of cruising among the islands, “a locality of great and increasing interest and importance.” This vessel surveyed the islands and reefs, northwest of the Sandwich Islands toward Japan. It was as a result of these surveys that the United States established its claims to Midway Island. The Secretary of the Navy was able to write in his annual report of 1868, that in November, 1867, forty-two American flags flew over whaleships and merchant vessels in Honolulu to only six foreign flags. 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. In the following year, Congress approved an appropriation of $50,000 on 1 March 1869, 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 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 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