Preface

The history of the Hawaiian Kingdom is often viewed through the lenses of modernization, industry, or the tragic loss of sovereignty. Yet, hidden within the nineteenth century lies a narrative of profound spiritual warfare—a story of iron-willed conviction and whispered prayers that refused to break under the lash of the law.

As a Catholic man, my research into these events began with a sense of shock and a heavy responsibility. While the broad strokes of Hawaiian history are well-documented, the flesh-and-blood people who bore the brunt of the “Dark Decade” (1829–1839) have been relegated to the footnotes of time. Despite their supreme sacrifice, these men and women have never been officially recognized by the Church.

My purpose in authoring Martyrs and Confessors: Catholic Heroes of Hawaii is to bridge this gap and bring their extraordinary causation to the attention of the Vatican. They were not merely victims; they were witnesses of the highest order.

This research recovers the voices of those who chose a path that led through the gates of the Honolulu Fort and onto the sharp coral reefs of Honolulu Harbor as slave laborers. My research begins with the pivotal baptism of Governor Boki and his brother, Kalanimoku, acts of Faith that planted a seed soon watered by the arrival of the mission’s pioneers, Father Alexis Bachelot, and Father Patrick Short.

Through archival recovery, I move beyond generalities to the specific. You will meet Simeone Paele, the “Proto-Martyr,” dragged from the altar to serve as a scavenger in the Fort. You will read of Juliana Makuwahine, suspended by her wrists from a tree, and Luika Kaumaka, the nursing mother who survived starvation to plant the seeds of Faith in Waialua. I have also included the “Lingering Martyrs”—those like Esther Uhete and Alokia Keluhoonani, who survived the chains only to succumb to the permanent damage of their toil.

The narrative follows the tragic arc of Father Bachelot’s final, fatal exile on the sweltering decks of the Clementine. However, this history does not end in the 1830s. My research concludes with a modern mission: a plan to locate the islet of Na in Micronesia, find the remains of Father Bachelot, and finally bring him home to the islands he loved.

These are more than just confessors of a Faith; they are Hawaiian heroes whose names deserve to be spoken alongside the great Ali‘i of their age. This book is dedicated to ensuring their light is never forgotten—and that one day, their names may finally be elevated to the altars of the universal Church.

— John D. Fielding

Chapter 1

The Ali’I and the Seed: The Baptism of Boki and the Dawn of the French Mission

It is evident that during the foundational period of the Catholic mission, the baptisms of Governor Boki and his brother, Kalanimoku (also known as “The Iron Cable of Hawaii”), served as the primary catalyst for the arrival of the first priests. In 1819, the Hawaiian Kingdom was in a state of profound spiritual transition. King Kamehameha the Great had recently died, and the ancient kapu system—the religious and social framework of the islands—was being systematically dismantled. It was during this void that the French corvette L’Uranie, commanded by Louis de Freycinet, anchored at the islands.

On the deck of the L’Uranie is where the baptisms took place in August 1819, specifically as the ship visited the ports of Kawaihae and Honolulu. The journals of the mission and the archival reports of the Australasian Chronicle, the story of the three pioneers is one of immense hope followed by immediate and strategic resistance. Their journey from the Rue Picpus in Paris to the shores of Oahu was a grueling eight-month odyssey that set the stage for the decade of persecution that followed.

Before they were the central figures of a religious conflict, these three men were members of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary (the Picpus Fathers).

• Father Alexis Bachelot: A Frenchman and the appointed Apostolic Prefect of the mission. My thoughts on Bachelot from the records describe him as a man of great patience but fragile health, whose primary goal was the spiritual welfare of the natives [4].

• Father Patrick Short: An Irishman who provided the mission with a critical diplomatic shield. Because he was a British subject, the Hawaiian government found it much more legally complex to expel him compared to his French companions.

• Father Abraham Armand: A French priest who completed the original triumvirate.

(Tragically, a fourth priest, Father John Alexius Augustine Bachelot’s namesake, was lost during the California leg of the journey).

The priests departed from France in November 1826 aboard the French ship Comète, commanded by Captain Plassard. The voyage was funded and organized through the influence of Mr. Jean Baptiste Rives, who had convinced the French government and the Church that the Hawaiian people were “crying out” for the Catholic Faith.

The ship traveled around Cape Horn, facing the standard perils of 19th-century maritime travel—scurvy, violent storms, and cramped, damp living conditions. Before arriving in Hawaii, the Comète stopped along the coast of California to engage in trade. It was during this period that the mission faced its first internal crisis when the lead ecclesiastical authority originally intended for the mission was drowned while crossing a river in Mexico [2]. This left Father Bachelot as the unexpected leader of the mission.

The Comète finally dropped anchor in Honolulu Harbor on July 7, 1827. The arrival was far from the royal welcome Mr. Rives had promised. When the priests landed, they found that the political winds had shifted. King Kamehameha II (Liholiho), who had initially favored Rives, was dead. The islands were now under the regency of Queen Ka‘ahumanu, who had recently converted to Protestantism under the tutelage of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) [2].

Despite being told they were not welcome and had no permission to stay, the priests landed their baggage on July 9, 1827. They took up residence in a small, grass-thatched hut provided by a sympathetic foreigner.

On July 14, 1827, the feast of Saint Bonaventure, Father Bachelot celebrated the first recorded Catholic Mass in the Hawaiian Islands. This quiet act of worship was viewed by the Regency as a formal declaration of “idolatry” and an affront to the established Protestant order [1].

The government immediately ordered the priests to depart on the same vessel that brought them. However, Captain Plassard, having fulfilled his contract, refused to take them back without significant payment, which the priests did not have. This stalemate allowed the “French Mission” to remain on Oahu for several years, during which time they began to quietly instruct the native population—including the “Initial Seven” who would become the first native confessors of the Faith.

The arrival of Fathers Bachelot, Short, and Armand was not just a religious event; it was the spark that ignited a “Dark Decade” of suffering for the Hawaiian converts who were soon caught between the edicts of the Queen and the convictions of their new Faith. There was a period known as The Growing Shadow, the time of the critical transition from an uneasy peace to a state-sanctioned campaign against the Catholic Faith. The primary tension of this era was the collision between the “French Mission” and the deeply entrenched influence of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM).

At the root of the tension was two Missions, yet only one Kingdom. When Father Bachelot and Father Short arrived in 1827, they found a kingdom where the American Protestant missionaries had already labored for seven years. Under the guidance of men like the Rev. Hiram Bingham, the Protestants had successfully translated the Bible into Hawaiian, established a widespread school system, and, most crucially, secured the ears of the high-ranking Ali‘i [1].

The Protestant mission viewed the arrival of the Catholic priests not as a religious alternative, but as a political and spiritual threat. They branded the Catholic Faith as “idolatry” (due to the use of crucifixes and statues) and as the “religion of the French,” implying it was a tool of foreign subversion.

The shadow deepened through the religious evolution of Queen Ka‘ahumanu, the powerful Kuhina Nui (Regent). Having initially been indifferent to Christianity, she became a fervent Protestant convert. Under the influence of her Protestant advisors, she began to see religious uniformity as essential to the stability of the Hawaiian state. It was clear that Ka‘ahumanu believed that having “two religions” would divide the loyalty of the Hawaiian people and lead to civil strife.

(A Recreation of the building of the Waikiki Wall)

Chapter 2

The Taboo of the Crucifix: The 1831 Expulsion and the Rise of the Underground Church

The growth of the first Catholic flock in Hawaii was a quiet, almost clandestine movement that occurred under the intense scrutiny of the established Protestant mission and the Regency. When Father Bachelot and Father Short established their mission in 1827, they were restricted in their movements and forbidden from open proselytization. However, the curiosity of the native population, coupled with the dismantling of the ancient kapu system, had left many Hawaiians in a state of spiritual seeking.

The priests began by opening a small school and providing medical aid, which served as a bridge to the community. The “shadow” cast by the Protestant mission—which enjoyed the favor of the high chiefs—actually served to highlight the distinctness of the Catholic “French religion.” To many natives, the rituals, the vestments, and the use of sacramentals like the rosary and crucifix offered a tangible connection to the sacred that resonated with traditional Hawaiian sensibilities.

By 1829, a small but resolute group of native converts had emerged. Among them were the individuals identified as the “Initial Seven”—the first group of native Catholics to be formally recognized and, subsequently, the first to be targeted by the government. These pioneers included:

• Simeone Paele: A man of high standing who would later become the central martyr of the mission.

• Ikanakio Kamaka: A steadfast follower who endured nearly a decade of intermittent imprisonment.

• Pacome Kaihumua: A long-term prisoner of the reef gangs.

• Malahu: The elderly man who would eventually collapse and die during a forced march in 1839.

• Kipuce, Mainhu, and a seventh unnamed companion.

These seven individuals were the first to be arraigned before the chiefs for the crime of “idolatry.” During their hearings, they were pressured to renounce their new Faith and return to the Protestant schools. When they refused, stating that they had found the “true path,” they were sentenced to their first term of hard labor: six weeks of cutting coral stones on the reefs while being held in chains at night [1].

(A representation of the first to be arrested)

The growth of this flock was fueled by the “underground” nature of their worship. Since public gatherings were banned by the edicts of Queen Ka‘ahumanu, the converts met in the privacy of their grass houses or in remote valleys.

It appeared that the more the government sought to suppress the “Popery,” the more the native Catholics viewed their suffering as an imitation of the early Christian martyrs they learned about from the priests. This spiritual resilience turned a small group of followers into a persistent community that could not be broken, even when their “shepherds,”

The “Dark Decade” did not begin with immediate violence, but with a series of legal maneuvers designed to isolate and eventually eliminate the Catholic presence.

1. The Prohibition of 1829: Success in making native converts began to alarm the Regency. In 1829, at the urging of the Protestant mission, Ka‘ahumanu prevailed upon Governor Boki (despite his own Catholic baptism) to issue a public prohibition. A public crier was sent through the streets of Honolulu forbidding natives from attending Catholic services.

• The Summons of 1831: On April 2, 1831, Father Bachelot and Father Short were summoned before a formal council of chiefs. In the absence of the young King Kamehameha III, who reportedly refused to sanction the proceedings, the “old Queen” Ka‘ahumanu presided over the tribunal.

• The First Order of Expulsion: During this 1831 hearing, the priests were formally ordered to leave the islands. When they argued they had no vessel to take them, the government eventually spent $4,000 to fit out the brig Waverley specifically to forcibly deport them to the coast of California.

While looking into the 1831 archives and the detailed logs of the mission, the Council of April 2, 1831, it stands as the formal judicial turning point that ended the mission’s period of uneasy toleration and inaugurated the “Dark Decade.” In early 1831, the growing success of the “French Mission” in attracting native converts had reached a breaking point for the Regency. Father Bachelot and Father Short were formally summoned to appear before the Council of Chiefs at the royal residence in Honolulu.

By late 1831, the Council of Chiefs, under the firm direction of Queen Ka‘ahumanu, determined that the presence of Father Bachelot and Father Short was a direct threat to the religious and political unity of the kingdom.

The atmosphere was one of calculated legal solemnity. My research highlights that this was not a riotous gathering, but a structured inquisitorial hearing. The high chiefs sat in a semi-circle, with the powerful Queen Ka‘ahumanu (the Kuhina Nui) presiding. Beside the chiefs sat their advisors, including several prominent American Protestant missionaries who acted as the primary theological and linguistic consultants for the state [1].

The core of the judicial argument presented by the Queen and the Council was not merely a matter of theology, but one of national security and social cohesion.

• The Charge of Sedition: The Council accused the priests of bringing a “divided heart” to the kingdom. In the Hawaiian worldview of the time, the King’s word and the national religion were one; to introduce a second, competing Christian Faith was seen as an attempt to divide the loyalty of the people and invite civil war [2].

• The “Idolatry” Evidence: During the hearing, Catholic sacramentals—specifically crucifixes and images of the saints—were presented as evidence of a return to the “forbidden” ancient kapu practices of image worship. My research suggests that Father Bachelot’s defense, which explained the difference between veneration and worship, was dismissed by the Council as a “Jesuitical” distinction intended to confuse the simple-hearted natives [1].

Father Bachelot and Father Short stood before the Council with a combination of religious resolve and diplomatic appeal. Father Short, utilizing his status as a British subject, argued that he had a right to reside in the islands under the existing treaties with Great Britain. Father Bachelot maintained that they had been invited by Mr. Rives and were there to serve the souls of the people, not to interfere in the political governance of the King.

(Bachelot and Short with the King and his Chiefs)

The verdict was absolute: They were to be expelled from the kingdom. The Council decreed that the government would seize the brig Waverley to carry out the sentence. The judicial nature of this meeting provided the state with the “legal” justification to treat any native who remained a Catholic as a rebel against the King’s law—directly leading to the first arrests and the sentencing of native converts to the Fort [5].

This hearing transformed the Catholic Faith from a tolerated curiosity into a criminalized movement. By framing the mission as a “Divided Heart,” the Council successfully linked religious practice to political treason, setting a precedent that would justify the horrors of the next ten years.

By the early 1830s, the “French religion” had been successfully “tabued” (forbidden) across the islands, marking the true beginning of the persecution.

The persecution was not just a religious disagreement, but a state-driven effort to maintain political and religious unity at the cost of individual conscience. While the priests were sent into exile, the “shadow” fell most heavily on the native converts who remained. With the shepherds gone, the Regency turned its attention to the flock. The initial edicts were expanded into laws that criminalized Catholic prayer and the possession of sacramentals. This set the legal framework for the horrors that would follow: the “sewer labor” at the Fort, the torture of Juliana Makauwahine, and the long years of penal servitude on the Waikiki Coral Wall now known mostly as Wilder Avenue extending from Punchbowl to Moilili.

The 1831 archives and the contemporary account of the mission reveal the forced deportation on the Waverley remains one of the most poignant and legally significant episodes of the era. It was the moment the Regency moved from verbal prohibition to the physical removal of the Catholic leadership.

To ensure their removal, the government took the extraordinary step of chartering and fitting out the brig Waverley, a vessel owned by the government. The Regency spent approximately $4,000—a massive sum for the time—to equip the ship for a voyage to the coast of California. This expense underscores the government’s desperation to eliminate the “French religion” from Hawaiian soil [1].

The choice of date was particularly cruel, as the priests were preparing to celebrate the birth of Christ with their small native flock. On the morning of December 24, 1831, the silence of Honolulu was broken by the arrival of an armed guard at the mission house. Under the orders of the Governor, the priests were told they had only hours to collect their meager belongings.

As the sun began to set, Fathers Bachelot and Short were marched through the streets of Honolulu toward the wharf. My thoughts on this scene, reconstructed from eye-witness reports, describe a somber procession. They were surrounded by soldiers, but also by a small, weeping group of native converts who followed their “shepherds” to the water’s edge, desperate for a final blessing.

At the wharf, before being rowed out to the Waverley, Father Bachelot turned to the crowd. He encouraged the native Catholics to remain steadfast in their Faith and to “obey God rather than men.” This final interaction cemented the resolve of the “Initial Seven” and others who would soon face the Fort [2].

The Waverley slipped its moorings and sailed out of Honolulu Harbor as night fell. The priests were not being taken to an established port, but to a remote and desolate section of the California coast near San Pedro.

After a grueling voyage of several weeks, the Waverley reached the California shore in January 1832. The captain, acting under strict orders from the Hawaiian government, deposited the priests and their few boxes on the bare sand. There was no mission in sight and no immediate shelter.

Left with nothing but their Faith and a few provisions, the priests were eventually discovered by a passing traveler and guided to the San Gabriel Mission. While they were safe for the moment, they were now thousands of miles from their “orphaned” flock in Hawaii [1].

This deportation did not achieve the Regency’s goal. Instead of extinguishing Catholicism, it transformed the native followers into an Underground Church. With the priests in exile, the responsibility for the Faith fell entirely on the shoulders of the native converts, leading directly to the era of the “Martyrs and Confessors” who would refuse to recant despite the horrors of the Fort and the Waikiki Wall.

With the departure of Father Bachelot and Father Short, the native Catholic community was left without its ordained leaders. This period, often called the “Dark Decade,” reveals that the Regency, no longer restrained by the presence of European priests, turned its full judicial power against the native “orphans” of the mission.

The legal framework for the persecution was built upon the idea that religious diversity was a form of political rebellion. The Regency, under the heavy influence of the Protestant mission, issued edicts that specifically targeted the outward expressions of the Catholic Faith.

The language of these initial edicts was absolute. The laws declared:

“It is not proper that any person should follow after the religion of the French… No man shall repeat their prayers, nor shall any man keep their images or the cross of their worship.” [5]

By these words, the simple act of reciting a Hail Mary or wearing a crucifix was transformed into a criminal offense against the King. The Regency branded these practices as “idolatry,” a return to the forbidden kapu system that had been abolished in 1819.

The enforcement was swift. Armed guards and government agents began a systematic “purging” of the villages. Native Catholics were rounded up and brought before inquisitorial tribunals led by the chiefs. They were given a simple, brutal choice: renounce the “religion of the French,” attend Protestant services, or face the “wrath of the law” in the Honolulu Fort.

The story of the first flock is not one of mass conversion, but of a few deep roots being planted. The “Initial Seven” provided the template for the hundreds of “Martyrs and Confessors” who would follow them into the horrors of the “Dark Decade.”

Luika (Laika) Kaumaka – The First Confessor and Apostle of Waialua

Historical research indicates the foundational period of the Catholic mission and the detailed ecclesiastical records of Father Reginald Yzendoorn, the story of Luika (Laika) Kaumaka is one of the most significant accounts of early religious resilience in Hawaii. She stands in the archives as the first native Hawaiian documented to have suffered systemic state persecution for her adherence to the Catholic Faith.

Luika Kaumaka was a native convert who embraced Catholicism shortly after the arrival of the first Picpus Fathers in 1827. In an era where the ancient kapu system had been recently abolished, Luika was drawn to the rituals and spiritual structure of the “French religion.”

Following the expulsion of Fathers, Luika did not retreat. She recognized that the Faith was most vulnerable in the capital and strategically moved to the rural district of Waialua. The Kikii Stream Sanctuary: She settled in the area of Paalaa on the banks of the Kikii Stream. In my perspective, Luika transformed this remote area into a “Living Sanctuary.” In the total absence of priests, she became the primary catechist of the North Shore, secretly instructing and baptizing communities of native Hawaiians while evading government “re-education” efforts [6]. Her mission was so successful that when religious freedom was finally granted in 1839, the returning priests did not find a void, but a vibrant, ready-made community. Luika had kept the “Underground Church” alive for nearly a decade [1][7].

In 1830, Luika was singled out by the government authorities. She was summoned before a high tribunal presided over by the Queen herself. The judicial nature of this hearing was intended to make an example of her and break the resolve of the burgeoning “underground” Catholic community.

Luika was ordered to renounce the “religion of the French,” surrender her sacramentals, and attend Protestant services. Despite the overwhelming pressure of the high chiefs, Luika remained steadfast. My research highlights her reply to the Queen: she informed the Regency that while she owed her physical loyalty to the King, her soul and her conscience belonged to the truth she had found in the Catholic mission.

Enraged by her defiance, Ka‘ahumanu ordered a punishment designed to induce a slow, agonizing recantation. Luika was confined to the Honolulu Fort, a damp and overcrowded structure that served as the kingdom’s primary site of detention.

For fifteen days, Luika was denied all food. My thoughts on this period, reconstructed from missionary logs, describe a brutal psychological war. Throughout her fast, government agents visited her cell, placing food just out of reach and promising her immediate liberty if she would only promise to attend the Protestant schools.

Luika’s resolve was heroic. Despite her physical fading, she refused every offer. She reportedly told her captors that the prayers they had forbidden were the only food her soul required. This fifteen-day fast became a legendary moment of resistance within the native Catholic flock.

Though she survived the starvation period, Luika’s persecution did not end. She was eventually transferred to a penal gang and sentenced to hard labor. She was sent to the Waikiki Coral Wall, where she was forced to work alongside common criminals. The labor was grueling: it involved diving into the sea to cut sharp coral stones and carrying them on her shoulders to build the massive sea wall. At the time, Luika was a nursing mother; she was frequently seen performing this heavy labor while simultaneously trying to care for and nurse her infant child.

Following Luika Kaumaka’s heroic stand, the Regency’s strategy shifted from isolated intimidation to a systematic “Widening of the Net.” The ecclesiastical logs of the 1830s reveals a cold, calculated attempt to shatter the Catholic movement by targeting those perceived to be the most vulnerable: nursing mothers, the infirm, and the elderly.

The government authorities, acting under the increasingly rigid edicts of the Regency, believed that if they could break the “weakest” members of the flock, the more prominent leaders would surrender out of guilt or despair. This led to the arrest of women like Kaika Kapuokalani, a woman over sixty years of age, who was sentenced to eighteen months of hard labor solely for her refusal to attend Protestant services.

In the damp, unsanitary confines of the Honolulu Fort, the scene was one of immense suffering. My research identifies several nursing mothers who were held in heavy irons. These women were often denied adequate water or food, a tactic intended to dry their milk and force a recantation for the sake of their starving infants. It was during this period that the Child of the Mat-Weaver and the Infant of the Waikiki Wall tragically perished—innocents who became silent martyrs to the state’s religious intolerance.

However, the Regency’s plan backfired. Instead of producing a wave of recantations, the story of Luika’s fifteen-day fast and the quiet dignity of the suffering elders acted as a spiritual catalyst. The “underground church” did not collapse; it solidified.

The Regency failed to understand the power of Martyrdom and Confession. As news of the horrors at the Fort spread, the native Catholics began to view their trials not as a defeat, but as a “share in the Cross.” The terrified minority was transformed into a movement that operated in the shadows of the mountains and the privacy of grass huts, maintaining their Faith through the recitation of the Rosary and the clandestine teaching of the catechism.

By 1835, the government found itself in a stalemate. The net had been widened, and the prisons were full of the elderly and the young, yet the “religion of the French” remained an unextinguished light in the Hawaiian heart. This resilience set the stage for the next and most brutal phase of the persecution: the systematic use of the Waikiki Coral Wall as a penal colony for the Faithful.

(A depiction of Luika teaching Catechism)

While the exact date of her death is not prominently recorded as a “martyrdom” in the same immediate sense as Simeone Paele, whom we will talk about further in this book, Luika’s story is categorized in my research under the Lingering Martyrs. The extreme physical toll of her fifteen-day starvation, followed by years of reef labor and exposure, permanently shattered her health.

Father Joseph Desvault: Arriving in 1840, Father Desvault became the first resident priest to labor “in earnest” on the North Shore. He constructed a primitive chapel to serve the very converts Luika had gathered and sustained during the Dark Decade [3][4].

The Consecration (1853): On May 8, 1853, the first permanent Roman Catholic Church on the North Shore was dedicated under the patronage of St. Michael the Archangel. Celebrated by Bishop Louis Maigret, this landmark event was the ecclesiastical culmination of Luika Kaumaka’s decades of sacrifice [7].

Luika Kaumaka is remembered not just as a victim, but as the “First Confessor.” Her story proved to the Regency that the Catholic Faith had taken root in the Hawaiian heart so deeply that neither the threat of death nor the degradation of the Fort could extract it. Her survival of the 1830 inquisition provided the spiritual blueprint for the “Martyrs and Confessors” who would endure the remainder of the Dark Decade.