226: The Lost Tomb of King Kamehameha
King Kamehameha 1 was a chief who took control of all the islands of Hawaii by conquest. Let's make this clear, the unification of Hawaii was not a peaceful affair, but it is the same with all races is it not?
But this story starts with an American ship called the Fair American. This was a fur trading vessel that was captured in Alaska, sailed to Mexico but later released, and the crew sailed to Hawaii hoping for a rendevouz with the Captains father and not knowing what his father had done to a hawaiian chief. So Thomas Metcalfe brought the Fair American into Kawaihae Bay in South Kohala. This bay is about 60km from what we know as Kailua Kona. (I know this place and I love it. And I've walked the lava fields up to Waikoloa Beach which is where the north Kona area ends and south Kohala begins). Thomas landed at an inappropriate time. Before you read on, look up this article -
Simon Metcalfe of the ship Eleanora mistreated Kameʻeiamoku when he boarded his ship, had him flogged and then the massacre at Olowalu commenced. Kameʻeiamoku decided to attack the next American ship and take revenge. Thomas knew nothing of this and on 16 March 1790, Kameʻeiamoku's men easily captured the Fair American and killed everyone. Only one survived. Kameʻeiamoku took the ship and all on it. The Fair American was then commandeered by King Kamehameha I and this vessel became the first foreign style vessel in Kamehameha's war fleet. This gave him the upper hand, just like the NgaPuhi of New Zealand when they gained muskets and slaughtered other Maori who were using stone weapons. Kamehameha did the same thing for he was at war with other Hawaiian Kings at the time.
Now we go back to those four killed. They were killed at Kawaihae Bay and, as it turns out, buried in a cave system just down the coast a little. Whether they were always in the same cave or transferred after Kamehameha died no one knows. King Kamehameha 1 ( a tall man of about 7') died in 1802, only 12 years after this event by which time Hawaii was 'unified'. Don't get caught up in that niced word, like all unifications, blood was spilled. But he was a great chief and is greatly honoured and was buried in a secret location. No one knows where he is buried, most say on Maui but that is to divert attention. He is buried on the Big Island. A few days after the March 16, 1790 attack, Kamehameha arrived at the scene and angrily rebuked his trusted advisor Kame‘eiamoku for his deed. Then he ordered the remorseful Kame‘eiamoku to place the bodies of the “foreigners” deep in a specific lava tube, one where some of his 8 stillborn children lay in coconut husk beds in chamber two. These four foreigners in chamber three were Thomas and his three shorter Chinese crewmen. This story somehow led to a National Geographic team being shown where these four murdered skeletons now lay, in a cave on the Ka‘ūpūlehu lava field. Without saying too much, this site is secret and those showing the NG team these historic skeletons (which they are) also suspected something else. They were allowed to take just one photo and that is shown below - the four dead in the third deeper chamber.
But on the way back they were asked to measure an ancient canoe stored in the first chamber. It was measured at 12'. Those who saw it were amazed at what was inside it for at the base lay a large skeleton that filled the base of the old wooden canoe. It was measured at 7' long and laid out perfectly. This is the final resting place of Kamehameha 1. There are no photographs available of what is in that canoe.
Reverend Pogue’s Mo‘olelo Hawai‘i of 1858 is the first written reference to the concealment of Kamehameha’s bones in a secret burial cave: “...Hoapili ordered his man (half-brother) Ho‘olulu to take the bones of Kamehameha to Kaloko. The next morning, Hoapili and Keōpūolani sailed by canoe to Kaloko. Then Hoapili hid the bones of Kamehameha in a secret cave. It is conceivable thieves would not suspect that Kamehameha had planned with Hoapili and Keōpūolani to have his sacred bones hidden in a canoe in a lava tube known to contain the sailors of the Fair American. No one would expect the kind to do such a thing. No one would conceive that a loving mother like Keōpūolani had visited perhaps for years, the middle chamber, the family crypt she had chosen for her royal children with Kamehameha. In the dark and quiet of that early morning long ago, Hoapili and Keōpūolani had a mission to complete: escorting a loving father on his final journey home to be with his children. The perfect secret crypt.
Officially, Mauna Ala, also known as the Royal Mausoleum State Monument, is the final resting place of the Kamehameha and Kalakaua dynasties. But that can't be true because Kamehameha's bones were placed in a secret place, with his children.
Today, the location of the lava tube burial is a protected historical site on land owned by Bishop Estates.
Comentarios