Dream islands of the South Seas and Prussian trading dreams
Knowledge about the dream islands of the South Seas had already reached German-speaking countries in the last quarter of the 18th century through Georg Forster and Heinrich Zimmermann. The natural scientist and poet Adelbert von Chamisso also came to Hawaiʻi during the Rurik expedition under the command of Otto von Kotzebue in November 1816 and September 1817. Even before his “Remarks and Opinions of the Naturalist of the Expedition” were printed in Weimar in 1821, his observations had already spread in Berlin and his friend E. T. A. Hoffmann published his epistolary novella “Haimatochare” in Berlin in 1819, the first European work of prose set on the Hawaiian island of Oʻahu. Hawaiʻi was therefore not only no longer terra incognita, but already a literary setting when the “Mentor” set sail from Bremen in December 1822.
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| King Kamehameha I of Hawaiʻi |
As the “Age of Discovery” reached its end, the major trade routes had already shifted to the oceans when Prussia set out to open up new markets with its first circumnavigation of the globe. While the “East India” and “West India” companies of European countries had long since established extensive trade links, the “Royal Prussian Asiatic Company in Emden to Canton and China” had only been founded in ambitious Prussia under King Frederick II. Its ships brought not only tea and spices to the country, but also luxury goods such as porcelain and silk. However, the decline of the company began with the Seven Years’ War (1756-1763) and it was finally dissolved in 1765.
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| Sealing mark of the “General Directorate of the Shipping Trade Society” |
Just seven years later, the “General Directorate of the Shipping Trade Society” was founded in Berlin, although it was not particularly successful at first – partly due to the Napoleonic Wars. This changed when it became an independent financial and trading institution under state supervision. From 1820 onward, Christian Rother in particular shaped the Shipping Trade Society’s ventures, which also included the first Prussian circumnavigation of the world with the “Mentor”. However, the merchant frigate was not yet in Prussian hands when it sailed from Bremen, but the Berlin merchant Wilhelm Oswald, who was responsible for the cargo, supervised the trading business as supercargo from the very beginning.
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| The Royal Prussian naval vessel Mentor sailing around Cap Horn |
Like the Prussian ships of the Emden East Asian Trading Company, the “Mentor” was also supposed to make port in Canton, China – this time, however, coming from the east. After sailing around Cape Horn and stops in the Chilean ports of Valparaíso and Coquimbo, the ship arrived in the port of Honolulu on the island of Oʻahu in the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi on November 28, 1823. The day before, King Liholiho and Queen Kamāmalu, accompanied by Boki, the governor of Oʻahu, his wife Kuini Liliha and other companions, had left Hawaiʻi for London on board the British whaler “L’Aigle”, although there was “great stir among the chiefs about the king going to England”, as Stephen Reynolds had already noted in his diary on November 8. Wilhelm Oswald observed immediately after the arrival of the “Mentor” that “the death of a chief, who was buried in the morning, ... caused deep mourning among all those present”.
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| Mahiole |
It is not known whether these political events had anything to do with the fact that a young Hawaiian who introduced himself as “Harry” wanted to be taken on board the “Mentor”. When the ship left Honolulu for Canton on December 3, he saw his homeland Hawaiʻi for the last time in his life. Also on board with him were a number of items that had been acquired during his short stay, including a woven helmet (mahiole), which is now on display at the Humboldt Forum in Berlin. The Germans also called Harry “Maitey” and this name, which goes back to the Hawaiian “maitaʻi”, later became his surname in Prussia. Since the sources always describe Harry Maitey as friendly and gentle, the meanings “good, fine, all right” of “maitaʻi” probably suited his character.
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| King Liholiho and Queen Kamāmalu in the theater in London |
No one knows what dreams of the future in a distant land sailed with Harry Maitey to Canton and then on to Europe via Java and St. Helena. At the same time as the “Mentor” was sailing through the English Channel, a ship was preparing to depart from the Thames to return the mortal remains of King Liholiho and Queen Kamāmalu to Hawaiʻi, who had been infected with measles and died in London.
The “Mentor” had been purchased by the Prussian Shipping Trade Society during the returning voyage and was therefore ordered to Swinemünde, where it arrived on September 14, 1824. King Frederick William III decided that Christian Rother, the president of the Shipping Trade Society, was to bring Harry Maitey to Berlin and accommodate him. The “Sandwich Islander” now had his domicile in the “Jägerstraße” on the corner of the “Gendarmenmarkt”. What else would his eyes see in a foreign country – and through what eyes would the Berliners see him?
(Fortsetzung folgt)
Teil 1: Reisen zu den Inseln der Träume
Illustration credits
- „Tammeamea“ – Otto von Kotzebue: Entdeckungs-Reise in die Süd-See und nach der Berings-Straße zur Erforschung einer nordöstlichen Durchfahrt, volume 2, before p. 15, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek: https://mdz-nbn-resolving.de/details:bsb10715380
- Siegelmarke der General-Direction der Königlichen Seehandlungs-Societät, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Siegelmarke_General_-_Direction_der_K%C3%B6niglichen_Seehandlungs_-_Societ%C3%A4t_-_Berlin_W0223066.jpg
- „Das Königl. Preuß. Seeschiff Mentor das Cap Horn umsegelnd“, Von Sr. Majestät acquirirt im Dec. 1843, überreicht von dem K. P. Generalkonsul Hr. Oswald, Oelgemälde im Berliner Schlosse, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Handelsfregatte_Mentor.png
- Mahiole (Helm), Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Ethnologisches Museum / Heinz-Günther Malenz, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://recherche.smb.museum/detail/1000355/
- „Their Majesties King Rheo Rhio (Liholiho), Queen Tamehamalu (Tamāmalu), Madame Poke (Boki) of the Sandwich Islands“ by John William Gear (Ausschnitt), 1824, color lithograph, Honolulu Museum of Art accession 9990, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:King_Rheo_Rhio,_Queen_Tamehamalu,_Madame_Poke_by_John_William_Gear,_color_lithograph.jpg
References
Historical sources
- Chamisso, Adelbert von: Bemerkungen und Ansichten auf einer Entdeckungs-Reise: unternommen in den Jahren 1815-1818 auf Kosten Sr. Erlaucht des Herrn Reichs-Kanzlers Grafen Romanzoff auf dem Schiffe Rurick unter dem Befehle des Lieutenants der Russisch-Kaiserlichen Marine Otto von Kotzebue. Entdeckungsreise in die Süd-See und nach der Berings-Straße zur Erforschung einer nordöstlichen Durchfahrt / Otto von Kotzebue. Weimar: Hoffmann, 1821. https://digitale-sammlungen.de/de/details/bsb10715381.
- Judd, Bernice, and Helen Yonge Lind: Voyages to Hawaiʻi Before 1860: A Record, Based on Historical Narratives in the Libraries of the Hawaiian Mission Children’s Society and The Hawaiian Historical Society, Extended to March 1860. University of Hawai’i Press, 1974. https://manifold.uhpress.hawaii.edu/projects/voyages-to-hawai-i-before-1860.
- Oswald, Johann Carl Heinrich Wilhelm: Erlebnisse von Johann Carl Heinrich Wilhelm Oswald auf seiner ersten Reise um die Welt in den Jahren 1822 bis 1824. Hamburg: H. O. Persiehl, 1915.
- Reynolds, Stephen W., and Pauline King Joerger: Journal of Stephen Reynolds. Honolulu, Salem, Mass.: Ku Paʻa Inc. ; Peabody Museum of Salem, 1989.
Mahiole
- Sammlungen Online (Staatliche Museen zu Berlin): „Helm“. Zugegriffen 3. Februar 2023. https://recherche.smb.museum/detail/1000355/.
Miscellaneous
- Burmester, Heinz: Weltumseglung unter Preußens Flagge: die Königlich Preussische Seehandlung und ihre Schiffe. Hamburg: Kabel, 1988.
- Moore, Anneliese W.: „Hawaii in a Nutshell - E. T. A. Hoffmann’s Haimatochare“. Hawaiian Journal of History 12 (1978): 13–27.
- Schindlbeck, Markus: „Der Federmantel von Hawaiʻi in der Berliner Sammlung“. Baessler-Archiv 58, Nr. 2010 (2011): 139–158.
Erstveröffentlichung: „No ka hoʻomanaʻo ana ia Berlin“
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