I dug out this photo of my Irish great-grandfather, Robert William Cathcart, for Saint Patrick’s Day. He was born January 20, 1856 in County Down, Ireland. He was 25 years old when he arrived in Hawaii on October 24, 1881, aboard the American Barkentine “Ella” from San Francisco, according the the ship’s manifest from that voyage, now in the State Archives.
My sister, Bonnie, provided more information about the photo.
The man is Robert Cathcart, our great-grandfather. The woman is the 3rd woman by whom Cathcart had Hawaiian children, and the only one he married haole style. She is Ellen Poaha. The oldest boy is Willie (William). Edwin came next; he is the one who died young. Then Uncle Arthur, then Tony, the baby. Tony was not born until after Galbraith died in 1904, so I’m guessing that the photo may have been taken just before Cathcart, Ellen and Tony headed off to Tahiti. He was given the trip by Wilder Steamship Company — I thought when he left their employ, but I don’t know where he was working when he died.
Cathcart was naturalized a US Citizen about 1906 in preparation for that trip. He had to be a US Citizen to get himself back into Hawai’i after going to Tahiti, and he had to be married haole style (legally, by American standards) to Ellen if he was going to take her with him. They were married in Honolulu on 26 Oct 1905, per the marriage index 1832-1910, Vol 1, O-75:46, Hawaii State Archives. Tony went along, I suspect because he was still nursing, but don’t know that for a fact. I found Cathcart’s Citizenship certificate in the National Archives branch, Burlingame CA several years ago. There is a copy here in the house, but I am not even going to TRY to find it tonight! Interestingly, as noted, by this time Galbraith had died and it was established that Cathcart had written the Galbraith will. He lists his occupation on the ship manifest to Tahiti as — would you believe — ATTORNEY. I have not looked at the City Directories to see if he changed his occupation there, but did have to chuckle when I found that on the manifest for the Tahiti trip! Did the man have delusions of grandeur?
The taller of the two girls is Auntie Helen, the other is our grandmother.
I marvel about this because I never had any idea while growing up that I was Irish. I was raised as “part-Hawaiian.” But, it seems, I’m as much Irish as Hawaiian, perhaps a little more because of Irish roots somewhere in both of my parent’s heritage.
In any case, I picked up a bottle of Jameson Irish Whiskey at Tamura’s in Hauula yesterday, and had a drink last night in honor of my Irish heritage.
So, here we go, greetings to my Hawaiian-Irish cousins in honor of Saint Patrick’s Day.
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Three cheers for Jamesons!
Three cheers for Tamura’s, also!
Gee and I thought alcohol wasn’t sold in your neck of the woods. Especially on a Sunday. Another lesson learned. For you and your mates, a spoonful of scotch whiskey ice cream. Everyday is heritage day.
That Sunday alcohol thing is only up the road in Laie, as far as I know. And even there, of limited effect.
Neat! Now we will expect to see you wearing the green!
Nope, gotta’ wear the Orange! Our people — the ones I am certain about — were all North Ireland!
King Kauikeaouli Kamehameha III, not knowing his actual date of birth, selected St. Patrick’s Day to be his “official birthday.” For that reason, several years ago I exercised my kuleana as a man of Irish ancestry to proclaim him an “honourary Irishman.” Why did nobody know his actual birthdate? And why did he choose St. Patrick’s Day for an official birthdate? See the webpage at
http://tinyurl.com/58ft2
Here is an unexpected connection between Hawaii and Ireland.
We’ve all heard of the Irish Republican Army. From the wiki:
The organization was therefore created by elected members of the British parliament from Ireland who broke away and formed their own legislature.
After the founding of the modern Irish state, there was a split within the IRA, which led to a civil war.
What is called the IRA today is that faction of the old IRA that rejected the treaty with Britain that left a divided Ireland; the current IRA is considered a terrorist organization, by both the Irish and the British states. In contrast, those in the old IRA who accepted the treaty went on to form the core of the current Irish state’s military force.
The ideology of ‘Irish republicanism’ go back to the 18th century, and can be summarized as the belief that the island of Ireland should be democratic and united into a single state. This was inspired by the American and French revolutions, and found its first representation in the group Society of United Irishmen, founded in 1791. The one man who was considered the founding father of the movement was Wolfe Tone. He was captured by British forces after the 1798 rebellion.
Ouch. Not a fun way to end a political career.
But how did he begin his political career?
You heard that right. He wanted to lead the British conquest of Hawaii (or at least a part of Hawaii).
Now, as part of a thought experiment, what do you imagine Hawaii would be like if he had succeeded?
In some respects, that question might be like the counter-factual history question of what the US would look like if there had been no American Revolution. In general, what is now the US might be a bit like Canada today. This is complicated because Canada is influenced strongly by American culture, and by its deliberate attempts to be different from America (e.g., by its multiculturalism and multilingualism, and its progressive social policy and its temperamental conservatism), and by the fact that just after the American Revolution, one-third of the colonists ran off to Canada because they were loyalists (one reason why Canadians talk a bit like Americans).
One might assume that if Hawaii were British, on the whole it would me mostly just the same as it is. There would still be a heavy US military presence (after all, the US military has a major base in Cuba).
There might be a greater cultural orientation toward Australia, New Zealand and the UK, and perhaps Canada, the way there is in places like New Zealand, but the influence of the US, in particular of California, would still be huge.
But even that might be nullified in the contemporary world. For example, young people in Tahiti often end up going to college in France or Australia. But their great fascination today is Japanese anime and manga, Korean pop music and Facebook. Their perspective is global. Young people around the world just aren’t that different from one another.
If Hawaii were British, people in Hawaii might drink more tea than coffee, as they do in Anglo countries. There might be more alcoholism than drug addiction. People might speak with a slight British accent (the way elderly Native Hawaiians sometimes did, up until recently). Iolani School, founded by the British, might be the ascendant private elite prep school rather than Punahou.
We’d probably have a bunch of statues everywhere of our “great Governor Wolfe Tone”, who would have supposedly brought all the things that everyone in the English-speaking world values, like democracy, freedom, progress, prosperity, etc., etc.
But on the whole, there does not seem to be any reason to believe that things would be otherwise than the way they are.
Six of one, half a dozen of the other.