Column 6--A Town Called Levuka -- Part 2

This is the sixth column in a serialization of PACIFIC FLASH: A Year in FIJI by Gerry Takano. Copies will be available April 1, 2010. Stay tuned for more information.

The ascent of Christianity, proclaimed certain locals, had a profound impact on the extraordinary transformation from Fiji’s image as a land of savagery to its enlightenment and alignment with European powers. Not much was said about cannibalism, even on the island of Ovalau, though early missionary reports vividly detailed the practice in Fiji. From Barnum circus promoters desiring a Fijian cannibal for their American show to articles in the New York Times, the West continued to view Fiji as a land of horror, fear and mystery.

By 1867, the Fijian custom of banqueting on one's political enemies ended. The last act of cannibalism in Fiji was that of an English missionary named the Reverend Thomas Baker of East Sussex along with his accompanying party of Methodist Fijians. Since then Fiji, and specifically the European-friendly town of Levuka, saluted Britain and its Christian religious conversion, with colonial pride. The first European traders arrived on Ovalau Island, Fiji, in the early 1830s.

Among them was an American named David Whippy who jumped ship and later became an advisor to the local chief. Like many other Europeans, Whippy’s interracial off-springs remain part of Levuka’s part-European-Fijian society. By the 1860s, Levuka became a bustling waterfront port full of shops, residences, saloons and offices. Houses were built high on the hillsides connected by a series of stairways. It was here in Levuka that another American, John Brown Williams, demanded debt payments from the local chief, Cakobau. Prompted by the American debt, King Cakobau, who had earlier converted to Christianity, ceded Fiji to the British in 1874 to assist in the debt’s resolution. The signing of the deed of Cession, as witnessed during the year’s Back to Levuka festivities, celebrated the beginning of Fiji as a British colony. Fiji’s Deed of Cession to Great Britain was signed on 10 October. Excerpts from the writings of William Floyd who arrived in Levuka, Fiji in 1870 describe the town life:

Levuka, in 1870, saw life lived furiously. It was said to have had no less than 52 hotels, licensed bars and kava-saloons strung along its one mile beach front. It used to be asserted, and my authority is Miss Constance Gordon-Cumming, in "At Home in Fiji", in 1875, that ships' captains had no need for charts. All they needed to do was to pick up the long line of Holland's square gin bottles that floated out to sea, increasing in number as they neared the port, and they found themselves unerringly right at their anchorage.

Gerry Takano was reared in Honolulu, Hawaii and received his architectural education and early training in upstate New York and Boston. Gerry served as Hawaii’s National Trust Advisor and State of Hawaii Commissioner of the Historic Sites Review Board.

He currently resides in the San Francisco Bay Area and can be reached at gertkno@aol.com