During the wars between the Te I'i and the Tai Pi, on October 25, 1813, the
American navy
Captain David Porter arrived in the
frigate USS Essex,
the flagship of his fleet of ten other armed ships. A shore party was
landed and they claimed the island for the United States and constructed
a small village, named
Madisonville. A
fortification, named
Fort Madison, and a dock were also built, the latter to refit the
Essex. Almost immediately Porter became involved in the tribal conflict. The first expedition into the jungle was led by
Lieutenant John Downes, He and forty others captured a fort held by 3,000 to 4,000
Happah
warriors with the assistance of several hundred Te I'is. The victory
forced the Happah to terms and they allied themselved with both the
Americans and the Te I'i. A second expedition was led by Porter himself
and he made an amphibious assault against the Tai Pi held coastline.
5,000 Te I'is and Happahs accompanied the fleet in at least 200
war-canoes.
Though the landing was unappossed, Porter's force of thirty men and a
cannon led the march inland where they found another, more formidable,
enemy fort. Thousands of natives armed with rocks and spears, positioned
in a formidable mountain fortress, were able to fend off their enemies.
The victory was short-lived however and Captain Porter followed up his
landing with an expedition overland, bypassing the fort, to threaten the
Tai Pi's village center in
Typee Valley as the Americans named it.
[3]
When the column arrived at their destination it was November 30 of
1813. The first shots fired occurred after the Tai Pi's attempted to
ambush the column, the attack was beaten off Porter issued a message
warning that if the Tai Pi did not cease their resistance at once, he
would destroy the villages. After a little while of waiting, the
hostiles seemed to ignore the demands so the expedition advanced. A
engagement ensued as the villages were burned. In the end, the Americans
and their Te I'i and Happah allies had won at severe cost to the enemy,
who sued for peace soon after. The next few months were peaceful until
May 1814. The
War of 1812 between the United States and the
United Kingdom was in its third year and most of the American fleet was captured British
privateers.
At least six British prisoners were at Nuku Hiva during the American
operations against the natives, not including a number who volunteered
to fight for Captain Porter. But in December 1813, Porter left Nuka Hiva
to continue raiding British
whalers. He left behind only nineteen navy sailors and six prisoners under two
midshipmen and
United States Marine Corps Lieutenant
John M. Gamble.
On May 7, 1814, a group of the British sailors mutinied, released the
six prisoners and attacked the fort. Gamble was wounded in the foot and
taken captive with his remaining men on the
corvette Seringapatam though the Americans were set adrift later that day.
[4]
An Englishman, named Wilson, on the island was used as an interpreter
by the American navy and on May 9 he convinced the Te I'i that Porter
would not return from his raid which the natives were not happy about.
Wilson eventually persuaded the Te I'is to cancel the alliance and
attack. Six American sailors were on the beach at Madisonville at the
time, four of the men were killed and one other man escaped wounded with
a second survivor. Gamble was alone on the
Sir Andrew Hammond,
one of the captured British ships. While still recovering from his wound
to the foot, two Te I'i war-canoes attacked the ship. The ship's cannon
were already loaded so Lieutenant Gamble stumbled from one gun to
another, firing them as fast as he could. Ultimately Gamble beat off the
enemy attack single handedly but after the deaths of four of his men in
town, there was no choice but to abandon the colony with the remaining
seven, all of whom were either wounded or ill. After that the base was
never again occupied by American forces. Captain Porter, who intended to
sail back to Nuka Hiva, was captured at the
Battle of Valparaiso on March 28, his claim on Nuku Hiva was never ratified by the
United States Congress and in 1842
France took possession of the whole group, establishing a settlement which was abandoned in 1859.
[5][6]
From Wikipedia
