Europeans, Missionaries, Kings and Independence in Tonga | Sea Life, Islands and Oceania

FIRST EUROPEANS IN TONGA

Dutch sailors explored the islands of Tonga in the 1600s The first European to sight the islands of Tonga were the Dutch navigators Schoten and Lemaire in 1616. They noted the islands in a 1622 report. The main island of Tongatapu was first visited by the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman in 1643 during his journey around Australia and Tasmania.

Continual contact with Europeans, however, did not begin until more than 125 years later, until 1767, when Samuel Wallis anchored at Niuatoputapu. Trader and explorers from the Netherlands, Great Britain, France, and Spain introduce many new trade goods — and diseases — to Tonga. Europeans did not gain a foothold in Tonga until the late eighteenth century when English captain James Cook (1728–1779) visited the islands in the 1770s, naming them the Friendly Islands.

One famous early European visitor to Tonga was Will Mariner, a 15-year-old boy who arrived in islands in 1806 on the ship “Port-au-Prince”. A group of Tongan warriors masquerading as traders bordered the ship and at a signal clubbed to death everyone except Mariner who was given to a chief and raised as warrior named Toki Ukamea (Iron Ax). Mariner stayed on Tonga for four years and eventually managed to escape adn wrote about his adventures in a book called

Captain Cook in Tonga

Cook visited Tonga during his second and third voyages. He stopped at Tongatapu and Ha'apai groups in 1773 and again in 1777, and called Lifuka in the Ha'apai group the "friendly island" because of the gentle nature of the people he encountered there. This is the source of the name Friendly Islands given to the entire archipelago. Cook was unaware that while he was there there was debate among chiefs and nobles over who should have the honor of attacking Cook's tiny fleet and killing its sailors. [Source: “Countries of the World and Their Leaders Yearbook 2009]

After visiting Tonga, Cook wrote in his log "the friendly behavior of the Natives who seem'd to [vie] with each other in doing what they thought would give us pleasure...this group I have named the Friendly Archipelago as a lasting friendship seems to subsists among the Inhabitants and their Courtesy to Strangers entitles then to that name." Cook returned for the last time in 1777. After leaving he wrote: "Thus we took leave of the Friendly Islands and their inhabitants after a stay of between two and three Months, during which time we lived together in the most cordial friendship..."

Samwell described the scene at Hapaee in Tonga: “A prodigious Number of the Natives were collected together on the Beach & a large Space was left clear for our People. Captn. Cook with some of the officers of each Ship sat in a House at the upper end of the open Area along with Phenow & the Chiefs of the Island.” [Source: Samwell in Cook, Journals III, 2, 1016-19]

Cook described the entertainment on his arrival at Hapaee: “Presently after a number of men entered the Circle or Area before us, armed with Clubs….and began to engage and continued till one or the other gave out or their weapons were broke….there were Wristling and Boxing matches; the first were performed in the same m(an)ner as at Otahiete, and the second very little different from the method practiced in England.” [Source: Cook, Journals, III, i, 107]

Mutiny on the Bounty and Tonga

Several officers who served under Cook went on to distinguish themselves elsewhere. William Bligh, Cook's sailing master, was given command of HMS Bounty in 1787 to sail to Tahiti and exploit breadfruit. Bligh became known for the mutiny of his crew, which took place off of Tonga.

On April 28, 1789, the famous mutiny on the British ship, Bounty, took place in the waters between the Ha apai and Nomuka island groups in Tonga. . After the mutiny, Captain Blight and 18 loyal crew members were set adrift and landed on the Tongan island of Tofua, where they were attacked by islanders. The Bounty's quartermaster John Norton was clubbed to death but Bligh and others escaped and set sail in an open boat and eventually arrived in Timor in the Dutch East Indies after a 5,822-kilometer (3,618-mile) journey.

The Bounty was only 27.7 meters (91 feet) long and 7.3 meters (24 feet) wide. The crew slept in cubicles below that were only five feet high. On the Bounty, one out of seven seamen died, More than that jumped ship, The rest subsisted on wheat-and-pear flour biscuits dyed white with alum, rock-hard salted pork and beef, a gallon of beer a day, and generous potions of other spirits.

Captain Bligh had been sent to what is now French Polynesia to collect seedlings of the wondrous "Uru" or breadfruit tree, to introduce them to the West Indies as food for slaves there.. After five months at sea Fletcher Christian, his first mate, lead the a mutiny on Bligh's ship, the Bounty. The mutiny was reportedly inspired by an argument over coconuts. Before the voyage, Captain Bligh and Fletcher Christian were friends. There are rumors they may have even been lovers. The fight may have been because Fletcher owed Bligh money.

The Bounty crew of eight seamen, six Polynesian men, and a dozen women landed on Pitcairn Island after a four month, 12,875-kilometer (8,000-mile) journey. No one discovered them for two decades. When a whaling ship arrived on Pitcairn in 1898 only one European man and four Polynesian women remained, the rest were teenagers and children that had been born after the mutiny. Captain Edward Edwards, the man in charge of bringing back Christian himself suffered a mutiny.

Tonga in the 19th Century

In 1799, Tonga fell into a new round of civil wars over succession as the three lines of kings contended for dominance. At about the same time, young Tongan nobles serving as mercenaries took Tongan culture to Fiji's most eastern island group, the Laus. European contact, particularly the introduction of firearms, made the situation worse, resulting in a period of violence and disorder that continued into the 1820s.

Charles F. Urbanowicz wrote in the “Encyclopedia of World Cultures”: “Although Tongan oral histories report some traditional conflicts relating to political situations, Tongans were essentially peaceful islanders prior to the coming of European missionaries. Although it may not have been a deliberate nineteenth-century missionary plan, a divideand-conquer policy saw non-Christian Tongans fighting against Christian Tongans, and there were additional conflicts in 1837, 1840, and 1852. [Source: Charles F. Urbanowicz,“Encyclopedia of World Cultures, Volume 2: Oceania,” edited by Terence E. Hays, 1996]

Order was restored when the the powerful 6-foot-6 warrior and orator King Taufa'ahau Tupou I of the Ha'apai group united Tonga as a kingdom in 1845, taking the title King George Tupou I (in honor of England’s King George III [1738–1820]) and establishing the dynasty that rules Tonga to this day.

Under King George’s leadership, Tonga became an independent nation with a constitution established in 1862 and a parliamentary system of government. Tonga signed agreements with Germany, Great Britain, and the United States recognizing its independence.

George Tupou I centralized all power in his hands and united the islands. He abolished the feudal system of land tenure and became a constitutional monarch in 1875. He gave Tonga a legal code, and an administrative system.

Missionaries in Tonga

English missionaries began arriving in Tonga in the mid 1700s and helped to strengthen British political influence there. The first missionaries, attached to the London Missionary Society, arrived in 1747. A second missionary group followed in 1822, led by Walter Lawry of the Wesleyan Missionary Society. The Wesleyan missionaries quickly converted the population. By middle of the 19th century, most Tongans had become Christians, the great majority being Wesleyans, and the king himself was strongly influenced by the missionaries.

According to the “Encyclopedia of World Cultures”: “Tonga, along with the South Pacific islands of Tahiti, was one of the first island groups to receive European missionaries specifically for the purpose of converting the native inhabitants to Christianity. After European missionaries landed in Tahiti in 1797, additional missionaries continued on to Tongatapu in Tonga. Two Tahitians who had converted to Christianity in their native islands arrived on Tongatapu while en route to Fiji and began their Christian work among the Tongan natives. [Source: Charles F. Urbanowicz,“Encyclopedia of World Cultures, Volume 2: Oceania,” edited by Terence E. Hays, 1996]

In the 1830s, Taufa’ahau, then a low-ranking chief from Ha’apai, began consolidating control over the islands and won the support of the missionaries by declaring that he would dedicate Tonga to God.

In 1831,King Taufa'ahau was converted to Methodism by missionaries from the Wesleyan Methodist Church. He then changed his name to George Topuy I and converted his subjects and made Methodism the state church of Tonga. He named himself after England's King George III and had his wife baptized as Salote (SAH-lo-tay), a Tongification of Charlotte, George III's wife.

Charles F. Urbanowicz wrote in the “Encyclopedia of World Cultures”: “In early nineteenth-century Tonga, the Christian missionaries made numerous efforts to convert the chiefs to the new religion, since if the chiefs converted, their people would follow. As word of missionary successes in the islands spread, other missionaries arrived and religious wars of intense fury began in 1826....With the aid of missionaries, three Tongan law codes were introduced to Tongans in 1839, 1850, and 1862. The culmination of all missionary involvement was the Tongan constitution of 1875. [Source: Charles F. Urbanowicz,“Encyclopedia of World Cultures, Volume 2: Oceania,” edited by Terence E. Hays, 1996]

In the latter part of the century, there were religious and civil conflicts between the Wesleyan Mission Church and the newly established Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga. After the dismissal of the prime minister, the Rev. Shirley Waldemar Baker, in 1890, the new government allowed full freedom of worship. [Source: “Worldmark Encyclopedia of Nations”, Thomson Gale, 2007]

Tonga Becomes a British Protectorate

In 1900, during the reign of King George Tupou II (1893–1918) the first treaty of friendship was concluded between the United Kingdom and Tonga. Tonga was made a British protectorate but had full freedom over internal affairs. Britain was given the right to set up coal stations in return for protecting Tonga from an invasion and looking after the country's foreign affairs. Some say Tonga became a protected state not a protectorate.

King George Tupou II, agreed to enter a protectorate agreement with Britain after rival Tongan chiefs tried to overthrow him. As a protectorate, Tonga never completely lost its indigenous governance, but it did become more isolated and the social hierarchy became more stratified between a group of nobles and a large class of commoners. Today, about one third of parliamentary seats are reserved for nobles. [Source: CIA World Factbook, 2023]

Tonga is the only South Pacific country that was never colonized. It remained self-governing, with the British only responsible for foreign and defense affairs. Queen Salote Tupou III ruled from 1918 to 1965, when she was succeed by her son, King Taufa'ahau Tupou IV. A new treaty in 1968 reduced British controls, and complete independence was attained on June 4, 1970.

Queen Elizabeth visited Tonga in 1953 on one of her first royal visits after her coronation. The Tongan queen and king moved out the royal place so Elizabeth and Prince Philipe could stay there. The following morning the British royals were awakened by the music of four nose-flute players.

Tonga’s Road to Independence After World War II

During World War II, Tongan soldiers under Allied command fought the Japanese in the Solomon Islands, and New Zealand and US forces were stationed on Tongatapu, which served as an important shipping point. In close collaboration with New Zealand, Tonga formed a local defense force of about 2,000 troops that saw action in the Solomon Islands.

After World War II a new treaty of friendship and protection with the United Kingdom, signed in 1958 and ratified in May 1959, provided for a British Commissioner and consul in Tonga who were responsible to the Governor of Fiji in his capacity as British Chief Commissioner for Tonga. In mid-1965 the British Commissioner and consul became directly responsible to the U.K. Secretary of State for Colonial Affairs.

Queen Salote Tupou (r.1918–65) negotiated the end of the protectorate in 1965. She came to the throne at the age of 47 in 1918 and ruled for 47 years until her death in 1965. Standing over 6-foot-2-inches tall, the queen made a lasting impression at the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II by showing her respect to the new queen by driving around in an open car in the cold rain. She is still greatly admired by Tongans.

Tonga Becomes Fully Independent in 1970

Tonga became fully independent on June 4, 1970, as a member of the British Commonwealth of Nations. an event officially designated by King Taufa'ahau Tupou IV as Tonga's “reentry into the community of nations.” [Source: “Countries of the World and Their Leaders Yearbook 2009]

King Taufa'ahau Tupou IV had succeeded to the throne upon the death of his mother, Queen Salote Tupou (r.1918–65), Independence brought few immediate changes, apart from the fact that it added Tongan control of foreign affairs to self-rule in domestic matters. In 1972, Tonga claimed the uninhabited Minerva Reefs (now Teleki Tokelau and Teleki Tonga), situated about 480 km (300 mi) southwest of Nuku'alofa, in order to prevent an Anglo-American corporation from founding an independent Republic of Minerva on the reefs in order to gain certain tax advantages. [Source: “Worldmark Encyclopedia of Nations”, Thomson Gale, 2007]

Tonga is the only surviving kingdom in the Pacific. Its 1875 constitution is the oldest one in the Pacific islands, and although Tonga was a "protected state" of Great Britain for 70 years, most Tongans maintain that their country was never a colony. The current system of government is a hereditary constitutional monarchy. Beneath the monarch, there are 33 nobles, who control most of the land in the country. The nobility was established in the constitution of 1875 and is based on inheritance. The prime minister, deputy prime minister, and cabinet are appointed by the king from this group. The unicameral (single house) Legislative Assembly (Fale Alea) is made up of 30 seats, 12 of which are reserved for the cabinet appointed by the monarch, 9 are selected by the nobles, and another 9 are elected by popular vote of all citizens over the age of 21 years.

A prodemocracy movement gained steam in the early 2000s, led by future Prime Minister ‘Akilisi Pohiva, and in 2006, riots broke out in Nuku’alofa to protest the lack of progress on prodemocracy legislation. To appease the activists, in 2008, King George Tupou V announced he was relinquishing most of his powers leading up to parliamentary elections in 2010; he died in 2012 and was succeeded by his brother ‘Aho’eitu Tupou VI. Tropical Cyclone Gita, the strongest-ever recorded storm to impact Tonga, hit the islands in February 2018 causing extensive damage. [Source: CIA World Factbook, 2023]

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Text Sources: CIA World Factbook, 2023; “Encyclopedia of World Cultures, Volume 2: Oceania,” edited by Terence E. Hays, 1991, Wikipedia, Encyclopedia.com, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Times of London, Lonely Planet Guides, Library of Congress, The Guardian, National Geographic, Smithsonian magazine, The New Yorker, Reuters, Associated Press, AFP, BBC, CNN, and various books, websites and other publications.

Last updated September 2023