Sandalwood in Hawaii — St. John 
7 
but later they shared it with the higher 
chiefs. Taxes, to be paid in sandalwood, 
were levied on the district chiefs, who in 
turn levied them on their retainers, the peo¬ 
ple. Wanting some of the white man’s sail¬ 
ing ships, the king bought several, paying 
for them, it is said, with an equal or a double 
tonnage of sandalwood. For measuring the 
amount, a rectangular pit the size of the 
greatest length, breadth, and depth of the 
hull was dug, then filled with sandalwood 
logs (Rock, 1916: 10). These pits are still 
reported in various parts of the islands, and 
there is one, identified by the late Albert F. 
Judd, at about 800 feet elevation on the 
Kapalama-Nuuanu ridge, on the grounds of 
the Kamehameha Schools, Honolulu. 
After the death of Kamehameha I in 
1819, his successors ruled, but without the 
sagacity and shrewdness of the great king. 
Their sandalwood monopoly still seemed to 
them an inexhaustible source of wealth. 
The wood was marketed in China by the 
picul ( 133 V 3 pounds) and its value fluctu¬ 
ated from $3.00 to $18.00; during the pros¬ 
perous years 1825 to 1827 it sold at from 
$10.50 to $14.00 a picul. In 1822-23 a 
total of 20,000 piculs was sold in Canton. 
The trade was a great resource for Kame¬ 
hameha I, but for the next two kings, Liho- 
liho and Kauikeaouli, and their womenfolk, 
it was a bonanza. They paid $77,000 for a 
brig and its cargo. They bought frame 
houses shipped ready-cut, silks, woolens, 
liquors, cut glass, and luxuries of many other 
kinds. They paid $800 for a looking glass 
and $10,000 for a brass cannon. With the 
consent of the eager, competing traders, 
these purchases were accepted on credit for 
sandalwood to be delivered later. These 
reckless purchases piled up royal debts in 
1821 of 22,000 piculs—or $220,000 calcu¬ 
lated at $10 a picul, the quotation for 1821- 
23 (see Mathison, 1825: 5)—and by 1824 
of about $300,000. 
Not only were the logs of sandalwood the 
prime article of commerce, but for some 
years they served as a medium of exchange 
in the absence of a local coinage. This fact 
is recorded by James Hunnewell (1895: 
16), who as a ship’s officer made several 
voyages to Hawaii. When, on one of the 
voyages, the cargo was only partly disposed 
of by sale, Hunnewell was left in Honolulu 
with the remaining part of the cargo to sell. 
He wrote, concerning the years 1817 and 
1818: 
Business seems to have been conducted, to a very 
considerable extent, by barter. Sandal wood was 
the chief article, indeed it might almost have been 
called the standard coin, although Spanish silver 
more nearly reached that definition. There is con¬ 
stant mention of sticks or piculs of the wood, but 
none of money. May 14th [1818] is a note, "Sold 
40 looking glasses for 4 piculs wood”; next day, 
"Sold the remainder of the muslin, 2 pieces, for 
31 piculs wood received.” These examples are 
enough to show the nature of trade. 
The king and the chiefs, pressed for pay¬ 
ment, put pressure on the people, whose 
labor made the trade possible and who re¬ 
ceived little or none of the profit. There are 
numerous contemporary accounts of the 
forced gathering of sandalwood. All the in¬ 
habitants able to go were ordered into the 
hills in search of the precious wood. The 
trees were cut down and chopped into logs 
6 to 8 feet long; then with adzes the bark 
and sapwood were chipped off. Men and 
women tied the logs to their backs with the 
fibrous leaves of the ti (Cordyline termi¬ 
nal/s) and trudged to the measuring pit or 
to the shore. As many as a dozen small ships 
were used to haul the logs to Honolulu. 
Ellis (1826: 275) at Olaa, Hawaii, encoun¬ 
tered a chief with about 400 people bearing 
sandalwood from the mountains. There are 
also accounts of the gathering of logs by 
two to three thousand people near Waipio, 
Hawaii. The following account by a British 
sailor ("Old Quarter Master,” 1839: 220- 
221) does not- seem to have been noticed be¬ 
fore, and it is here quoted because of its 
