William Richards was an American missionary, diplomatic agent, and cabinet minister of the Hawaiian kingdom.
Background
William Richards was born on August 22, 1793 at Plainfield, Massachussets, the son of James and Lydia (Shaw) Richards, and a descendant of William Richards who was in Plymouth, Massachussets, in 1633. In his early youth he was surrounded by missionary influences; his elder brother, James, was one of the Williams College students who held the famous "haystack meeting" and whose zeal led to the formation of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.
Education
He graduated from Williams College in 1819 and from Andover Theological Seminary in 1822.
Career
The younger Richards made a public profession of religion in 1811 and was even then looking forward to a missionary career.
Within a few weeks after graduation, he was ordained as a missionary (September 12), and on November 19, sailed for the Hawaiian Islands. On his arrival there he was stationed at the important town of Lahaina on the island of Maui, where he resided for thirteen years engaged in the varied duties of preacher, teacher, physician, artisan, and translator of part of the Bible. He was thoroughly devoted and very successful in his work, exhibited great courage in the face of danger, and won, to an unusual degree, the love of the Hawaiian people and the confidence of the king and chiefs.
In 1837 he visited the United States - partly to provide for the education of his children, six of whom he brought with him, partly, as an agent of the Sandwich Islands Mission, to awaken Christian people to a greater personal participation in the evangelization of the world, and partly to seek some means of hastening the progress of the Hawaiian people in the arts of civilization. Upon his return to the Islands in 1838, the king and chiefs invited him to become their chaplain, teacher, and interpreter. Their need of an adviser was great, for the rulers were much troubled by the demands of foreigners and too inexperienced to know either the extent or the limits of their rights and authority. With the approval of his associates, Richards accepted the invitation, was released from missionary work, and spent the remainder of his life in government service.
The influence of his teaching is seen in the bill of rights (1839), the constitution of 1840, and the laws enacted from 1838 to 1842, though he did not himself write any of these documents. In 1842 he was sent on a diplomatic mission having two main objects: first, to obtain an explicit recognition of the independence of Hawaii by the United States, Great Britain, and France; second, to negotiate new and more favorable treaties. In this work he had several associates but the principal responsibility rested on him.
The mission was successful in the matter of recognition of independence but failed to get new treaties. Richards had a measure of Yankee shrewdness which aided him in his negotiations, but the success obtained was due more to independent circumstances than to his ability as a diplomat. While in Europe he allowed himself and the Hawaiian government to be drawn into a highly speculative project for developing the agricultural resources of the islands with foreign capital. In this matter he made a serious mistake of judgment, due largely to his natural disposition to repose full confidence in his friends.
The project failed to materialize but the episode caused much dissension and ill feeling in Hawaii. He returned to the Islands in 1845 and for some months was without official employment. Upon the organization of the board of commissioners to quiet land titles (1846) he was made president of the board, and later in the same year was appointed minister of public instruction - the first to hold that position in Hawaii.
To the work of these two offices he applied himself with great diligence, devoting to the service of the nation his extensive and accurate knowledge of Hawaiian customs and character. It is believed that overwork hastened his death. Little that Richards wrote was printed under his own name.