The Prison of Weltevreden: And a Glance at the East Indian Archipelago
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Gibson Walter Murray was an adventurer and a politician honored by Hawaiians. He was a commission merchant, visited Central America, Sumatra. Gibson wrote a book recounting his adventures “The Prison of Weltevreden”.
Background
Walter Murray Gibson was born at sea while his parents were emigrating from Northumberland, England, to the United States. After a childhood in New York and New Jersey, he became an orphan at the age of fourteen and began a career of wandering.
Education
Confined at Batavia for nearly sixteen months, Gibson studied Dutch and Malay, invented ingenious machines, and explained Christianity to heathen prisoners.
Career
Gibson lived for a time with Indians, settled long enough near Pendleton, South Carolina. In 1844, he was a commission merchant there.
After successful Californian speculations in 1849, he visited Central America, and on his return bought a schooner which he hoped eventually to command as Guatemalan admiral.
But the plan failed and he set sail in his vessel with the hope of selling her abroad. In 1852, he reached Sumatra, where a native revolt against Dutch rule promised a market.
At first Dutch East India officials welcomed him as a wealthy yachtsman, but his vessel’s warlike design, his partiality for the company of semi-independent native princes, and his loose talk about liberty aroused suspicions which led to his imprisonment on a flimsy charge of treason.
After a protracted trial, he was sentenced to exposure in the pillory and twelve years forced labor but escaped on April 24, 1853.
Reaching Washington, he persuaded Secretary of State Marcy to support his claim for damages against the Dutch government. He attracted popular attention by lectures and a fascinating but fantastic book recounting his adventures.
Stimulated by a desire to attack the Dutch commercial monopoly in the East Indies, August Belmont, United States minister to the Netherlands, virtually threatened war in September 1854 if Gibson were not compensated.
The Dutch presented a direct refusal though the affair later aided Belmont in negotiating a convention for establishing consulates in the Dutch colonies.
After attacking both minister and secretary and unsuccessfully petitioning Congress for settlement of his exorbitant claim, Gibson went to Utah, embraced Mormonism, and inspired Brigham Young with a grandiose scheme for selling the Salt Lake Territory to the United States and transplanting the Mormon colony to the Hawaiian Islands.
He was sent to Hawaii in 1861 to execute the plan. There he bought large estates which he retained in his own name when expelled from the church three years later.
Becoming master of the native language, he published in it a newspaper, the Nuhou, which advocated a policy of “Hawaii for the Hawaiians. ”
When the predominant foreigners split into “merchant” and “missionary” factions, he adroitly stepped into the premiership on May 19, 1882. Using with consummate skill all the arts of contemporary American politicians, he maintained himself in office for five years.
Gibson pleased both king and people by staging extravagant pageants and undertook a fatuous “Primacy of the Pacific” foreign policy which aimed at protectorates over the archipelagoes of Oceania.
This ended in fiasco when Germany protested activities in the Samoan Islands and Hawaiian envoys proved themselves, bibulous satyrs. Meanwhile the foreign factions, united by venomous hatred of Gibson and his régime, magnified every scandal of the administration, used Kalakaua’s fondness for military display to obtain permission for arming a citizen guard, and finally on June 30, 1887, made a show of force which cowed the king into dismissing his premier and granting a new constitution.
Gibson was arrested, but no charge could be proved against him and he was permitted to leave the country on July 5, escorted to his ship by a mob which threatened lynching.
Arriving at San Francisco a month later, he spoke in high terms of the new constitution and ministry, giving reporters an impression of quiet urbanity. A year later, he died without revisiting Hawaii.
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Personality
Honored by Hawaiians, whether of royal or common blood, Gibson was execrated by the wealthy foreigners.
An adventurer who combined broad culture, personal charm, and brilliant abilities with an unstable and romantic imagination, he was too impractical to be a successful statesman.
Connections
Walter Murray Gibson was married to Miss Lewis and they had three children.