SEPTEMBER 26, 1840

KAMOKUIKI MURDERED– GRANDMOTHER OF THE LAST TWO RULING MONARCHS OF THE KINGDOM OF HAWAII

Kamokuiki was born about 1795 –daughter of a chief and chiefess. Her grandfather’s sister, according to legend, hid and nursed the baby who would become Kamehameha I when he was being hunted down by Alapainui. Kamokuiki married High Chief Kamanawa II, and they had a son, Caesar Kapaʻakea (1815–1866) from whom the House of Kalākaua descends. After converting to Christianity, Kamokuiki divorced Kamanawa in 1840 based on the crime of adultery. Kamanawa was not allowed to remarry while she was alive. Six weeks after the divorce, Kamokuiki died in Honolulu. After an autopsy showed her stomach to have been “much inflamed,” Kamanawa and an accomplice were arrested, confessed, tried, and convicted of having poisoned her. Both were hanged in the Honolulu Fort on October 20, 1840–the first prosecutions under laws adopted in the Hawaiian constitution of 1840. Opponents of Kamanawa’s grandchildren, Kalākaua and his sister Liliʻuokalani, would use the murder case against them.

Sources:

Peter T. Young, “Capital Punishment,” Images of Old Hawaiʻi, 10/20/2021.  Retrieved 11/19/2023,  

Capital Punishment | Images of Old Hawaiʻi (imagesofoldhawaii.com)

Wikipedia

Photo:  Joel Bradshaw, 6/16/2024.  Grave marker of Kamokuiki, d. 1840, in Kawaiaha‘o Church cemetery, Honolulu, Hawaii.  Public Domain.