"Beautiful Islands": Charles Morris Woodford in the Western Pacific
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The Naturalist and his ‘Beautiful Islands’ Charles Morris Woodford in the Western Pacific David Russell Lawrence The Naturalist and his ‘Beautiful Islands’ Charles Morris Woodford in the Western Pacific David Russell Lawrence Published by ANU Press The Australian National University Canberra ACT 0200, Australia Email: [email protected] This title is also available online at http://press.anu.edu.au National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry Author: Lawrence, David (David Russell), author. Title: The naturalist and his ‘beautiful islands’ : Charles Morris Woodford in the Western Pacific / David Russell Lawrence. ISBN: 9781925022032 (paperback) 9781925022025 (ebook) Subjects: Woodford, C. M., 1852-1927. Great Britain. Colonial Office--Officials and employees--Biography. Ethnology--Solomon Islands. Natural history--Solomon Islands. Colonial administrators--Solomon Islands--Biography. Solomon Islands--Description and travel. Dewey Number: 577.099593 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. Cover image: Woodford and men at Aola on return from Natalava (PMBPhoto56-021; Woodford 1890: 144). Cover design and layout by ANU Press Printed by Griffin Press This edition © 2014 ANU Press Contents Acknowledgments . xi Note on the text . xiii Introduction . 1 1 . Charles Morris Woodford: Early life and education . 9 2. Pacific journeys . 25 3 . Commerce, trade and labour . 35 4 . A naturalist in the Solomon Islands . 63 5 . Liberalism, Imperialism and colonial expansion . 139 6 . The British Solomon Islands Protectorate: Colonialism without capital . 169 7 . Expansion of the Protectorate 1898–1900 . 197 8 . The new social order . 217 9 . The plantation economy . 243 10 . The critical question of labour . 287 11. Woodford and the Western Pacific High Commission . 309 Conclusion . 343 Bibliography . 351 v Woodford in London, 1885. Source: PMBPhoto56-137. vii This book is dedicated to my Solomon Islands colleagues and friends who have worked with me on numerous social science research projects in the islands since 2005. I have been fortunate to be involved with many Solomon Islanders in my work and to be able to travel widely within the ‘these beautiful islands’. My special thanks goes to Solomon Rakei Seimoana, my long-term research assistant, guide, friend and, during some difficult times, my protector. His family from Tikopia, especially his brother John Foimua and sister-in-law Karen from Malaita, have been the secure and trustworthy foundation on which my work has been based. My hope is that the Solomon Islands will emerge from this difficult period a much happier and more confident place. The beautiful islands—the shining place—that I remember from my childhood. ix Acknowledgments A very warm and special thanks goes to Joan and Keith Presswell for their friendship and for their generosity in depositing the Woodford archive at The Australian National University (ANU). My thanks also goes to Kylie Moloney at the Pacific Manuscripts Bureau and to Karina Taylor, formerly with the Pacific Research Archive at ANU, who sadly died during the writing of this book. Both archives contain wonderful resources for the Pacific historians and anthropologists, and these collections are world class. It is a fine thing to know that these institutions have now taken on the trust and care of the historically and culturally significant Woodford collection. Nicola Tubbs, Customer Service Assistant at the Gravesend Library, was exceptionally helpful and found the missing newspaper article written by a school colleague of Woodford that is referred to in this work. Mike Howlett, also of Gravesend and, like Woodford, an authority on birdwing butterflies—six degrees of separation—was kind enough to take a photograph of 146 Milton Road, Gravesend. I would also like to thank Herbie Whitmore of the West Grinstead Local History Group for his information and photographs of Grinstead House Farm and St Peter’s Cowfold. All contacts were secured through the power of the internet. I also wish to acknowledge the assistance of Dr Jari Kupiainen from the Centre for Creative Industries of the Karelia University of Applied Sciences in Joensuu, Finland, who spent much time enhancing and cleaning the historic images. I would also like to thank the staff of the Archives and Records section of the Australian Museum in Sydney, in particular Vanessa Finney, for giving me access to archives and the Capell/Lucas album, and to Dr Brian Lassig, the Assistant Director, Research and Collections at the Museum for facilitating that access. The staff of the Noel Butlin Archives Centre at ANU has given access to Burns, Philp & Co records. Staff at the Pictures Collection and the Microfilm sections of the National Library of Australia and the State Library of New South Wales have also been extremely kind and considerate. I am especially grateful for the assistance and support of Julian Ghonigolo, Mike Floyd Puhara, Louisa Laekemi and Kari James at the National Archives Solomon Islands (NASI). I hope we can work together to strengthen the ties between ANU and the NASI in preserving the heritage of the Solomon Islands. Dr Aoife O’Brien and Dr Ian Heath have been generous in allowing me access to their unpublished theses. Rhys Richards sent me a copy of his new book Head Hunters Black and White when I requested a copy. Dr Stewart Firth and the Pacific Editorial Board at ANU have been most encouraging. xi Note on the text Where necessary for clarity I have included relative values of the English pound. The figures, taken from www.measuringworth.com, include a range of comparative values. I have chosen to present the relative worth of the pound using average earnings. The following table illustrates that the value of average earnings declined during the period 1880–1915. The declining earnings are indicative of the economic downturn at the end of the 19th century. Table 1. Comparative value of the pound sterling. Original date Value Current date Comparative value 1880 £1 2010 £421 1885 £1 2010 £423 1890 £1 2010 £416 1895 £1 2010 £376 1900 £1 2010 £346 1905 £1 2010 £337 1910 £1 2010 £331 1915 £1 2010 £287 Source: http://www.measuringworth.com. Research into contemporary newspaper sources from the late-19th and early- 20th centuries is now possible through the Trove Digitised Newspaper database maintained by the National Library of Australia and Papers Past online from the National Library of New Zealand. Both are wonderful research sources and I have made extensive use of them. Much important information was reported in newspapers and I consider those sources to be primary research tools that cross- reference and date many obscure historical notes. Newspaper accounts also report speeches and interviews with prominent people in some considerable detail. These are now accessible, at no cost in Australia, due to the excellent online library databases. The spelling and names of people and places, particularly villages, in the Solomon Islands have changed significantly in recent years. Ingava, the prominent chief of Rubiana is now known as Hiqava of Roviana, Guadalcanar is now only known as Guadalcanal, Santa Ysabel is now called Santa Isabel or Isabel for short, San Christoval/San Cristobal is more commonly called Makira, Tucopia is now more famously known as Tikopia. Since independence on 7 July 1978, the Solomon Islands as a nation is now formally called ‘Solomon Islands’ without the definite xiii The Naturalist and his ‘Beautiful Islands’: Charles Morris Woodford in the Western Pacific article—as in the ‘Government of Solomon Islands’. I have attempted to use the common spelling of the time for the sake of clarity but, where necessary, I have included both names. David Lawrence 2014 xiv Introduction In January 1890 the account of three visits to the Solomon Islands made between 1886 and 1889 by the young English naturalist, Charles Morris Woodford, was published in London, to some critical acclaim, by George Philip and Sons. With a typical late-Victorian eye for romance in the exotic, and an appeal to the vogue for tales of adventure and daring, his publisher called the book A Naturalist Among the Head-hunters (Woodford 1890b). In that same year it was published in three editions, one in London, one in Melbourne, and one in New York. For a young traveller’s account and first published book, it is well written, sympathetic to the social and economic conditions of the Solomon Islanders of that time and, even now, is very evocative for anyone familiar with the islands and the people. Publication of the book further emphasised the practical value of scientific observation from the field. Arguments about the relationship between observations made in the field and the scientific theorising made in the study and the museum were endemic in the world of 19th century natural history (Driver 1998: 24). Knowledge from the field was not always to be trusted. For the author, the authority of his exploration depended substantially on the writing of a well-accepted narrative of travel. Woodford, then 38, listed his professional associations as Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, Corresponding Fellow of the Zoological Society, Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society of Australia, and Fellow of the Linnaean Society of New South Wales. During the course of his travels and work in the Solomon Islands over the next 25 years, Woodford would make collections of over 20,000 natural history specimens for the British Museum of Natural History and give more than 500 ethnological specimens to the British Museum and other major collections (O’Brien 2011). He also left us a substantial archival collection of reports, press cuttings, personal diaries and photographs (Woodford papers PMB 1290 & PMB 1381, PMB Photo 56 & Photo 58).