Lost Soldiers of European Wars in Marquesas (French Polynesia) from Napoleon to Bismarck Times

Transcription

1 Fourth European Congress on World and Global History E.N.S. rue d Ulm Paris 4-7 September Panel : Warfare, Soldiers and Military Encounters 09/06 Saturday p.m. Véronique LARCADE Université Bordeaux-Montaigne/Université de la Polynésie française Veronique.Larcade@u-bordeaux3.fr Paper: Lost Soldiers of European Wars in Marquesas (French Polynesia) from Napoleon to Bismarck Times Considering South Pacific is not so far off, as it seems, from the wars in 19 th c. Europe. There are three stages in my point: First, I mean to assert the presence of contemporary European wars in the area with a study case dealing with Nuku Hiva, one of the Marquesas islands; then to establish what contemporary European wars (or what in the European wars) are (or is) actually involved and in fact to question the notion and even its accuracy; at last, I mean to re-orientate the analysis in a new or at least in another direction that would consist in reflecting on how effectively European wars impacted on Marquesas archipelago. The presence of European Wars in Nuku Hiva: an amazing encounter [text to add to the map] Marquesas archipelago is about right in the middle of Pacific Ocean, in the far northern part of what is today French Polynesia, at three hours and a half by airplane from Tahiti, southwards, in Society islands (that is nearly the distance between Spain and Scandinavia) and some km away from California: it takes 8 hours to fly to Tahiti from Los Angeles. Nuku Hiva island itself is located in the northern part of the archipelago whose exact name is

2 Marquesas de Mendoça Islands owing to their Spanish discoverer in late 16 th c. It is the largest island in all. By comparison it is smaller than the Isle of Man, that you may know, and a bit larger than Jersey. The population, by 19 th c. beginning, probably amounted about ) inhabitants when it is now less than In Nukuhiva, on the 7th of May 1804, took place what could be qualified as an amazing encounter, that is to say altogether surprizing, uncanny, baffling and even shocking. That day, the first Russian expedition around the world arrived at Taiohae. It consisted of two ships: the Nasheda, under Adam Johann von Krusenstern, Commander in chief, and the Neva under captain Yuri Lisiansky who, in fact, caught up with the other ship, three days later, on May 10 th. That was an exploration and scientific expedition much akin to Bougainville's or Cook's and La Pérouse's ones, few years before (Despoix, 2005, 35). Therefore among Krusentern's crew ranked renowed experts such as naturalist Langsdorff and drawer Tilesius. The expedition was to be anchored at Taiohae for ten days. The Russians had to face a double surprise: two Europeans were already living on Nukuhiva where no more than 3 or 4 European ships had landed before as Nukuhiva was only discovered and mapped by French captain Marchand in 1790 (seventeen ninety). In fact, as they arrived the Russians were met successively by an Englishman and a Frenchman dressed in native fashion and tattooed. They were here for 5 years. They were Edward Robarts and Joseph Cabris (or Kabris). The first one, Robarts, had already an experience as pilot and provider for the few European ships that previously came to Taiohae Bay and, as the other one, Cabris, he offered to help the Russians to deal with the island and the islanders. That was the first surprise. The second one was that the pair was enemies and even bitter enemies: this enmity, that the Russians observed, is also evinced in the Journal that Edwards Robarts left. Several times, in this Journal he

3 mentioned the wicked French boy whose actions and behaviour are threatening to him. And, on the other side, Kabris, the French boy, according to the record of his life that he dictated or rather told just before his death, had no better opinion and intentions towards the treacherous English sailor. Robarts (no Royal Navy sailor) was 27 years old when he deserted (He declared at the end of his Journal written between late 1810 and apparently late 1811, that he is 53 years, implying he could be born around 1757)... All we know of him before this is that he had sailed in the African slave trade out of Jamaica and Santo Domingo, had visited St Petersburg (that probably made easier the contact with the Russian expedition in 1804, had unsuccessfully wooed a Cheshire farmer s daughter and was born near Barmouth in Wales (but search in the records of Barmouth has uncovered nothing about Robarts s birth). Robarts s ship the Euphrates had left England in November 1797 and had sailed down the Atlantic by the Cape Verde Islands, Rio de Janeiro and the Horn. Nearly a year s whaling up the west coast of South America and around the Galapagos got them only a hundred barrels of oil in a twelve-hundred-barrel ship. Small efforts at piracy against the Spaniards were as unsuccessful. In December 1798 damage from a sudden storm to them and their companion the Butterworth drove them to the Marquesas. Here Robarts deserted for what at first sight seems a reason a little too high-minded to be plausible. He deserted, he tells us, because he wanted no part in a mutiny that was being planned. In fact, we know from Crook s Journal that the crew of the Euphrates deserted to a man at Nukuhiva and were only got back when the captain of the Butterworth held hostages among the Marquesas (Crook, Account: 272-4)... Tom, a sailor of Hawaiian origin, was the instrument of Robart s desertion. He provided the canoe and arranged that a friendly chief would house him. Robarts was a crew member of one of the first whaling ships to enter the Pacific, the Euphrates. The Euphrates was not a happy vessel, and when storm damage forced her to take shelter in the Marquesas Islands to make repairs, Robarts took the opportunity to desert. This was in December For about the first year, his main residence was the island of Tahuata, then he moved to Hiva Oa and later to Nuku Hiva where he spent the bulk of the seven years of his Marquesan residence... Apart from the brief residence of the missionary William Crook, left by the Duff in 1797, Robarts was probably the first resident white man... desultory (décousu) marquesan warfare. The highlight of Robarts s career as a beachcomber was performing his pilot and providore role for the Russian exploring expedition that came by in 1804 under the command of the Captains Krusenstern and Lisiansky. These were his most distinguished guest, and they gave him the later gratification of mentioning him favourably in the books of the voyage that they published.

4 Cabris, for him, claimed he was 43, as he was dying in It means he should have been about 19 years old, in 1799, as he deserted of the whaleship London (capt Gardner) in Tahuata, a small island near Hivahoa, southwards Nukuhiva, where he settled some months later about the same time as Robarts. Cabris had enrolled, as he explained later on, to escape Portsmouth Prison hulks (made infamous through Louis Garneray s ( ) account -both written (Mes Pontons) and graphic : see Portsmouth Harbour view c.1814-), mentioning too he has participated to Quiberon affair (a bloody failed attempt for French counter-revolutionaries to land troops in southern Brittany on June 25th To the Russians that was clear evidence of the ever-conflicting nature of English-French relationships. Krusenstern precisely wrote, quote: Not content to disturb the peace of the whole civilized world, even the inhabitants of the lately discovered island of this ocean must feel the influence of their odious rival-ship without so much as knowning the origin of it (Krusentern, 1813: 111) To end this disturbing and as they saw it- appalling situation, The Russians effected an uneasy reconciliation between the hostile parties and even got them to shake hands. Indeed, in the end, they solved the problem completely. Cabris, making a last attempt to score over Robarts by being last on board the ships, was carried off the island. Bad weather and sea conditions preventing him to return ashore, he was taken all the way to Kamchatka. At Kamchatka, Cabris took a liking to the local governor and stayed there (Nozikov, 1945:24). From Kamchatka he made his way to Moscow and St Petersburg, where he exhibited his tattoos and Marquesan dancing and played cannibal charades for the curious great. His ability to swim with the ease of the Marquesans won him a job as swimming instructor to the marine cadets at Cronstadt. He was examined at times by scientists and presented to several crowned heads; But in later years he fell on leaner times and ended his days in the fairs of Brittany and Paris; There are stories of his taking unkindly to the competition at the Orleans Fair from a famous performing dog Munito and of his demonstrating his Marquesan skills on the competitor's head. when he died in 1818 or 1822 at Valenciennes, there was talk of his making a more permanent contribution to science, as the local museum thought that his hide should not be lost to posterity (Langsdorff, : XIII- XIV)

5 Robarts for whom no portrait exists- By 1822 Edward Robarts was still alive, but he had long left Nukuhiva. With Cabri's departure, Robarts' stay had entered its last stage. The wide network of relationships which he had built up by name exchange had become entangled. In his last years, he had become involved in property disputes within Keatonui's family. Also, at Nukuhiva, after a period of reasonable peacefulness from 1799 to 1804, there began a period of quite savage three-way hostilities between the Teii at Taiohae, the Taioa at Hakaui and the Taipi of Taipivai. By 1813, and even more after Porter's visit in that year, those hostilities became destructive in ways in which they had not been before. The knowledge of two bays on the southern coast of Nukuhiva, harbours in which ships could anchor with relative safety, was adding to the already existing tensions between the valley's inhabitants by encouraging the presence of Europeans. Except for a short period after Crook's departure, Taiohae was never to be without the presence of Aoe (non-marquesians) from 1799 to the present. neither the Taipi nor the Taioa had any way of sharing in the bounty that came with Aoe's visits to Taiohae except by victory over the Teii. There were other, more personal, considerations that would force Robarts to leave Nukuhiva. In October 1805, 6 sailors of the Leviathan deserted with a ship's boat. It was a dangerous adventure. On their ships, Aoe might protect their property with their guns. On the beach they came rich at their peril. Robarts probably saved the lives of the 6 by capturing them and securing their boat for Keatonui. But the presence of a gunner, cooper, cook, boatswain, landsman and a useful boy was a greater disturbance than Robarts and Crook had ever been. They clustered together, formed a social group, fell to quarelling and strained the resources of the valley. They viewed the sexual freedom with which Enata women greeted ships as if it were a permanent characteristic of the land. They did not understand the sexual rights and obligations Enata knew for themselves. For Robarts, the Land had become dangerous and the beach crowded. In February 1806 he took a berth on the privateer Lucy with Ena, Ellen and his dog Neptune. He was following another fantasy about the fair promise of Botany Bay, a land, he was told, overflowing with breadfruit and convict labour. He took beach with him. he continued a life full of crossings and margins, always looking over walls at someone else's land, always remembering his days of greatness in his association with blood royal at Nukuhiva, always savouring the days when being an outsider to both Enata and his own kind made him important. Not many months after the Russian visit, various members of Robarts s Marquesan family quarrelled, and although (as he claimed) he was able to smooth it over for a time, clearly serious trouble was brewing, so serious as to threaten the survival of the whole community. On the next opportunity to leave, Robarts did not hesitate. Captain Alexander Ferguson of the ship Lucy agreed to take Robarts and his wife and daughter to New South Wales... he spent the rest of his life in poverty. Instead of going to New South Wales, he left the Lucy in Tahiti where he spent a year and a half from early in 1806 to the middle of The missionaries were not much impressed by him, and he was not impressed by the Tahitians, debased as he thought they were by their contact with Western commerce. He lived by doing odd jobs for the missionaries and for the traders who called. He salted pork and distilled spirits, and when

6 war threatened again in Tahiti, he again escaped with his wife and daughters for an adventurous voyage across the Pacific. His hopes of land in New South Wales were not realized and he did not settle there but drifted on to the ports of Asia, subsequently finding small, humble jobs in Penang and Calcutta. In 1813, his unhappy wife died in Calcutta, and despite a second marriage and more children, Robarts in his old age had only one surviving daughter... he died in G. Dening (1974) suggests that Robarts might have a problem with alcohol (= a neurotic character?) Tom, a sailor of Hawaiian origin, was the instrument of Robart s desertion. He provided the canoe and arranged that a friendly chief would house him. Robarts remained nearly a year at Tahuata, moving about the island. This moving about was the feature of his nearly eight-year stay in the Marquesas. Not only did he move from Tahuata to Hiva Oa to Nukuhiva, where he finally settled down for the last six years of his stay as pilot to ships visting Taiohae, but he travelled from valley to valley on each island. He made this mobility his conscious policy, thus establishing a widening network of friends with whom he exchanged names, and in this way enjoyed more independence. For the same reason he kept himself unattached, until 1803 he realised that marriage brought with it land, and land the exclusive rights to food produced an stored on it...he married into Blood Royal, as he is pleased to call it: a chieftain s daughter. All his life this would be a source of pride. He was reduced to beggary in later years, going from one great man to another, and he was always wistful of his own days of greatness, a chieftain s son-in-law, adopted son of every great chief in the Marquesas, a tribal warrior, a pocket Napoleon, a man whose friendship the great sought after. His Journal ends with the hope that his half noble and only surviving daughter Ellen will receive the kindly favour of the gentility of England... The Russians did Robarts the service of publishing the only writing of his that reached print. This was a letter written in Calcutta to Dr James Hare outlining his career up to p. 29 Robarts s Journal written between late 1810 and apparently late He wrote at the end of the text that he is 53 years (implying he could be born around 1757). Robarts s Journal written between late 1810 and apparently late Remarkably edited by ethno-historian Greg Dening in II/ What European wars or what in the European wars are or is actually concerned? Questionable sources and notions As first sight, things are clear too clear maybe-: although indirectly involved in military affairs and very far away from the battlefields (or seas) this Englishman and this French man show how powerful the

7 contemporary conflicts (and especially what is sometimes called the New One Hundred Years War between France and England to describe the persistent warfare between the two nations during a large XVIIIth century): they are somehow conditioned to hate each other, including in such a remote and improper place as Nukuhiva. At first sight, Robarts and Cabris seem to embody the intrusion or interference of European warfare in Marquesas. They came with fire weapons, guns or muskets as Robarts says. Of course natives have some too, but the very difference is that they wage war in different ways than the Marquesans who value individual performance and recklessness rather than group strategy and efficient tactics. Robarts claims to have organize battle manoeuvrers and victory as well as Cabris boasts to have somehow modified the actions of Marquesans warriors. This is consistent with what we know on the part played by other deserters turned beachcombers, namely in Tahiti with James Morrisson, one of the Bounty mutineer, who left a Journal and Hoggerstein or Hagerstein, a Swedish-born sailor and skilful weapons user and troops leader, as it seems, to help the Pomare to become dominant above the former chiefdoms of Tahiti (change in power balance). Polynesians seem to have some fascination for European weapons and warfare endowing them with special powers and conceiving them as able to cure an ailing chief. The weapon being as important as a magical object, as it could be as an effective war tool. See Turnbull, 1802 (Tahiti) on Pomaré 1st ( )... c était le moment de distribuer nos présents pour achever de capter leur bienveillance: ils ne désiraient que des armes à feu, le reste leur semblait des bagatelles. Pomarri reçut une espingole qui l enchanta. Otou qui était resté dans la pirogue eut un fusil: cette distribution lui déplut; étant par son sang au-dessus de son père, il voulut avoir l espingole et finit par l obtenir. Pomarri se contenta du fusil. Aïddi, de son côté, rejeta avec dédain étoffes, ciseaux, miroirs, et même les haches, en nous faisant entendre qu elle était aussi capable qu un homme

8 de manier un fusil. Les missionnaires nous avaient déjà instruit qu elle ne se distinguait pas moins par son courage personnel, que par son influence dans la politique, et que son ressentiment était bien plus à craindre que celui de Pomarri. On s excusa donc de lui avoir offert ce qu elle dédaignait, sur ce que les dames anglaises l auraient préféré, et l on finit par lui donner un fusil : elle s en alla très contente. Parmi les questions que me fit Pomarri, et dont quelques-unes étaient relatives à la guerre, il me demanda à plusieurs reprises si quelqu un de nous savait faire de la poudre à canon. Les révoltés du Bounty lui ayant appris que c était une composition ; et non la graine d une plante comme il l avait imaginé, il s informa si les ingrédients se trouvaient à Taïti. Enfin, il voulut savoir si l armurier du vaisseau savait fabriquer des fusils. Sa curiosité et celle de sa femme étaient insatiables La maladie contractée par Pomarri ds la dernière campagne, prenait chaque jour un caractère plus grave et faisait craindre pour sa vie. Il imagina comme dernière ressource, de nous faire demander par les missionnaires de tirer 2 coups de canon pour apaiser la colère de son dieu. On y consentit, tant pour faire plaisir à Pomarri que pour obliger les missionnaires dont il nous paraissait important de maintenir le crédit auprès des Taïtiens, en leur donnant des marques publiques de notre considération» This fascination leading to some striking, both ridiculous and pitiful to European eyes as writers Max Radiguet and Herman Melville point out the way chief Iotete (grandson of Keatonui, with whom Robarts was acquainted) insisted on being dressed the day he welcomed Amiral Abel Dupetit-Thouars and make official a military presence of the French in (giving them a piece of land to settle an outpost): Kiatonui (died in 1818) chief of Teii clan Nuku-Hiva from 1798 to his death and grand-father of Paetini (beautiful lady met by Porter) and of Temoana. NB: Iotete is Tahuata island chief, he welcomed admiral Dupetit-Thouars and a french garrison for whom he offered a piece of land, but soon stroke a war against commandant Halley who was challenging his power. Defeated, he is dismissed of all his charges and exiled in Hapatoni valley. His nephew Maheono is in charge after him being his successor.) Melville mocks, later on in 1842 in his novel Typee the incongruity of Temoana, son of Keatonui who have to subscribe to French takeover the Haka'iki (Lord in Marquesan language) of Taiohae, in an admiral's uniform whose image Max Radiguet left us. See Max Radiguet ( ), Les Derniers Sauvages, la vie et les moeurs aux îles Marquises ( ), réed. Les Editions du Pacifique, Papeete, (NB: La Reine-Blanche, admiral Dupetit-Thouars frégate, arrived in Tahuata, on april 28th Max Radiguet was, as a secretary or writer member of the admiral s staff)... Iotete portait dans cette circonstance le costume qui lui avait été donné par les Français, costume dont les diverses parties formaient entre elles, le plus bizarre désaccord. C'était un habit du temps de Louis XV, en peluche rouge, galonné sur toutes les coutures et chargé d'une massive paire d'épaulettes. Un diadème en carton doré, enjolivé de verroteries,

9 ombragé de plumes peintes, couvrait sa tête et faisait ressortir sa face bleue. Un pantalon blanc et une chemise complétaient cet accutrement, à l'extravagance duquel s'ajoutait encore l'obésité du chef. Près de lui se trouvait son neveu Maheono; Ce dernier pouvait avoir 25 à 30 ans. La disposition de son tatouage dont les bandes horizontales lui couvraient le nez et la bouche, sa chevelure noire et frisée, qui, contrairement aux habitudes du pays, s'éparpillait en désordre autour de sa tête, donnaient à sa physionomie, naturellement expressive un certain caractère de fierté et d'audace. Il était vêtu d'un habit rouge et d'un pantalon bleu de ciel; quant aux fils du roi, ils portaient tous une chemise de matelot en étoffe de laine... Precisely Napoleon is known, admired and even appropriated in the Pacific area in early 19 th (nineteenth) century: See Thaddeus Bellingshausen, Journal (1820) Tahiti on Pomaré II ( ) (NB: Thaddeus Bellinghausen ( ), Otto von Kotzebue s friend, young navy officer in charge of charting and drawing maps for Krusentern, head in 1819 of a polar voyage: departure: July 19 th 1819 from Cronstadt, anchored in Tahiti July 22nd 1820: one of the first evidence on missionary settlement and action there. : nous avons mouillé à peu de distance du rivage et il ne faut donc pas longtemps pour que les pirogues viennent s'amarrer le long du Vostok. Le roi se présente le premier à la passerelle et m'offre d'abord sa main, puis attend que toute sa famille soit montée à bord. je les invite à descendre dans ma cabine, où ils s'assoient sur les divans. A plusieurs reprises, le roi répète Russes, Russes, puis prononce le nom d' Alexandre et finalement Napoléon, après quoi il éclate de rire. Il a cherché sans doute à nous faire comprendre qu'il a quelques connaissances des affaires européennes... See Marie Giovanni (1847) on Pomaré IV ( ) Marie Giovanni ( ), author of Journal d'une parisienne, pretends to be the young wife of an Italian merchant, in fact a nom de plume for vicomtesse de St-Mars, author of more than 130 books in the XIXth signed as Comtesse Dash (another alias). Traveled in Pacific area with her navy officer husband, she gave her notes to Alexandre Dumas wrote the book...: first published in instalments (or feuilleton ) in the famous newspaper Le Siècle, from March 31 st to November 23rd 1855, this successful text had several editions and translations in New York and in London (Hetzel coll., Bruxelles and Leipzig, 1855) Marie Giovanni is questioned by Queen Pomare as she is back from New Zealand:... Did you meet Eki-Eki?- I have been his guest for dinner. Great man, great warrior! Eki-

10 Eki, New Zealand Napoléon! Then she asked me a lot of details on the war, listening very carefully, showing strong support to New-Zealanders Napoleon son of Tonga Informant: Vave of Kolonga (1904) recorded by Lorimer Fison quoted in Sahlins (Marshall), La découverte du vrai sauvage et autres essais, Gallimard, 2007 (3 rd part of Culture in practice: selected essays, Urzone Inc., New York, 2000 first published in Donna Merwick (ed.), Dangerous liaisons: Essays in honour of Greg Dening, Parkville, University of Melbourne, 1994, The Discovery of the True Savage, p ) Napoleoni (Napoléon) mother was a strong and beautiful American woman who came to Tonga at the peak of whaling campaigns in the area and there she became pregnant (with a tongan as it were) then she came back to Merikei (Amérique) to bring up the son. Some time later, men from Faranise (France) came to Merikei ask for help against their plague: Uelingtoni (Wellington) because their High Priest had predicted that they had to find the son of a redskin (I quote) father to be their leader and to vanquish their enemies... of course Napoleoni had the right supernatural powers and qualities for that... and as it were he stalked Uelingtoni in various lands and countries until he caught him in a place named Uatalu (Waterloo) and banished him on a desert island where he died (Uelingtoni, it seems). What mattered really for Vave was to restore the truth on Napoleni s birth, as it was hidden by the Faranise. They say that he was born on the island where their royal blood came (Corsica to be sure), but they lie because Napoléon is Tonga-born As I hinted before, we have to scrutinize and even to question these first and hasty, too hasty assertions. What is prevalent in Tahiti with Morrisson and Hagerstein is not in Nukuhiva. Fire weapons are scarce and badly functioning. It is not easy to specify what type of musket is used, nevertheless one infer they were slow to arm with powder much sensitive too high humidity (a frequent condition in tropic areas) and so very often ineffective. Fergus Clunie, Fidjian Weapons and Warfare (1977) authoritative thesis on the part of fire weapons in fidjian History. He demonstrated that muskets were scarce until late 1820es. Before (between 1804 and 1814) very few in possession of foreign sailors and beachcombers such as Charlie Savage, studied by Marshall Sahlins.

11 Fergus Clunie evinced the minor importance of muskets in fidjian battles then because these muskets were a type slow to load by the barrel that left a long time for the adversary to attack with more traditional and efficient weapons), moreover as humidity is high in tropical zone powder quite often was useless and besides homemade powder charges were, as a rule, inadequate and the shots most imprecise. Such things are testified in Tahiti by Frederick W. Beechey, Relation de Voyage 1826 See Frederick W. Beechey, Relation de voyage (1826: Tahiti)... (NB : Beechey is a Royal Navy captain, commanding the Blossom (16 guns, 100 crewmen): exploring Pacific Ocean especially Pitcairn where he is one of the first to anchor (dec. 1825). Arrival at Tahiti, on March 18th 1826, stayed there for 40 days.) les habitants ne songent aucunement à mettre leur île sur un bon pied de défense bien qu ils aient eu souvent à souffrir des incursions de leurs ennemis. Ils ont tout à fait abandonné les armes dont ils se servaient autrefois dans les combats, et perdu l adresse nécessaire. Pour les manier avec avantage. Un certain nombre de mousquets distribués parmi la multitude crée dans l île une sécurité imaginaire; mais le mauvais état de ces armes d Europe, et le manque de poudre, les rendraient complètement inutiles... For instance as late as 1880, Commander Bergasse Dupetit-Thouars, nephew of the admiral, won a decisive battle against Marquesan insurgents because their weapons didn t fire. Then, in this respect, as far as we can see, it is not exactly the introduction of new, European weapons that destroyed Marquesan warfare and fighting capacity, but more profound change that undermine the very core of their values and social organizing. Muskets were not an item of trade with Enata (Marquesans) before about years later there were several thousand muskets in the islands and musket, ball and powder were the principal currency for provisioning Aoe (foreign) ships, organizing labour for sandalwood, finding crew. Almost every warrior had a musket. Haka'iki (lords) at Vaitahu and Taiohae owned small arsenals. Wanting muskets so much, Enata were willing to adapt their behaviour to acquire them. This included organizing labour without the usual exchange feasts. It meant selling pigs which were almost exclusively the currency of Tapu and Koina (Traditional Marquesan customs and value system). It meant growing crops like sweet potato and replacing traditional activity such as canoe building with the collection of sandalwood. Entrepreneurial activity by Enata who were willing to go away as crew on the promise of a musket, or who owned productive land or who were willing to do constant physical labour broke the line of authority to the haka'iki. The haka'iki's own entrepreneurial activity broke

12 the lines of exchange which bound him and his people together by losing for him the capital of these goods to Aoe (Foreigners). While wars and martial spirit thrived with the muskets, Koina died away. We have to bear in mind that our sources are biased and we have to consider them cautiously: in a few words the national antagonism in the facts related might be exaggerated, at least some hues have to be made. The German-Estonian born Commander Krusentern belonged to a generation of Russian naval officers who benefited from a British Royal Navy training that certainly made him especially sensitive to Robarts condition. Then but as the relation of Krusentern World Tour was published in 1805, when Tsar Alexander the 1 st, grandson of Catherine II the Great was still wavering in the involvement of Russian Empire in the anti-napoleonic coalition, the denunciation of the absurdity of French- English antagonism was fashionable. At last, Cabris seemed to be prone to fabrication. He was Bordeauxborn, from Gascony, and probably had exaggeration in his genetic code. More seriously, during his last years, he earned his life as a showman and needed to be sensational to draw attention to him from the public and the powerful ones. As the reactionary Restoration Regime then ruled and as he had been introduced to king Louis XVIIIth it was rather smart to claim he was a Quiberon survivor, as well as to inspire pity pretending he had escaped the horrific English pontons or Prison hulks, made then familiar in all their horrors by Louis Garneray s memoirs published in Jean Cabris was met by or heard by a number of people who thought him interesting enough to make some record (Porter 1809, Chaix 1959, Denis 1861, Leroy 1828, Leroy and Dineaux 1829). Bibliog: Porter (Robert Ker), Travelling Sketches in Russia and Sweden During the Years 1805, 1806, 1807, 1808, 2 vols., 1809./ Chaix (Paul), Joseph Kabris, matelot bordelais et prince de Nouka Hiva, Bulletin Mensuel des Musées et Collections de la ville de Genève./ Leroy (Aimé), Promenades au cimetière de Valenciennes, Valenciennes, 1828./ Leroy (Aimé) et Dineaux (Arthur), Les hommes et les choses du nord de la France et du midi de la

13 Belgique, 1829 (Langsdorff, : XIII-XIV; Vincendon-Dumoulin and Desgraz, 1843: 357. Robert Ker Porter met Cabris during his travels in Russia. Cabris filled Porter's evidently willing ear with much romantic fiction, and they both wept copious tears over his sad story. Porter's account (1809, II: 40-50) is inaccurate on almost all points. There is some britannization of Robarts as well: reduced to beggary at the end of his life in Bengal, expecting some aid and care from British authorities, he was, for sure, rather prone to insist on his britishness. Nevertheless there are some reasons to persist on being convinced of a real impact of contemporary European wars III/ How effective an impact for European wars? A substance revisited. A connection has to be made with a case rather similar to Cabris and Robarts one. It took place at the turn of 20 th century in the neighbouring island of Ua Uka staging on the one hand... Joseph-Napoléon Fournier ( ) A gendarme whose post had been cut out and chose to stay there in Ua Uaka where he had bought lands. He is on bad (even on worse) terms with another colon Théodore Lichtlé ( ) He left his native Alsace taken over by Prussians after 1870, forgetting to ask for french citizenship. This is the reason why he was treated as a «boche» (a very pejorative way as you know for French to name Germans). Nevertheless French administration had enough confidence on an orderly and well-famed Litché to entrust him with the island registry office); for this reason out of anger Fournier refused to register the birth of one of his children (BAILLEUL (Michel), LES ILES MARQUISES, histoire de la Terre des Hommes Fenua Enata du XVIIIe siècle à nos jours, Cahiers du Patrimoine [Histoire], Ministère de la Culture de Polynésie française, 2001, p. 140.) This last case leads me not exactly to dismiss the relevance of the impact of contemporary European wars. For Cabris and Robarts and for Lichtlé and Fournier, the conflicts and tensions existing in Europe actually mattered, counted and weighed as identity construction levers. The two of them were virtual «nobodies» in the social and

14 cultural organization of the overwhelming Marquesan population around, as people from France and Europe were exceptions. Fournier was married to a Tahitian and not to a Marquesan woman. Neither of them were probably churchgoers (I still have to verify the point) Fournié, as a libre-penseur, rather atheist let us say, former gendarme and Lichtlé because he was protestant-born and educated in a strongly catholicized archipelago. In such circumstances, fighting each other theatrically was a way to assert their existence and to resist to the un-settling and anxiety-inducing situation, both of them had to face. This is somehow consistent with the conclusions drawn on the field of clinical psychology by studies such as Maurice Duval s one: Ni morts, ni vivants, marins! (Duval (Maurice), Ni morts, ni vivants, marins! Pour une ethnologie du hui-clos, Controverses ethnologies, P.U.F., 1998) that displayed the mechanisms with whom the crews, owing to tradition and necessity, succeed in managing satisfactory relationships and avoiding or limiting conflicts in very small communities living and working in a dangerous and stressful conditions. That was precisely not the case for Cabris and Robarts in Nukuhiva and for Fournié and Lichtlé, later on, in Ua Uka. Conclusion As a conclusion, I mean to emphasize 3 (three) items 1-Rather obviously, as early as the beginning of the 19 th c. the world is already global and we have to think Europe and European conflicts somehow as planet-wide in their impact, far beyond the sole colonial territories. 2-A major stake for today historians in Pacific area is to understand the pace and the very nature of the change induced by this globalization, especially as war is concerned. It is really a major

15 challenge, because these historians face entangled actual multicultural societies and, at the same time, active renewed or re-shaped native identities, native awareness and, of course, grievances. 3-Viewing war as exclusively destructive or devastating may be wrong. As far as we can see in Cabris' and Robarts' case it has a constructive -although not exactly positive- capacity. For them, who were placed in a remote and stressful environment, the reference to European conflicts might have provided to both of them (who were expatriated and somehow outcasts among Marquesans) a purpose and a behaviour pattern transforming their marginal status and making it less un-bearable and less psychologically challenging, I think. Bibliography Bailleul (Michel), LES ILES MARQUISES, histoire de la Terre des Hommes Fenua Enata du XVIIIe siècle à nos jours, Cahiers du Patrimoine [Histoire], Ministère de la Culture de Polynésie française, Clunie (Fergus) Fidjian Weapons and Warfare (1977) Denoon (Donald) dir., The Cambridge History of The Pacific Islanders, Cambridge U. P., 1997, p.147 sur perversion paradis, p (sur influence Européens ds evolution guerre) p.190 (sur connaissance Napoléon) Despoix (Philippe), Le monde mesuré, Dispositifs de l exploration à l âge des Lumières, Droz, Genève, Duval (Maurice), Ni morts, ni vivants, marins! Pour une ethnologie du huis-clos, Controverses ethnologies, P.U.F., Guéhennec (Constant), «NukuHiva-Terre des hommes-langage des hommes-le document Langsdorff», Bulletin de la Société des Etudes Océaniennes, n 311, Décembre 2007, pp Kabris (Joseph) and Terrell (Jennifer), Joseph Kabris and his notes on the Marquesas, The Journal of Pacific History, Vol. 17, n 2 (Apr., 1982), pp Blais (Hélène), Voyages au Grand Océan, geographies du Pacifique et colonisation , CTHS géographie 4, Paris, sur prise de possession, 257 sur Iotete) Bourguet (Marie-Noëlle), «L explorateur» dans Vovelle (Michel) dir., L homme des Lumières, Seuil, 1996, pp Thomas (Nicholas), Marquesan Societies, Inequality and Poltical Transformation in eastern Polynesia, Oxford U.P., 1990 (Kabris, 122; Robarts, 38, 44-6, 52-3, 122, 141, 169, 172, 189.

16 Thomas (Nicholas), Le roi de Tahuata, Iotete and the Transformation of South Marquesan Politics, , The Journal of Pacific History, vol. 21, n 1 (jan., 1986, pp Duval (Maurice), Ni morts, ni vivants, marins! Pour une ethnologie du huis-clos, Controverses ethnologies, P.U.F., 1998 p. 36 Marc Augé distingue un «lieu» qui «peut se définir comme identitaire, relationnel et historique» d un «espace» «qui ne peut se définir ni comme identitaire, ni comme relationnel, ni comme historique» et qu il qualifie de «nonlieu» (Non-lieux. Introduction à une anthropologie de la surmodernité, Paris, Le Seuil, 1992). P ; 76 élaboration d un tps affectif du souvenir, bulle étanhe ds temps de travil en promiscuité ave ouverture d un espace autre de plus p. 79 : «le danger, on pourrait dire «le mal», ds les représentations, permet d identifier les problèmes que se pose un groupe, et peu importe d ailleurs ds ce cas leur degré de réalité (auj. l Autre, l étranger) p.80 pour les marins, le danger vient de la mer, ce qui les incite à s enclore et fait d eux des hommes d intérieur» sur le danger des états de transition (M. Douglas, De la souillure. Essai sur les notions de pollution et de tabou, Paris, Maspero, 1981) p.100 différences culturelles territoriales mis en avant alors que stratégies évitement de la polémique pq huis-clos par ailleurs : on évite constitution équipages mixtes septentrionaux/ méridionaux mais // affirmation identités intra-bretonnes par Bretons. p.101 «Les plaisanteries centrées sur le rapport aux épouses, leur autorité et le sexe unifient le groupe en mettant l accent sur les traits culturels partagés par tous. Au contraire, les plaisanteries portant sur les différences culturelles mettent en évidence les dissensions ds le registre de la différence, sans pour autant mettre en danger la solidarité grâce à la nature même de la plaisanterie. En remplaçant la notion de «drame» par celle d opposition», on pourrait appilquer ici la formule de C ; Bromberger : «Moyen corrosif de disqualification de l Autre, la moquerie consacre et atténue tt à la fois l intensité du drame» (Bromberger (Ch), «La moquerie, dires et pratiques», Le monde alpin et rhodanien, n 3-4.p. 136 huis-clos modifie les limites de l intimité => proximité : échange mais // génératrice de conflits.