HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0156.010 2004-2006 ~a w~o~
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As Ellie notes that the Hiles ponds were artificially excavated, perhaps it wee
their construction that caused the Hawaiians to resent their chief.
There is a fishpond today in the land of Ka'eliiiki, next to Hiles (see Fig.
10) . Springs there empty into a tidal inlet that extends inland for over 500 ft
(Fig. 11). It is said that there is a large red stone, the ku-ula or fish god, it
the middle of the pond. Today much of the pond is filled with rushes ('aka'ak~
the west end was once planted in tarn [Emory 1970:6) .
When the Hawaiian government began selling land about 1850, the Privy
Council refused to permit any fishponds attached to government lands to be
sold. They were all reserved for the government [Privy Council minutes, Nov.
20, 1850, Hawaii State Archives]. Letters frnm A. G. Thurston, Interior De-
partment of the Hawaiian Kingdom, to D. B. Lyman stated clearly the govern-
ment's position on selling fishponds and "landing places" (harbors)
The applications enclosed in yours of Jan. 12, arrived...
u;' [and] were all granted, exclusive of fishponds, of which, we
i;], are informed there is quite a number at Ninole, and the lands
on the seaboard. They are unquestionably of a much greater
value than 25~ or 50a per acre, and we were quite surprised
that surveys should have been made including them without
anything being said about them. They are not to be sold, at
' present... [Inter. Dept., Feb. 10, 1853, Hawaii State
Archives] .
v., No fishponds are to be sold, neither any landing places
[Inter. Dept. , Feb. 23, 1852, Hawaii State Archives] .
But the government did, by 1851, lease at auction some of the fishponds
located on its land, for periods of one to five years [Inter. Dept. , Land File,
Sept. 12, 1851, Hawaii State Archives] . As late as 1935, government tax map;
still identified Ninole pond as a government fishpond* (Fig. 12) .
In 1852, a letter written by H. M. Lyman, a land surveyor for kuleana
claimants, had this to say about the fishponds at Ninole:
The only lot that I have surveyed in Kau containing fish-
ponds is Holoua's in Ninole, which has one pond (but no
fish) near the Southern corner as you will see by referring
to the survey. There is also a slime pool misnamed a "pond"
below the road, but it contains no fish except the hogs of
Other problems connected with the shoreline along Ninole pond were the
result of the road having been washed away during the tsunami of 1868
(see Appendix F) .
Comrt. No.
Ref. To: r
. Ref. Ua~e
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Sch. Gr. 5:8
-L.C.A.
10516:1
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~ L.C.A. 9564-B:1
L.C.A
~ 10008.2 ` L.C.A. 9212:1
l L.C.A. j;i -
95b4 Honu'apo
% .t Fishpond
h
L.C.A.
9955-B:1 "
9668
HONU'APO BAY
` L.C.A.
` ~ 10323
Wharf
5 Site
Church
a
Fig. 13. MAP OF PORTION OF HONU'APO BAY SHOWING THE FISHPOND
AND SOME OF THE KULEA1vA AWARDS NEARBY. (Source: a'
Tax Key Map, 1935).
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L.C.A. /
7313
L.C.A. '
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L-! -4_~ L.C.A. 8979:1
,L.C.A.1 LY
-~8758:1'~ L.C.A. 8360:1
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, L.C.A.
' 7721:7'';
~ -
GRANT mole
' gZ~ Fishpond Government
To HoLOUA [0.4ac] Fishpond
_
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Government Beach Trail
Fig. 12. PORTION OF TAX MAP, 1935, SHOWING NINOLE POND AS A
GOVERNMENT POND, LOCATION OF XULEANA AWARDS (L.C.A.),
AND GOVERNMENT LAND SALE (Grant 821) TO HOLOUA AT
NINOLE.