Sea of Glory

hammocks, which were already soaked with Underwood’s blood. Wilkes ordered that the bodies be placed together in his gig and wrapped in the American flag. With Sinclair following in the tender’s boat, they rowed for shore.
    About twenty sailors, all dressed in white, made up the procession that took the two bodies to a grove of banyan trees in the center of the island. “It was a lonely and suitable spot . . . ,” Wilkes wrote, “in a shade so dense that scarce a ray of the sun could penetrate it.” The grave had been dug deep into the white sand, which was soon stained red with blood. Agate read the funeral service, and when three volleys were fired over the grave, a flock of birds took wing overhead. “Poor Capt. Wilkes,” Sinclair wrote, “his heart seemed nearly broken. He sobbed like a child and I felt for him from the very bottom of my soul.” Once the grave had been filled, tree branches were used to erase their footprints from the sand, while footprints were purposely left in an entirely different part of the island in hopes of diverting any natives that might come looking for the burial site. Wilkes decided to name it Henry Island, while designating the islands of which it was a part the Underwood Group.
    On their return to Malolo that evening, they found the Porpoise anchored in the bay. Emmons had told Ringgold about the killing of Underwood and Henry, and Ringgold’s men were already cleaning their muskets and pistols, filling their cartridges with gunpowder, and making other preparations for the impending conflict. Although Wilkes would later claim that he attempted to exercise due restraint in his actions against the natives, the journals of his officers tell a different story. “[W]ar was now declared against the Island,” Emmons wrote, “& orders issued by Capt. Wilkes to spare only the women & children.”
    That night Emmons and Alden patrolled the shores of Malolo in their cutters. It was evident that the Fijians were also preparing for battle. Warriors dabbed with paint and armed with muskets patrolled the shore, shouting out taunts and occasionally firing at the boat-crews. When the sailors had the opportunity to fire back, the Fijians dropped down at the flash of the musket in an attempt to dodge the ball.
    The next morning three divisions of about seventy officers and men under the command of Lieutenant Ringgold were rowed to shore at the southern tip of Malolo. Wilkes had instructed them to march across the island to Sualib, the village where the murders had occurred. Sualib was reputed to be an impregnable fortress, and Wilkes ordered Ringgold to kill as many warriors as possible and burn the village. On the northeastern side of the island was the lightly defended village of Arro (today called Yaro). Wilkes, who led the fleet of boats commanded by Alden, Emmons, and Midshipman Clark, would be responsible for burning Arro while also pursuing any natives attempting to escape by canoe. The Flying Fish and the Porpoise would stand by with their guns trained on shore.
    As the men were being rowed in, three canoes were seen sailing for Malololailai, and Emmons and Alden were sent off in pursuit. Serving as Emmons’s interpreter was a Hawaiian known as Oahu Jack. Once they were in firing range, Jack asked the natives where they were from. When they replied “Malolo,” Emmons unleashed his blunderbuss, immediately killing six natives as the rest dove into the water. “[A]s it was mere slaughter to kill them unresistingly,” Alden ordered that the remaining natives be taken alive. But his men refused to listen. Crying, “Kill! Kill!,” they raised their cutlasses and prepared to spear the natives like fish. When one of his men grabbed a Fijian by the hair and drew back his sword, Alden trained his pistol on his own man, who was about to behead a woman. There were also several children, and after putting the male captives in irons, Emmons and Alden returned the women and children to shore.
     
    George Sinclair was in the shore party’s second division commanded by Robert Johnson. As he and seventy others took up their positions around the village, he could not help but be impressed by the size and sophistication of the Fijian fortress. It was completely surrounded by a twelve-foot-wide ditch. Behind the ditch was a ten-foot-high palisade built of large coconut tree trunks knitted together by a dense wicker-work. Inside this imposing wall of wood was another ditch, probably dug