:Robert Crichton Wyllie

Wyllie was born October 13, 1798, in an area called Hazelbank in Dunlop parish of East Ayrshire, Scotland. His father was Alexander Wyllie.{{cite news |title= An Adventurous Life |work= Reminiscences of fifty years |author= Mark Boyd |year= 1871 |pages= 427–429 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=wDkBAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA427 }} (obituary attributed to Ayr Advertiser) His mother, Janet Crichton, traced her descent from James Crichton.

He attended the University of Glasgow, earning a medical diploma by the time he was 20.

He left as a ship surgeon, intending to practice in Russia. He got as far as Valparaíso in Chile in 1818, then set up in practice in nearby Coquimbo. After a few years he gave up medical practice and became a partner in a successful trading business. He took a small yacht, Daule, to Kolkata, India (then called Calcutta), from 1824 to 1826, stopping in the Hawaiian Islands en route. A friend William Edward Petty Hartnell had settled near Monterey, California since 1822, taking the name Don Guillermo and a Spanish wife.{{citation |author= Susanna Bryant Dakin |title= The Lives of William Hartnell |year= 1949 |publisher= Stanford University Press |isbn= 978-0-8047-1424-2 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=7IKaAAAAIAAJ }}

Wyllie returned to England in 1830, and continued to grow his fortune in banking with a partner named Lyall. He joined the expensive Reform Club in London. In 1842 he left for Mexico to investigate some of his investments in a group called the Spanish American Bondholders. Mexico was in financial trouble from the Texas Revolution and had essentially mortgaged vast amounts of land.

His friend Hartnell provided detailed reports encouraging British settlement of California. He was involved with Manuel Micheltorena, governor of Alta California, and Wyllie proposed a plan to buy land in Sacramento Valley and colonize California in 1843.{{cite book |title= History of California |chapter= Foreign Relations and Immigration—1843 |publisher= Hubert Howe Bancroft |author=Henry Lebbeus Oak |author2=William Nemos |author3=Frances Fuller Victor |year= 1890 |pages= 383–384 |volume=4 |chapter-url= https://books.google.com/books?id=_DEaAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA383 }}

Writing about this episode, a historian says:

...no drama in the Pacific was complete without the fastidious, meticulous and verbose Scots busybody, Dr. Robert Chrichton Wyllie.{{cite book |title= Macnamara's Irish colony and the United States taking of California in 1846 |author= John Fox |chapter= Wyllie |pages= 83–86 |publisher= McFarland |year= 2000 |isbn= 978-0-7864-0687-6 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=cg1MP1zFVEYC }}{{rp|83}}

He stayed with British Consul to Mexico (and fellow Scot) Alexander Forbes, hoping to get help from his investors for the California scheme. The investors, however, were willing to wait to get their money back. Irish priest Eugene McNamara led what would be the closest attempt to assert British influence in California. By the time McNamara acted, however, events such as the "Bear Flag Revolt" gave the United States effective control over California.

Wyllie ran into his friend William Miller while in Mazatlán. Miller, although born in England, served as a general in the Latin American wars of independence under Simón Bolívar. The two had met earlier in Valparaíso. Miller had just been appointed British Consul to the Kingdom of Hawaii and convinced Wyllie to come with him while he was waiting for a response from his investors.

They arrived in Honolulu in January 1844 aboard {{HMS|Hazard|1837|6}}. Miller continued on his voyage to Tahiti, since he was assigned to oversee British relations to all Pacific Islands. Wyllie stayed in the Hawaiian islands for the rest of his life.{{cite journal |hdl= 10524/223 |title= The Journals and Letter Books of R.C. Wyllie: A Minor Historical Mystery |journal= Hawaiian Journal of History |publisher=Hawaiian Historical Society |volume= 18 |author= James D. Raeside |year= 1984 |pages= 87–95 }}

Wyllie first worked as acting British Consul until Miller returned March 15, 1845. During this time he compiled in-depth reports on the conditions in the islands.

He was then appointed by King Kamehameha III as Minister of Foreign Affairs, Secretary of War, and to the legislature in the House of Nobles on March 26, 1845.{{cite web |url= http://archives1.dags.hawaii.gov/gsdl/collect/governme/index/assoc/HASH013f/d49c1049.dir/Wyllie,%20Robert%20Crichton.jpg |title= Wyllie, Robert Crichton office record |work=state archives digital collections |publisher=state of Hawaii |access-date= 2010-01-31 }}

He was seen as a counter to the American influence of Gerrit P. Judd, who had been a missionary doctor before becoming the first Treasurer, effectively the most powerful position in the country. Judd had also been acting as Minister of Foreign Affairs up to the appointment of Wyllie. Judd served about a year as Minister of Interior, and then was given the title Minister of Finance April 15, 1846.{{cite web |url= http://archives1.dags.hawaii.gov/gsdl/collect/governme/index/assoc/HASH0134/9a539506.dir/Judd,%20Gerrit%20Parmele.jpg |title= Judd, Gerrit Parmele office record |work= state archives digital collections |publisher= state of Hawaii |access-date= 2010-01-31 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20110721042721/http://archives1.dags.hawaii.gov/gsdl/collect/governme/index/assoc/HASH0134/9a539506.dir/Judd%2C%20Gerrit%20Parmele.jpg |archive-date= 2011-07-21 }}

One of his first assignments was to list the various complaints between the previous British Consul Richard Charlton and the American Commissioner George Brown. Brown had been fairly universally disliked, and was removed by request of the Hawaiian government.

In 1847 he started collecting documents to form the Archives of Hawaii.{{cite journal |author=Agnes C. Conrad |year=1967 |title=The Archives of Hawaii |journal=The Journal of Pacific History |volume=2 |pages=191–197 |doi=10.1080/00223346708572115 |jstor=25167917}}

On August 12, 1849, French admiral Louis Tromelin staged a French Invasion of Honolulu. Tromelin sacked the city before sailing off with the king's yacht and other plunder. Judd and two young princes were sent to Europe to negotiate treaties, stopping in the United States on the way. Judd advocated annexation by the United States to protect against further actions by British and French.{{citation|author= William De Witt Alexander |title= A brief history of the Hawaiian people |publisher= Board of Education of the Hawaiian Kingdom |year= 1891 |isbn=978-0-89875-324-0 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Fds3JhdHlnsC}}

Wyllie was more in favor of a simple treaty of Reciprocity.

Former Hawaiian newspaper publisher James Jackson Jarves negotiated a treaty with John M. Clayton signed on December 20, 1849.{{cite web |title= Treaty with the Hawaiian Islands |date= December 20, 1849 |url= http://hawaii-nation.org/treaty1849.html |access-date= 2010-03-13 }}

In the meanwhile, Judd had met Charles Eames, the new American Commissioner and negotiated his own treaty in October 1849. Eames had been appointed by President James Polk for this purpose, but got only as far as San Francisco when he got involved in the California Gold Rush.{{cite book |title=Hawaiian Kingdom 1778–1854, foundation and transformation |author= Ralph Simpson Kuykendall |url= http://www.ulukau.org/elib/cgi-bin/library?c=kingdom1&l=en |volume=1 |publisher= University of Hawaii Press |year= 1965 |orig-date=1938 |isbn= 0-87022-431-X |page=249 }}{{rp|379}}

Eames was quickly replaced with Luther Severance as U.S. Commissioner.{{cite book |title= Imperial Maine and Hawaiʻi: interpretive essays in the history of nineteenth-century American expansion |author= Paul T. Burlin |publisher= Lexington Books |year= 2006 |pages= 95–134 |chapter= Chapter 5: Luther Severance: Whig Ideologue as Diplomat |chapter-url= https://books.google.com/books?id=gU5jh-Ew0HgC&pg=PA95 |isbn= 978-0-7391-1466-7 }} By 1850 he had treaties signed by the United States, Britain, France, and Denmark.

Wyllie had suggested dismantling the old Honolulu Fort, since its outdated armaments had proven to be useless in preventing attacks anyway. In 1850 he proposed developing land around the Honolulu Harbor including the old fort land. Distractions would prevent this from happening for several years.{{cite journal |hdl= 10524/46 |title= Early Improvements in Honolulu Harbor |journal= Annual Report |publisher=Hawaiian Historical Society |author= William De Witt Alexander |year= 1907 |page= 16 }}

A shipload of former gold prospectors led by Samuel Brannan arrived in 1851. These came to be known as the "filibusters".{{cite book |title= A political biography of David Lawrence Gregg, American diplomat and Hawaiian official |author= Pauline King Joerger |publisher= Ayer Publishing |year= 1982 |isbn= 978-0-405-14093-8 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=QC5Ag9jsH80C }}{{rp|69}}

Brannan's men destroyed some mail on their ship, hoping to start a surprise rebellion, but Wyllie had already heard rumors and had them closely watched. After vacationing for the winter, they left without getting any popular support.{{cite journal |title= Uncompleted treaty of annexation of 1854 |author= William De Witt Alexander |year= 1897 |journal= Papers of the Hawaiian Historical Society |publisher= Hawaiian Historical Society |hdl= 10524/962}}

File:Royal Hawaiian Agricultural Society.jpg

Wyllie built a house in Nu{{okina}}uanu Valley he called Rosebank. He entertained foreign visitors at the house, and the area today still has several consular buildings.{{cite journal |last= Taylor |first= Albert Pierce |title= Intrigues, conspiracies and accomplishments in the era of Kamehameha IV and V and Robert Crichton Wyllie |journal= Papers of the Hawaiian Historical Society |publisher=Hawaiian Historical Society |location= Honolulu |volume= 16 |date= October 15, 1929 |pages= 16–32 |hdl= 10524/978}}

In March 1853 he bought a plantation on Hanalei Bay on the north shore of the island of Kaua{{okina}}i. After an 1860 visit by Queen Emma of Hawaii and her son Prince Albert Kamehameha he named the plantation Princeville. He named another part of the plantation Emmaville, but that name never stuck.{{cite book |title= Kauai: The Separate Kingdom |author= Edward Joesting |pages=180–187 |publisher= University of Hawaii Press |year= 1988 |isbn= 978-0-8248-1162-4 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=GfWj0Pt3cwoC&pg=PA182 }}

Originally the land was planted with Coffee which was not suited to the wet lowlands. It was then planted with sugarcane.{{cite journal |hdl= 10524/630|title= Princeville Plantation Papers |journal= Hawaiian Journal of History |publisher=Hawaiian Historical Society |volume=16 |author= Rhoda E. A. Hackler |year= 1982 |pages= 65–85 }}

He was a founding member of the Royal Hawaiian Agricultural Society in 1850, contributing many papers.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7RgTAAAAYAAJ|title=The Transactions of the Royal Hawaiian Agricultural Society|date=August 1850|publisher=Henry M. Whitney, Hawaii Government Press|volume=1}}

Another former Scottish physician, William Jardine (1784–1843) had become wealthy trading opium out of Hong Kong. Wyllie made Jardine's nephews consuls to make sure the lucrative China trade continued.{{cite web |title= Circular and related documents MS.JM/L4/5 |work= Jardine Matheson Archive |date= c. 1850 |url= http://janus.lib.cam.ac.uk/db/node.xsp?id=EAD%2FGBR%2F0012%2FMS%20JM%2FMS.JM%2FL4%2F5|access-date= 2010-03-17 }}

When his sugar production was limited by a labor shortage, he proposed importing workers from Asia for plantation workers.{{cite book |title=Hawaiian Kingdom 1854–1874, twenty critical years |author= Ralph Simpson Kuykendall |url= http://www.ulukau.org/elib/cgi-bin/library?c=kingdom2&l=en |volume=2 |publisher= University of Hawaii Press |year= 1953 |isbn= 978-0-87022-432-4 }}{{rp|179}}

Wyllie would outlast many of his rivals and colleagues.

Elisha Hunt Allen was American Consul 1850–1853.

David L. Gregg became the US commissioner 1853–1858.

A smallpox epidemic in 1853 forced Judd to resign from the cabinet September 5, 1853.

By the end of 1853, foreign residents were pressuring the king to sign a treaty of annexation with the United States to protect them from more rumored insurrections.

Kamehameha IV became king in January 1855, and kept Wyllie in the cabinet. The new king had seen American racism first-hand on his 1849 trip, so ended all negotiations for annexation.

James W. Borden became the US commissioner in 1858, and Thomas J. Dryer in 1861.

Kamehameha V then came to power when Kamehameha IV died November 30, 1863, and also kept Wyllie in the cabinet.

A letter once appeared in the Ayr Advertiser confusing Wyllie with English physician Thomas Charles Byde Rooke, who was adoptive father of Kamehameha IV's wife Queen Emma. It was titled "The Ayrshire Queen" and called Emma Wyllie's daughter.{{cite web |title= Notice re the ancestry of Queen Emma MS.JM/L4/8 |work= Jardine Matheson Archive |date= c. 1857 |url= http://janus.lib.cam.ac.uk/db/node.xsp?id=EAD%2FGBR%2F0012%2FMS%20JM%2FMS.JM%2FL4%2F8 |access-date= 2010-03-17 }}

Wyllie kept Hawaii officially neutral during the American Civil War,{{cite web |title= Kamehameha IV Printed Proclamation of Neutrality |work= The Abraham Lincoln Papers |publisher= United States Library of Congress |date= August 26, 1861 |url= http://memory.loc.gov/mss/mal/mal1/113/1136200/001.jpg }}

but promoted continuing trade of sugar and other products to the expanding Californian market. Meanwhile, he quietly tried to lessen the influence of conservative American missionaries.{{cite journal |hdl= 10524/159 |title= Hawaiʻi's Holy War: English Bishop Staley, American Congregationalists, and the Hawaiian Monarchs, 1860 - 1870 |journal= Hawaiian Journal of History |publisher=Hawaiian Historical Society |volume= 34 |author= Robert Louis Semes |year= 2000 |pages= 113–95 }}

In 1859, Wyllie instructed the Hawaiian Consul in London, Manley Hopkins{{cite book |title= Hawaii: the past, present, and future of its island-kingdom; an historical account of the Sandwich Islands |author= Manley Hopkins |publisher= D. Appleton and Company |year=1869 |url= https://archive.org/details/hawaiipastpresen00hopk }} to send a priest from the Anglican church. He also contacted William Ingraham Kip of the American Episcopal Church in California who supported the idea, but the Civil War prevented any help from them. Thomas Nettleship Staley, an Englishman, was consecrated as Bishop and arrived October, 1862, to start the Church of Hawaii. This was a more liberal church with pomp and ceremony missing from the dour American sects. Wyllie would even have dancing at his social events (previously prohibited as sinful), and held the first "fancy dress ball", coming in Scottish Highland Dress. He even invited the Catholic Bishop who came in his full Pontifical vestments.{{cite journal |hdl= 10524/400 |title= Decline of Puritanism at Honolulu in the Nineteenth Century |journal= Hawaiian Journal of History |publisher=Hawaiian Historical Society |volume= 1 |author= Gavan Daws |year= 1967 |pages=31–42 }}

Wyllie encouraged Emma to write to Queen Victoria, and despite the contrast in their respective dominions, they became lifelong friends. They exchanged condolences when their sons and then husbands died. Victoria sent an elaborate silver cup and offered to be godmother (by proxy) of the young prince.{{cite journal |hdl= 10524/202|title= "My Dear Friend": Letters of Queen Victoria and Queen Emma |journal = Hawaiian Journal of History |publisher=Hawaiian Historical Society |volume=22 |author= Rhoda E. A. Hackler |year= 1988 |pages= 101–130 }}

File:Robert C. Wyllie tomb - Royal Mausoleum, Honolulu, HI.jpg.]]

In 1862 Lady Jane Franklin was entertained by Wyllie at his estates. He proposed awarding out peerage titles, with Lady Franklin as one of the first to be awarded by giving her the title of Baroness. The democratically minded Americans would not allow it, but he did introduce court etiquette rules and official titles for the royalty. He insisted on formal European-style military uniforms for both royalty and cabinet officers, and favored decorative medals such as the Royal Order of Kamehameha I.

Wyllie died on October 19, 1865. Charles de Varigny who was serving as Minister of Finance, was his successor as Foreign Minister. He was the third person buried in the Royal Mausoleum of Hawaii, which had just been completed.

His nephew Robert Crichton Cockrane was named his heir, and changed his last name to Wyllie. Robert found out that the new sugar factory built on his Princeville plantation was deep in debt, and committed suicide in 1866. It was then bought by Elisha Hunt Allen at auction for a fraction of what Wyllie had spent on it.

A tomb built in 1904 was named for him, and his remains were moved there, along with members of the family of Queen Emma.

Rosebank was bought at auction by Charles Judd, son of Gerrit. Walter M. Gibson wrote that the personal papers were thrown out of the house, but most have never been found. He then sold Rosebank to Frederick August Schaefer.

However, his meticulous records of public government business became the basis of the Hawaii State Archives.

A street is named Wyllie Road in the Princeville resort at {{coord |22|13|8|N| 159|28|16|W| type:landmark_region:US-HI| display=inline |name=Wyllie Road }}. As Nu{{okina}}uanu Valley was developed, a Wyllie Street was named for him, opposite the site of his Rosebank estate at {{coord |21|19|38|N| 157|50|45|W| type:landmark_region:US-HI| display=inline |name=Wyllie Street}}.{{cite web |url= http://wehewehe.org/cgi-bin/hdict?a=q&j=pp&l=en&q=Wyllie |title= lookup of Wyllie |work= on Place Names of Hawaiʻi |author= Mary Kawena Pukui and Elbert |year= 2004 |publisher= Ulukau, the Hawaiian Electronic Library, University of Hawaii |access-date= 2010-03-15 |archive-url= https://archive.today/20120716114317/http://wehewehe.org/cgi-bin/hdict?a=q&j=pp&l=en&q=Wyllie |archive-date= 2012-07-16 }}

• {{cite book |author=Robert Crichton Wyllie |title= Mexico: Report on its finances under the Spanish government; since its independence and prospects of their improvement |year= 1844 |publisher= A. H. Baily, London |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=_mguAAAAYAAJ }}
• {{cite book |author=Robert Crichton Wyllie |title= Table of consular grievances, 1843–1846 |year= 1846 |publisher= A. H. Baily, London |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=B1LRv4HEBgkC }}
• {{cite book |author=Robert Crichton Wyllie |title= Answers to questions proposed by His Excellency, R. C. Wyllie, His Majesty's Minister of Foreign Relations, and addressed to all the Missionaries in the Hawaiian Islands, May 1846 |year= 1848 |publisher=Hawaii Department of Foreign Affairs |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=tF2gR5GUC-oC }}
• {{cite book |author=Robert Crichton Wyllie |title= Address to the House of representatives of the Hawaiian kingdom: on the inefficiency of high duties on spirits, in promoting temperance, morality and revenue, and the expediency of lowering the duties, in conformity with the strong recommentations of the chamber of commerce of Honolulu |year= 1851 |publisher=Hawaii Department of Foreign Affairs |url= http://name.umdl.umich.edu/AEB6390.0001.001 }}
• {{cite book |author=Robert Crichton Wyllie |title= Motion in the Hawaiian Parliament to release John Ricord, Esquire, His Majesty's attorney general, from a debt standing against him in the books of the King's Treasury, since June, 1847 |year= 1854 |publisher=Hawaii Department of Foreign Affairs |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=XFQdZtc7oDMC }}

{{Reflist|2}}

• {{cite book |title= The Story of Scots in Hawaiʻi |editor= Rhoda E. A. Hackler |publisher= The Caledonian Society of Hawaiʻi |year= 2001 |edition=2nd |asin=B000QJ4790 }}
• {{cite journal |title= California in 1844 as Hartnell Saw It |author= Lauro de Rojas |journal= California Historical Society Quarterly |volume= 17 |number=1 |date= March 1938 |pages= 21–27 |jstor= 25160752 |doi=10.2307/25160752}}
• {{cite journal |title= California Filibustering and the Hawaiian Kingdom |author= Andrew F. Rolle |journal= The Pacific Historical Review |volume= 19 |number=3 |date= August 1950 |pages= 251–263 |jstor= 3635590 |doi=10.2307/3635590}}

{{Commons category}}

• {{cite web |title= R.C. Wyllie tomb at Mauna 'Ala |author= William John Kaiheʻekai Maiʻoho |year= 2003 |publisher= Pacific Worlds & Associates |url= http://www.pacificworlds.com/nuuanu/memories/wyllie.cfm |access-date= 2010-03-06 }}
• {{cite web |title= A Rich History |work= Princeville at Hanalei web site |year= 2010 |url= http://www.princeville.com/history.html |access-date= 2010-03-15 }}
• {{cite web |title= A Letter from Robert Crichton Wyllie to Queen Emma and Lady Franklin and the Sandwich Islands by Ethel Damon |author= Bette Layton |year= 2007 |publisher= Pacific Worlds & Associates |url= http://www.kauaihistoricalsociety.org/assets/finding_aids/ms_30_wyllie_finding_aid.pdf |access-date= 2010-03-15 }}

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{{succession box| title= Kingdom of Hawaii Minister of Foreign Affairs | before= Gerrit P. Judd | after= Charles de Varigny | years= 1845–1865 }}

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{{Hawaiian Ministers of Foreign Affairs}}

{{Hawaiian Ministers of Finance}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Wyllie, Robert Crichton}}

Category:1798 births

Category:1865 deaths

Category:Burials at the Royal Mausoleum (Mauna ʻAla)

Category:Hawaiian Kingdom politicians

Category:Foreign ministers of the Hawaiian Kingdom

Category:Members of the Hawaiian Kingdom Privy Council

Category:Members of the Hawaiian Kingdom House of Nobles

Category:19th-century Scottish medical doctors

Category:People from Dunlop, East Ayrshire

Category:Alumni of the University of Glasgow

Category:Ambassadors of the United Kingdom to Hawaii