KAIMIMIKI
Interspersed through this concise and interesting story of earthquakes told in a few word pictures are many references to other volcanic phenomena. “Activity great in Mokuaweoweo. Mountain clear for several days, the smoke is marked, light brilliant at night, snow extensive on both mountains.”
The year 1868 has been marked as the volcano year of Hawaiian history. Mr. F. S. Lyman, now living in Hilo, wrote a journal letter, which was quoted in full. He writes as follows about the earthquake:
“March 27–31, 1868. A sudden eruption from Mauna Loa, no forewarning, a spray of red lava thrown high in the air, followed by a great stream of smoke rising up thousands of feet. In Kau we had quite a sprinkling of Pele’s hair, peculiar earthquakes—first hard shakes, then a swaying motion, as if the whole island were swaying back and forth and we with it. March 31—From about 10 P.M. to 2 A.M. the shaking was incessant. Thursday, April 2nd. We experienced the most fearful of earthquakes. The earth swayed north, south, east, west, round and round, up and down, and in every imaginable direction, everything crashing around us, trees [[179]]thrashing as if torn by a mighty wind, impossible to stand. We had to sit on the ground, bracing with hands and feet, to keep from rolling over.”
Mr. H. M. Whitney, editor of the Advertiser, says that “the number of shocks which occurred at Waiohinu from March 29 to April 10 was estimated at upwards of two thousand. The heaviest shock, that of April 2d, destroyed every church and nearly every dwelling in the whole district. This earthquake was felt very sensibly in Honolulu. Following the earthquake came a great tidal wave at Punaluu. It rolled in over the tops of coconut trees, probably sixty feet high at least, driving all floating rubbish inland about a quarter of a mile—taking with it, when it returned to the sea, houses, men, and women and everything movable.”
Mr. Lyman wrote: “We could see the shore. All along the seashore from directly below us to Punaluu about three or four miles the sea was boiling and foaming furiously, all red.”
Two remarkable eruptions accompanied this earthquake. The lava, starting from the slope of Mauna Loa, sank into some great channel but “burst forth with a heavy roar several miles farther down. The lava stream became a river of fire, flowing rapidly toward and around some farmhouses. The inmates had barely time to escape. The path by which they fled was covered [[180]]with lava within ten minutes after they passed over it. Animals and even human beings perished. The number of deaths were between eighty and one hundred. This eruption flowed ten miles in two hours, and continued five days, destroying many thousands of acres of good lands.” The second remarkable eruption was nearer the crater Kilauea and has been known as “The Great Mud Flow of 1868.” It is in the region covered by the Pahala plantation.
Mr. Lyman writes: “In the midst of the great earthquake we saw burst out from the top of the pali about a mile and a half north of us, what we supposed to be an immense river of molten lava (which afterward proved to be red earth), which rushed down in headlong course and across the plain below, apparently bursting from the ground and swallowing up everything in its way—trees, houses, cattle, horses, men, in an instant as it were. It went three miles in not more than three minutes’ time and then stopped. After the hard shaking had ceased we went right over to a hill with the children and our natives expecting every moment to be swallowed up by the lava from beneath, for it sounded as if it were surging and washing under our feet all the time. Outside of Punaluu we saw a long black point of lava slowly pushing out to sea. An island about four hundred feet high rose out of the sea at the south [[181]]point. The lava river has extended the shore to this island one mile at least.”
Mrs. Lyman wrote: “Jan. 30, 1875. Light exceedingly brilliant. Perpendicular column of smoke over 1,000 feet high on the summit crater spreading out at top like an expanding flower.” This august glow was described by members of the “Challenger” expedition as “a globular cloud perpetually reformed by condensation, having a brilliant orange glow at night as if a fire were raging in the distance.”