At just 11 years old, Ke Aliʻi Pauahi witnessed the most harrowing event her beloved Hawaiian Kingdom would endure in her lifetime.
British naval captain George Paulet intervened in a dubious land dispute between his country’s consul and the Hawaiian monarchy. He ultimately seized control of the sovereign Hawaiian Nation through the threat of military force.
For five long months, the Union Jack flew over Honolulu as Pauahi’s grand uncle, King Kamehameha III, was forced to surrender his authority. Adding insult to injury, Paulet ordered Hawaiian Kingdom flags gathered and burned.
Then came a reversal as dramatic as the loss: Rear Admiral Richard Thomas arrived with orders from Queen Victoria to restore the kingdom’s independence.
On July 31, 1843, Pauahi watched her nation rise again. That day, later celebrated as Lā Hoʻihoʻi Ea, Restoration Day, became the first national holiday of the Hawaiian Kingdom.
As a student at the Chiefs’ Children’s School, Pauahi recorded the joy of that moment in her own hand: “[t]hey pulled down the English flag and hoisted the Hawaiian flag and we were all rejoicing. This evening the largest children went down to Mrs. Hooper’s and we sang, ʻGod Save the King.’”
On the inside cover of her journal, the young chiefess drew the symbols she held most dear: the hae Hawaiʻi, flying proudly on its staff, and the hae kalaunu (royal standard) of her uncle and king, Kauikeaouli. Beneath them were the carefully written letters “BERN,” a tender shorthand for her own name.
Even as a child, Pauahi felt a deep love and connection to her nation, the kingdom founded by her great-grandfather, whose name she would one day bestow upon her schools. She understood the magnitude of her family’s kuleana to the nation and its people, as well as the challenges that lay ahead.
The hope she carried from Lā Hoʻihoʻi Ea never left her. That day held all the elements that would shape her future.
Her grand uncle, the king, stood firm in his belief in education. The school he founded prepared her for a life of high responsibility in the Hawaiian Kingdom. And in the day’s ceremonies, she witnessed the resilience of her lāhui. From these seeds grew Pauahi’s conviction that education would be the surest path forward for her people, a belief that would one day be written into her kauoha, her will, as her final and greatest gift.
Education at the core of her worldview
As a young king, Kauikeaouli famously declared: “ʻO koʻu aupuni, he aupuni palapala” (My kingdom shall be a kingdom of learning). He understood that the strength of the Hawaiian Kingdom rested not only in its ʻāina and its rulers, but in the knowledge of its people.
Acting on this conviction, he established the first public school system west of the Mississippi River, making education a responsibility of the government to provide for all rather than a private privilege for the few.
Literacy spread swiftly, reaching not only the aliʻi but the entire lāhui. By the mid-19th century, Hawaiʻi stood among the most literate nations on earth — a society where learning held great kuleana, the expectation and ability to use those skills for good ends.
In 1839, Kauikeaouli founded the Chiefs’ Children’s School in Honolulu to prepare the next generation of aliʻi to lead with wisdom in a rapidly changing world.
There, Pauahi was educated side by side with her cousins and peers. Among them were the future kings and queens of Hawaiʻi: Lot Kapuāiwa (Kamehameha V), Alex- ander Liholiho (Kamehameha IV), William Lunalilo, Emma Rooke, David Kalākaua and Lydia Liliʻuokalani.
For 10 years, until she was 18, this boarding school was Pauahi’s home, where she lived year-round in close company with those who would one day wear the crown. In those classrooms and dormitories, bonds of pilina were tightly secured, and the chiefly kuleana to the nation and its people, rooted in generations of cultural tradition, was instilled in each of them.
While many of her classmates would ascend the throne, Pauahi twice turned aside the crown. Her vision was not to govern from the palace, but to serve in another way: by ensuring her people’s future through education.
It was in these formative years that she came to see her kuleana as a chiefess who would help prepare generations of Native Hawaiians to thrive.
Charles Reed Bishop and her kauoha
Pauahi’s 1850 marriage to American businessman and banker Charles Reed Bishop was controversial to some, but it proved enduring. Together they became a philanthropic force.
“She was very congenial. She was very empathetic, and I think that empathy, and caring for the situations of others really became a part of her ʻano. Always caring about how other people are doing and how other people are feeling,” said Manu Boyd, a Kamehameha Schools cultural consultant.
“That’s something in leadership you don’t see a lot of today. She really put her people first. We talk about servant leadership, alakaʻi lawelawe, and it really is kind of a reflection of Pauahi herself. She was selfless. She put her people first.”
After her death, Charles honored his wife’s kauoha, her charge issued through her last will and testament, ensuring that her gift to her people would be realized.
On Oct. 31, 1883, Pauahi signed her will, bequeathing 375,500 acres of ʻāina inherited from numerous chiefly lines to establish schools for Native Hawaiian children. Four years later, the first Kamehameha School for Boys opened.
Pauahi’s kauoha alive today
Nearly 140 years later, Kamehameha Schools continues to carry out Pauahi’s kauoha (last will and testament) with the same fidelity set by her husband and the first trustees.
Her will has shaped generations of Native Hawaiian leaders who, in turn, have shaped Hawaiʻi itself. Today, her haumāna continue that legacy — growing as ʻŌiwi leaders, grounded in their identity, strengthened by ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi and culture, and prepared to uplift their ʻohana, their kaiāulu, and the lāhui.
As foreigners renew their assaults on her will, it is important to remember Pauahi’s kauoha in the context of her time.
She passed away nearly a decade before the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom, and long before the United States began its occupation of Hawaiʻi. She wrote her will as a chiefess of her nation.
That is why the story of Lā Hoʻihoʻi Ea matters still.
For Pauahi, it was never only about laws, treaties, or politics. It was about the uncle who stood for education as the hope of a nation. It was about the hae Hawaiʻi and royal standard she sketched in her journal, binding her own name to her people’s future. And it was about her chiefly kuleana, born of generations before her, to ensure that her lāhui would rise and sustain itself through learning.
In her kauoha, she transformed that kuleana into a gift of immeasurable love, one that continues to shape Hawaiʻi nearly 140 years later.
To honor her will is to honor Pauahi herself, and the enduring vision she entrusted to her people.
