Title: A Week of Terror
Author: Tere Tremaine Fase
Publisher: Jcrispin Publishing Co.
ISBN: 0975264614
Pages: 140, Paperback
Genre: History
Reviewed by: Gary Sorkin, Pacific Book Review
Book Review
Written in the narrative by the great grand-niece of Hawai’is most renowned historian during the reign of the Kamehameha Dynasty, Tere Tremaine Fase, author of ‘December 7, 1941: A Week of Terror’ has lived up to the reputation of her famous ancestor, David Malo, author of the book, Hawaiian Antiquities. Her extensive research into the history of the island of Ni’ihau, the smallest of the inhabited islands in the State of Hawai’i, provided her with answers to the mystery that, for more than a century, surrounded the island known as the ‘forbidden’ isle.Beginning with the discovery of the islands in 1778 by Captain James Cook, the author provides the reader with brief histories of its Rulers, and the trials and tribulations of Kamehameha III, who, at the age of eleven, was proclaimed King of the Hawaiian Nation.
In minute detail, the author describes the terror that wreaked havoc on the island of Ni’ihau after Shigenori Nishikaichi, a pilot in the Imperial Japanese Navy, crashed his A6M2 Mitsubishi warplane on the island of Ni’ihau on the early morning of December 7, 1941, and threatens to kill every man, woman, and child, if the documents that were removed from his flight jacket were not immediately returned.
Other than Yoshio and Irene Harada who took the pilot into their home until he was able to return to Japan, none of the villagers were aware that America was at war with Japan. Nearly a week after the pilot crashed his plane on the island, the author describes the true, but tragic account of the pilot’s death at the hands of Ben Kanahele, and the suicide of Yoshio Harada, the island’s overseer.
The author describes the means by which the men plan to rescue their families, not knowing if they would be successful in reaching the island of Kaua’i where Aylmer Robinson, owner of the island of Ni’ihau, made his home. They recalled the order issued by Robinson that the sampan boats used to load cattle were not to be used for travel to another island. Desperate, the men decided to ignore the order and prepared themselves for the dangers they knew lay ahead. Forming a circle, the men bowed their heads and asked God to protect them and the loved ones they were leaving behind. Guided only by the dark silhouette of the island of Kaua’i, the men began their desperate journey.
