ISLAND HISTORY: Wilhelm George Schimmelfennig, Koloa Plantation Supervisor

Born and raised in Honolulu, Wilhelm George Schimmelfennig (1863-1927) was the son of German immigrant George Fredrick Schimmelfennig, a whaler captain, and his wife Fredricke.

As a young man, Schimmelfennig moved to Kaua’i, where he was hired as a supervisor at Koloa Plantation under manager Anton Cropp (1853-1913), a reserve officer in the German army.

Cropp was a harsh disciplinarian whose only concern for non-supervising workers was that they worked hard and efficiently.

These workers – faced with long hours, low wages and harsh contractors – resented Cropp and his supervisors and responded by refusing to work or deserting, actions punishable by fine or a prison sentence.

Schimmelfennig’s great-grandson, Charles E. Schimmelfennig III, informed me that Schimmelfennig, carrying out Cropp’s orders, personified the caricature of the dreaded plantation luna on his high horse with a menacing whip in his hand its workers.

One day in Lawa’i, for example, Schimmelfennig was on horseback admonishing a Japanese ox-cart driver, when, in exasperation or anger, he grabbed the driver from his seat and in the process snatched the man’s shirt, exposing his bare back.

In Western culture, this was undoubtedly an assault, but for the Japanese oxcart driver and his fellow Japanese workers, it was also culturally interpreted as an act of shame towards him, his family and his ancestors. .

A mob of Japanese workers then chased Schimmelfennig to his home in Koloa, where he further infuriated them by spraying them with kerosene and threatening to set him on fire with his cigar, until a sheriff arrived and break up the confrontation.

According to “Return to Maha’ulepu” author Charles Katsumu Tanimoto, Schimmelfennig was then all the more reviled by the Japanese at Koloa Plantation.

Despite this, he was promoted to superintendent and was retired from the Koloa Sugar Plantation in 1918 after an overpass collapsed on top of him, crushing his leg.

Schimmelfennig and his Hawaiian wife, Rebecca Pahukoa Neal Schimmelfennig, had four children: Helen, Fischer, Carl, and Neal.

Their good character has never been questioned.

The Japanese government eventually filed a formal complaint with the US Congress for abuse of its workers.