Leper Colony

Island of Molokai

While he was stationed in Pearl Harbor, and when he was in Port he was dating a young woman whose parents lived at the Leper Colony on the island of Molokai. He accompanied her a few times when she went over on the water taxi to visit them.

He was really amazed, and impressed at how these people who had been ostracized and banished from Society to this remote and deserted part of the Island, accessible only by boat, had made such a good life for themselves. He loved the time he spent in Pearl Harbor and on the West Coast, but after he came back stateside, and after we got married he had no desire to go back, but I had a desire to go.

Islands of Hawaii

Overlook of Leper Colony

Many years later I made a trip to the Hawaiian Islands and I visited some of the places he had told me about. I did not get to visit the Leper Colony, but I stood on the side of the mountain that overlooks it.

I could see from the place I was standing on the mountain side looking down how secluded it was, just a small point of land jutting out into the sea with a sheer mountain cliff behind, there was no way for any of them to escape.

Father Damien

A Church built by Father Damien

I read all of the plaques and legends at the Overlook, and I too was amazed at how they had survived.

I also read about how Father Damien had made it his life's work to care for these people that no one wanted. I found it very sad that he would die of the same disease of those he spent his life caring for, both spiritually and physically. I consider his life’s work to have been the Love of God in action!

There was no way for any of them to escape, they were secluded and left to fend for themselves and to eventually die, but they turned their abandonment into a cause with tenacity, and chose to live out their time, and make a life for themselves here.

His Original Resting Place

Pandanus Tree

Father Damien died April 15, 1889 at the age of 49, and was originally laid to rest at Kaluapapa, Molokai under the same Pandanus tree he had slept under on his arrival to the island. Later his body was removed and returned to Tremolo, Belgium. 

They had been rejected by Society, but they had each other! Chuck would have been so very happy to know that there is now a cure for Hanson’s Disease. His visits to this Leper Colony touched him deeply.