My interest in Tahiti comes from the fact that my grandfather Robert Keable, an Englishman, lived there in the 1920s. As I show in my book Guys like Gauguin (coming out in August 2026) there were a number of English and American writers and artists who settled on the island during that decade. Part of the attraction of Tahiti at that time was that it was French. It meant high quality food, cheap wines and spirits and officials who seldom interfered. But why was the island French and not English?

First visitors

Tahiti was first ‘discovered’ by Europeans in the 1760s and for the next seventy years a motely crew of Europeans and Americans began to visit the island, with some deciding to settle there. Whaling ships, hunting whales across the Pacific, used the island as an excuse for some rest and recreation, and missionaries from Great Britain, France and elsewhere also arrived. 

For the first decade of the nineteenth century there was civil war across the island but by 1812 King Pomare II had, with the help of weapons supplied by some missionaries, taken control. Once the King becoming a Christian it was not long before almost the entire population of the island had been converted and the influence of the missionaries helped establish new laws and codes of conduct. Despite this influence the King, and from 1827 Queen Pomare IV, governed the island.

In the 1830s, as the non-Polynesian population began to grow and the number of ships visiting the island increased America (first) and then Britain and France, established consulates on the island in order to look after the interests of their citizens. None of these countries’ governments had any interest in colonising the island. The French had lost much of its empire when Napoleon was defeated and, although keen to reclaim land they had lost, were not looking for new territories. The British government, aware of public opinion following the Napoleonic wars, was not looking to expand the empire. There were no new colonies, with the exception of the occupation of Singapore, during the reigns of George IV and William IV (from 1820-1837). America, although busy expanding its territory across the continent, had, until the 1850s, laws that specifically prevented overseas expansion.

So how did Tahiti become French?

The truth is that it was an accident that Tahiti became French. Unsurprisingly, the three consuls on the island in the 1830s did jockey for influence, and it was the British Consul, Rev George Pritchard who developed the closest relationship with the Queen, offering her protection if needed.

George Pritchard, a Congregationalist, had first arrived on the island as a member of the evangelical London Missionary Society and one of his biggest concerns was to try and prevent Roman Catholicism taking hold across the Society islands. When he learnt that two French Catholic priests had secretly landed on the island and travelled to Papeete, he managed to persuade the Queen to refuse them permission to stay on Tahiti.  

When the French learnt that two of their citizens had been expelled, they dispatched a warship to the island and demanded reparations. The Queen was asked to pay a huge sum - 100,000 piasters, about $2,000 – or else agree to Tahiti and the neighbouring islands being placed under nominal French contol.

Pritchard, still trusted by Queen Pomare, offered her security while the negotiations with the French proceeded. He assured her that the British would come to her protection and believed they would organise a military response.

He returned to England but was horrified to discover the British government had decided to take no action. The Prime Minister, Sir Robert Peel, who was annoyed with the decision to expel the two Roman Catholic priests was not prepared to act and instead downplayed the significance of the French actions. In March 1843 in answer to a question in parliament from Sir George Grey he said:

All that France had done by her officer was to place the islands under her sovereignty, which was acceded to by the Queen and chiefs, but no possession was taken by placing any French force on the islands.

The British supported the French on condition that they helped provide protection for the 60 or 70 British citizens living on the island at that time. Pritchard was reprimanded by the foreign secretary, Lod Aberdeen, for ‘prejudging the course which his government might see fit to adopt’ and for ‘acting in a way that might endanger the harmony of relations with a foreign power.’

The British papers at the time were very clear that what they saw as the loss of the island to the French was the fault of Pritchard’s decision to persuade the Queen to deport the original Catholic missionaries. The Colonial Gazette in July 1845:

Discussion and public meetings may take place, pamphlets and statements by dozens; but the result is an accession of French physical power in the Pacific and the almost universal spread of the Catholic religion. Verily, gentlemen of the Protestant Mission Societies, your political interference has come to something; or to use a vulgar expression, ‘You have burned your fingers’, it is you who have provoked all this.

Unsupported by the British the Queen was eventually forced to give in to the demands of the French. Although initially a protectorate French influence gradually increased and in 1880 King Pomare V was persuaded to cede sovereignty and the island officially became a French colony.

 Portrait of Queen Pomare IV by Charles Giraud

Did the French want to keep Tahiti?

By the beginning of the twentieth century there began to be rumours that the French were considering handing control of Tahiti to another country, with America or Germany the most likely candidates. An article in the Hawaiian Star written at the beginning of 1906 suggested the United States Government had offered 20 million Francs, then roughly $4 million, for the island. The article went on to say:

Absurd as it appears to be, the residents of this magnificent island, even the French residents, appear to be pleased over the prospect that the island might come under the jurisdiction of Uncle Sam.

According to the, then, British Consul Robert Simons, in a long letter to the then Foreign Secretary, the French had recently withdrawn troops and a naval vessel from Tahiti and the island had become a financial burden. He reported that a dramatic fall in the value of imports to the island, not helped by the fall in price paid for shells, had cost the French government almost fifteen thousand pounds a year in lost revenue. He also suggested that the French decision to hand over their rights to the Panama Canal project had diminished their interested in the Eastern Pacific, and that the French share of total imports into Tahiti and the local islands was down to an average of less than 17% a year.

In his letter, written in June 1905,  Simons, in effect, pitched the idea of the UK taking over from the French ownership of all the local islands including Tahiti, Moorea, the Titiaroa, the Leeward Islands, the Paumotus, the Marquesas Islands, the Gambier and Austral Islands and Rapa. He produced accounts showing that in 1905 the French were barely breaking even and suffered from high administrative costs of £71,900. He estimated that the United Kingdom could run everything for about £35,000. He argued the French were not prepared to invest in improving the infrastructure of any of their islands and that the administration was very inefficient. He explained:

With regard to the question of administration, it may fairly be admitted that the system in force is far too complex for the requirements of this country. The functionaries sent out from Europe are too numerous; they are poorly paid; their emoluments are often inadequate; their sojurn is too short; and the expense to the Colony of thier passages to and from France is excessive.   

The main part of the Consul’s pitch for Tahiti was that the harbour at Papeete was ‘large and well protected, and the formation of the shore suitable for the erection of wharves would make an excellent coaling station and rendezvous.’ The Consul added ‘Tahiti, moreover, is absolutely outside the zone of cyclones and tidal waves, which not infrequently attack the islands in this neighbourhood, and its shelters are therefore secure.’

The British do not act

The British Foreign Secretary ignored the Consul’s advice to buy the colony and I have found no evidence that any offer was made. Which was lucky because ironically the following year the seaboards of Tahiti and Moorea were hit a meteotsunami caused by a cyclone off the Paumotu Islands. The tsunami wreaked havoc. Incredibly only one man died, the keeper of the quarantine store, but the Consul explained in a letter to Sir Edward Grey, the new Foreign Secretary, the extent of the damage.

In all parts of tahiti and Moorea, on the seaboard, buildings, bridges, plantations etc. have either been destroyed or wrecked. In the town of Papeete the destruction of property is deplorable: the quarantine station, the slip and its power-house; the post, port and public works offices, the Mormon Church and its Settlement of adherents, whole native villages in the vicinity of Papeete, including those of 500 British South Sea islanders, and numerous residences etc. have disappeared together with their contents. The American Consular property, a large store and various warehouses and workshops, have collapsed. All the large stores, British, American, French and German have been wrecked and their contents ruined by salt water and sand to the value of many thousand pounds. The Government coal sheds, and many places of businesses and private residences, are damaged almost beyond recognition. The beach road in front, and for a considerable distance on each side, of His Majesty’s Consulate has been washed away; iron bridges have been carried inland and the general dissolution is pitiful.

As the Consul pointed out the immediate consequence were ‘calamitous’, with many homeless, penniless and without employment. It took France many years to repair the damage. A cost which would have fallen on the British if they had bought the colony the year before. Unsurprisingly after that there was no more discussion about Tahiti being taken over by the British.