Event of 1862: Peruvian slave raiders land on Easter Island, beginning a decade of the destruct

Background. Easter Island, or Rapa Nui, was historically one of the most isolated inhabited territories in the mid-Pacific Ocean. Its inhabitants, the Rapa Nui, had previously endured famines, civil wars, and environmental collapse. The arrival of Peruvian slave raiders in 1862 marked a new phase of destruction, as crews from Peru sought to fill an extreme labour shortage by kidnapping indigenous people from Polynesian islands.

The Raid. At the end of 1862, eight ships organised under Captain Marutani conducted an armed operation at Easter Island. Over several days, the combined crews systematically surrounded villages and captured as many Rapa Nui islanders as possible. This raid was part of a wider blackbirding trade that relied on coercion and kidnapping to transport tens of thousands of indigenous people to work on plantations in conditions similar to the Atlantic slave trade.

Consequences. The slaves were freed in autumn 1863, but most had already died of tuberculosis, smallpox, and dysentery. A dozen islanders managed to return from Peru, but they brought smallpox with them, starting an epidemic that reduced the island's population to the point where some of the dead were not even buried. The Peruvian labour trade in Polynesians lasted only from 1862 to 1863, during which 93% of those recruited perished.