Akaroa restaurant name an offensive gesture, says writer
A Canterbury restaurant is under fire after an academic claimed its name honours slavery.
Writer and academic Scott Hamilton posted on Twitter claiming the Bully Hayes Restaurant and Bar in the small tourist town of Akaroa is ‘‘a tribute to the most notorious of all the Pacific’s slave traders’’, William ‘‘Bully’’ Hayes.
‘‘It’s a rather offensive gesture . . . It’s as though somebody 100 years in the future would name a restaurant after [the Christchurch mosque shooter],’’ Hamilton told The Press.
Owner Wayne Jones said he had no say in the name as it was chosen by the previous owners who built the restaurant, but he may consider changing it in the future.
Hamilton wrote a book, The Stolen Island, about a group of Pacific Islanders who were taken as slaves in the 1860s. During his research, he learned of Hayes’ actions.
Hamilton, who has a PhD in sociology from the University of Auckland, said he met a Niuean whose family had stories about Bully Hayes abducting and raping their ancestors.
He said Hayes was ‘‘a man who used his power and connections to systematically abuse people’’.
Hamilton said Hayes abducted islanders and sold them to the plantations of Tahiti, Fiji and Queensland.
He said Hayes raped many of the girls and young women he abducted.
‘‘It would be a very good idea for [the restaurant] to change their name.’’
Hamilton suggested the restaurant could be named after Frank Worsley, a New Zealander born in Akaroa who was part of Sir Ernest Shackleton’s famous crew that shipwrecked in
Antarctica in 1915 and survived.
‘‘There’s a real hero from Akaroa, and if you wanted to celebrate the maritime history, how about that guy?’’ Hamilton said.
Jones said he may think about changing the name of the restaurant ‘‘further down the track’’ but at this stage, it was ‘‘not really a story’’.
‘‘The Black Lives Matter [movement] is more important to be thinking about to me.’’ Jones declined to comment further.
The restaurant website does not shy away from Hayes’ notoriety, describing him as a ‘‘smuggler, illegal grog trader, swindler, gun runner and slave trader’’.
It explains an incident where Hayes, described as a ‘‘lovable rogue’’, persuaded a young teenager to sail to Lyttelton with him on the pretence she would be joining a theatrical company in China.
‘‘Bully had other ideas. He was arrested for abduction but talked his way out of trouble, yet again a free man,’’ the website says.
‘‘It’s as though somebody 100 years in the future would name a restaurant after [the Christchurch mosque shooter].’’
Scott Hamilton