Kahi Maluhia (“place of peace”) Columbarium, a place of rest for cremated remains, stands in the center of the historic Episcopal Cemetery at 645 Wainee Street in Lahaina. Designed by Archhitect Uwe H. H. Schulz to reflect ancient Hawaiian concepts, Kahi Maluhia has a floating pavilion roof structure, open corridors from the mountains to the sea, and is finished in Italian granite.The 1,400 Columbarium’s niches, which house individual ash repositories, are of solid bronze. Nameplate plaques are also on display commemorating those whose ashes are buried elsewhere or at sea.

The Columbarium was dedicated as a community facility for use by people of all faiths in 1991, and is managed by Holy Innocents Church.

For more information about niches for ash remains or to place a memorial plaque in the Kahi Maluhia Columbarium, please contact the Church Office at 808-661-4202 or office@holyimaui.org

Among the Earliest To Be Buried in
​Holy​ Innocents Church Cemetery

Paul Nahaolelua (1806–1875)

Paul Nahaolelua was a Hawaiian chief who served many positions in the Kingdom of Hawai’i. He was a schoolmaster  at the Royal School in Kaupo, Maui; District Magistrate and Circuit Judge of Maui; the Royal Postmaster under Kamehameha; deputy to the Governor Kanehoa of Maui; and Governor of Maui in 1852, serving until 1874. Afterward he became president of the legislative assembly and later Minister of Finance. He married Helekunihi and had one son Obed, who died shortly after birth. They adopted Helekunihi’s nephew, Edward George Huakini “Kia”, son of her brother Aki and his wife, Kaaiohelo. Edward would be known as Kia Nahaolelua.

Henry Dickenson (died October 29, 1876)

In the 1830’s, Hawaii emerged as the principal stopover for whaling and Lahaina developed into an important

whaling town. By the 1840’s, the whaling industry’s dominance subsided. At mid- century, sugarcane emerged as the prominent crop and economic driver.

In 1859, Henry Dickenson began a sugar plantation in Hanaka`o`o and the success of the Lahaina Sugar Company led to growth of a second plantation, on vast acreages to the south, run by Pioneer Mill. Pioneer Mill established a mill near the present Lahainaluna Road and a railroad, which traveled north from the mill to a point north of the Villages of Leiali`i.

In 1874, a lot was purchased from Henry Dickinson on the corner of Prison and Front Streets for $600 and a new Holy Innocents Church and St. Cross School were built there. The new church was consecrated on January 1, 1875 and Governor Nahalelua was confirmed that day.

The English stained glass windows above the altar at Holy Innocents were a memorial to Dickenson. The windows are all that remain from the former church on Front Street. The triptych portrays the baptism, crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Rev. Cooper Searle (1820–1876)

Cooper Searle was an Episcopalian Priest ordained in England and originally sent to Tasmania by the Church to pay penance for his indebtedness to creditors in England. Rev Searle arrived in Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania) in August 1842 and held positions as a Catechist and Religious Instructor and schoolmaster.

In 1853, the Bishop of Melbourne appointed Rev. Searle as Lay Reader in the Diocese of Melbourne. In December 1854 he was ordained as Episcopal Deacon at Cathedral Church of St. James in Melbourne. The peripatetic Reverend served in Bendigo in 1858 during the Gold Rush, and also in Ballarat, but he resigned from his last position because of certain charges that were brought against him in 1860. He became a Minister at a school for 81 boys and 57 girls, but resigned because of ill health. In November 1864 he had a document of indebtedness served by 19 creditors totaling in excess of £222.

In July 1870, he wrote to his daughter ‘Nelly’, Sarah Ellen Cooper (Searle) Greaves from his hotel room in Sydney prior to his sailing, with his 2 sons (Richard 21 and John 9) for Hawaii, whereas his wife, Elizabeth and daughters, Sarah Ellen and Annie stayed in Australia, living at Glenora, Tasmania. He opened the Waimea School for Boys in Hawaii (which became the Hawaii Preparatory Academy of to-day), and he died in August 1876.

Francis A. Oudinot (1817-71)

 In 1854 or 1855, Captain Edwards of the American whaleship “George Washington,” brought a bundle of choice sugar-cane from Marquesas for Mr. Charles Titcomb, of Hanalai, Kauai. As the ship put into Lahaina first, and the facilities for sending the cane to Kauai were few and far between, he gave them to Consul Chase, who planted some in his garden. Mr. F. A. Oudinot, a resident of Lahaina, known as “Marchal Oudinot,” also planted some of this cane on his premises. From these few plants sprang what is now known as Lahaina cane. It proved to be a remarkably rapid grower, very sweet, and as the leaves dropped off readily, an easy cane to handle and take care of, and in appearance very handsome and attractive.

from “Mark Twain: The Adventures of Samuel L. Clemens” by Jerome Loving;

In real life, Mark Twain encountered in the town of Lahaina the eccentric Francis A. Oudinot, a [native of Kentucky and] Southern sympathizer hiding out from the Civil War. In his lie, he claimed to be a descendant of the famous marshal of Napoleon’s army, Charles Nicolas Oudinot (1767-1847). But he was probably just another “American climant,” a type of liar that Mark Twain would depict as the Duke and the King in his most famous book.

from Kew bulletin, Vol. 7, 1894, p. 419