S1-E53: Vanuatu: Gifts and Gunfire

When trust unravels in the shallows of a Pacific bay, what begins with trinkets ends with bloodshed.

In August 1774, the HMS Resolution sails along the mountainous coast of Erromango, in what is now Vanuatu. The island offers every promise—lush vegetation, fresh water, and signs of cultivation reaching to the peaks. Yet beneath this welcoming facade, tension simmers.

**A circle of welcome turns to chaos—just offshore, oars are seized, muskets misfire, and a bay earns a new name in smoke and fear. – Click on the image to listen to this episode on YouTube.**

First contact unfolds with caution: a ring of islanders wades into the bay, and Cook’s crew responds with nails, cloth, and medals. But as more armed men appear and the captain signals retreat, an unexpected spark ignites the powder. A seized oar. A misfired musket. Then a volley of spears—and return gunfire from the boats and the ship’s swivel gun.

This episode explores how misunderstanding, fear, and colonial presence escalate into violence within moments. It also asks what it meant to “name” places like Traitors-head—branding memory into geography. Along the way, we glimpse the complex realities of Pacific island life: the absence of canoes mistaken for unreadiness, the power of swimming cultures, and the deep knowledge of land and sea that outsiders so often failed to see.

A brief landing, a brutal moment, a bay forever changed.