Dutch conquest of the Banda Islands

The Dutch conquest of the Banda Islands, also called the Banda massacre was a military conquest in 1621 which resulted in the Dutch East India Company occupation of the Banda Islands as well as the severe depopulation of the islands' inhabitants by the fighting, starvation, as well as massacres and deportation by the invaders.

Campaign

Invasion

The Dutch East India Company (known by its Dutch acronym, VOC) fleet from Batavia sailed at the end of 1620.[1] The fleet consisted of 19 ships, 1,655 European troops and 286 Asian auxiliaries, and was led by Governor-General Jan Pieterszoon Coen.[1] On 21 February 1621, The fleet arrived in Fort Nassau, where it was reinforced by the fort's 250-strong garrison and 36 indigenous vessels.[2]

After unsuccessfully trying to recruit Englishmen from the nearby Run and Ay islands, Coen began sending scouts to the coastline of Lontor, the main Bandanese island. The reconnaissance took two days, during which some boats came under cannon fire from the native defenders. The scouts found fortified positions along the Southern coast and in the hills and failed to find a possible beachhead. On 7 March, a VOC probing party landed in the island but was repulsed after suffering one dead and four wounded.[3]

On 11 March he ordered a decisive assault. He divided his forces into several groups, which attacked different points in the island. The invaders swiftly captured key strongholds, and by the end of the day the island's northern lowlands and southern promontories. The defenders and local population fled to the hills that made up the island's center, with the Dutch forces in pursuit. By the end of 12 March, the Dutch occupied the whole island, suffering six dead and 27 wounded.[4]

Temporary peace

After the Dutch initial success, Lontor's aristrocracy (orang kaya) sought peace. They offered gifts to Coen and accepted all of the VOC's demand. They agreed to surrender weapons, destroy fortifications, and give up hostages. They promised to pay a portion of their harvest, and sell the remainder exclusively to the VOC at a fixed price. In exchange, the Dutch agreed to give the natives personal freedom, autonomy and the rights to keep practicing Islam.[5][6]

Resumption of hostilities

As peace was agreed between the orang kaya and the VOC, most of the islanders fled to the hills, and began to engage in skirmishes with the Dutch. Coen responded by razing villages and forcing their inhabitants to work for the VOC.[5]

On 21 April, the Dutch extracted, using torture, confessions from the orang kaya that there was a conspiracy against the Dutch.[7] Coen captured at least 789 orang kaya and members of their families, and deported them to Batavia, where some were enslaved.[8][6] He ordered his troops to sweep the island to destroy villages in order to force the surrender of the population.[8] Over the following months, the Dutch and the natives were engaged in fierce fighting. Seeing the destruction caused by the Dutch, many of the defenders chose to die of starvation or from jumping off the cliffs rather than surrender.[6]

According to Coen, "about 2,500" inhabitants died "of hunger and misery or by the sword", "a good party of woman and children" were taken, and not more than 300 escaped.[8] Another account estimated that out of the islands' 15,000 population, only 1,000 survived, including those who lived in or fled to the English-controlled islands of Ay and Run.[8][6] Modern scholars, including Willard Hanna and Vincent C. Loth, estimated that 90 percent of the population were killed, enslaved or deported during the campaign.[9]

Aftermath

After the campaign, the Dutch controlled virtually all of the Banda Islands. The English evacuated the island of Run, and had only intermittent presence on Nailaka. In the 1667 Peace of Breda the English formally gave up all claims to the islands.[1]

The islands were severely depopulated as a result of the campaign. Only about 1,000 out of the 15,000 inhabitants remained.[6] To keep the island productive, the VOC repopulated the islands, mostly with slaves taken from the rest of modern-day Indonesia, India, the coast of China, working under command of Dutch planters (perkeniers).[10] The original natives were also enslaved and were ordered to teach the newcomers about nutmeg and mace agriculture.[11] The treatment of the slaves were severe — the native Bandanese population dropped to one hundred by 1681, and 200 slaves were imported annually to keep the slave population steady at 4,000.[11]

References

Footnotes

  1. 1 2 3 Loth 1995, p. 19.
  2. ↑ Corn 1998, p. 165.
  3. ↑ Corn 1998, p. 165–166.
  4. ↑ Corn 1998, p. 166.
  5. 1 2 Corn 1998, p. 167.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 Loth 1995, p. 18.
  7. ↑ Corn 1998, p. 169.
  8. 1 2 3 4 Corn 1998, p. 170.
  9. ↑ Lape 2000, p. 139.
  10. ↑ Loth 1995, p. 24.
  11. 1 2 van Zanden 1993, p. 77.

Bibliography

  • Corn, Charles (1998). The Scents of Eden: A Narrative of the Spice Trade. New York City: Kodansha International. ISBN 978-1-56836-202-1.
  • Lape, Peter V. (2000). "Political Dynamics and Religious Change in the Late Pre-Colonial Banda Islands, Eastern Indonesia". World Archaeology. Taylor & Francis. 32 (1). JSTOR 125051.
  • Loth, Vincent C. (1995). "Pioneers and Perkeniers: The Banda Islands in the 17th Century". Cakalele. Honolulu, Hawaii: University of Hawaii at Manoa. 6: 13–35.
  • Hanna, Willard A. (1978). Indonesian Banda: Colonialism and Its Aftermath in the Nutmeg Islands. Philadelphia: Institute for the Study of Human Issues. ISBN 978-0-915980-91-8.
  • van Zanden, J. L. (1993). The Rise and Decline of Holland's Economy: Merchant Capitalism and the Labour Market. Manchester University Press. ISBN 978-0-7190-3806-8.
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