Situation at date of Treaty of Munster. The extent of the grant. Spain had discovered and explored America: she had discovered, explored, taken possession of, and settled Guiana: she held undisputed control of the Orinoco and of that coveted interior whose famed wealth had been the cause of so many foreign expeditions uselessly undertaken, and of so much blood uselessly spilt: the key to that interior was in her hands-alone: into the great interior Cuyuni Mazaruni basin she had pushed her roads and extended her conquests; and the entrancethe only entrance-to it, over the gentle rolling savannas of the Orinoco, was in her keeping: the Essequibo itself she had settled, cultivated, fortified: for the moment she had left its mouth unoccupied, thus permitting the Dutch to trade there: upon the restoration of peace she gave them a title to territory which up to that time. they had held as mere trespassers. The extent of this grant cannot be difficult to define: the entire Dutch colony, if indeed it might be dignified by such a name, consisted of a body of two or three dozen unmarried employés of the West India Company, housed in a fort on a small island, and engaged in traffic with the Indians for the dyes of the forest: at the time when the treaty was signed, they were not cultivating an acre of land. This and an establishment on the Berbice were the only Dutch settlements in Guiana in 1648. Neither then, nor at any time prior thereto, had the Dutch occupied or settled a foot of ground west of their Essequibo post.† *The only other avocation mentioned is that of fishing: one Jan van Opstall, an employé of the Company in Essequibo, in 1644, complained of the loss of a finger while fishing for the Company, and asked compensation, but the Company could not find this in the contract. The fishing was probably for the food supply of the post-as often later. [U. S. Commission, Report, i, 192.] Such as it was, the post on the Essequibo remained in 1648, as it had always been, the westernmost establishment of the Dutch on this coast, and was now, with the exception of Berbice, their only Guiana colony. [U. S. Commission, Report, i, 193.] VI.—HISTORY OF THE ESSEQUIBO DUTCH POST. 1648-1674. Dutch West India Charter re The charter of the Dutch West India Company hav ing expired in 1645, was in 1647 renewed for 25 years newed 1647. more.* But the West India Company was not founded for the sake of Guiana: that region always constituted its most insignificant field.+ Its main business was priva teering. The peace with Spain therefore took from it its principal source of revenue; and the company, after the peace of Westphalia (Treaty of Munster), found itself in great danger of coming to an end.§ The care of the Essequibo post was in the hands of the Zeeland Chamber of the Company, and for some years they struggled along hardly keeping their heads above water. The hope of recovering Brazil sustained them; but when that hope was gone, the company was driven to desperate expedients to keep the trade of Essequibo alive. * In thinking the charter "reaffirmed in 1637" the English Blue Book is in error. Granted for 24 years, it did not expire till 1645. Even then it was not at once renewed, for its friends sought strenuously the consolidation of the West India Company with the East, whose charter had also just run out. It was not until July 4, 1647, that the States-General promulgated the intelligence that on March 20 preceding they had prolonged for another quarter-century the charter of the West India Company. The limits were unchanged, and are not restated. [U. S. Commission, Report, i, 102.] Note by Prof. Burr.-Even of their colonies it was by no means the chief. New Netherland by actual figures grew as much in five years as Essequibo in a hundred. Reprisals on Spanish commerce were the great object of the West India Company. The Spanish prizes, taken by the chartered privateers, on a single occasion in 1628, were almost eighty-fold more valuable than the whole amount of exports from New Netherlands for the four preceding years. [Bancroft (G.) History of the United States, 4th ed., Boston, 1839, ii, 277-278.] With the conclusion of a lasting peace with Spain and with the renewal for another quarter century of the Dutch West India Company's charter, one might look for a rapid colonial development. But the company was now robbed of the privateering which had been its leading source of revenue, and bankrupted by the long and fruitless struggle for Brazil. [U. S. Commission, Report, i, 193.] Privateering, the Company's principal source of revenue. Discouragement of the Company. Coast thrown open to colonization. New "liberties and exemptions" offered. In 1656 they determined to try the result of throwing the coast open to colonization. The preamble of the resolution by which this act was accomplished is, of course, merely formal; yet it records the disappointment of the company; and serves to show the little that had been accomplished toward developing the Essequibo. This preamble and the introductory resolution are as follows: Whereas the directors of the Zeeland Chamber of the West India Company, for many years, by all conceivable means and ways, both by its, the Chamber's own means, and by contracting with private persons, have tried, not only to increase its trade and commerce from here to the coasts and islands situate under the charter, but also and especially have made it their aim to further the colonization and agriculture of the aforesaid lands, and yet without such success, results, and fruits as they could have hoped, Therefore, inasmuch as they have found by careful observation and long experience, that not only the islands lying in their district but also the mainland coasts, and especially the Wild Coast, extending from the river Amazon to. degrees northward, are of such situation and soil that one can there cultivate, plant, raise, and gather everything which it has been possible to cultivate and gather in the famous regions of Brazil, yet that there are needed, for the greater increase of population and agriculture, not only persons of reasonable means, skill, and experience, but also all others of lesser condition and ability; they are disposed to offer, and do hereby offer, with the knowledge and approval of the States General of the United Netherlands and of the General Chartered West India Company, in order thereby to encourage each and everyone, these following conditions:* Then follow tempting conditions; which, however, were apparently not tempting enough; for the following year new "liberties and exemptions" had to be offered before colonists could be induced to embark upon the uncertain undertaking.t * Appendix to Case, ii, 28-29. As a result of all these efforts, on March 22, 1657, more than nine years after the treaty of Munster, the first free colonists, to the number of twelve persons, arrived in the Essequibo.* First free colonists 1657. Whether it was that this small number of colonists Zeeland Chamber loath to conwas not sufficient to insure success, or that for other tinue direction of Colony. reasons the Zeeland Chamber felt discouraged at the prospects, the fact is that it shrank from assuming the management of the Colony, and on June 9, 1657, petitioned the provincial Estates of Zeeland to themselves assume its control.+ The Estates of Zeeland did not regard the proposition with favor, and so it fell through.‡ Having been unable to get rid of its load in this direction, the Zeeland Chamber next turned to the Walcheren cities; and, towards the close of 1657, succeeded in inducing Middelburg, Flushing and Vere to assume the risks of the undertaking.§ The cities, however, recognizing the failure of the U. S. Commission, Report, i, 195. From the Provisional Contract between the West India Company (Zeeland Chamber) and the Walcheren Cities, December 24, 1657. The West India Company shall approve and so far as in it lies make effective this agreement, basis, and ordinance whereby the aforesaid cities, together with a committee from the aforesaid directors, are to establish and plant colonies on the continental Wild Coast between the first and the tenth degrees, and that in conformity with the liberties and exemptions granted or to be granted by the Board of Nineteen. To the aforesaid cities, as founders and colonizers of the aforesaid Coast, the States-General shall concede and grant high, middle and low jurisdiction, in order the better to maintain the necessary authority over their subordinates. The sovereignty and supremacy, with all that thereto belongs, remaining nevertheless to the States-General, and to the Company, in so far as the latter is by the charter entitled thereto. From proceedings of committee governing for the Walcheren cities the colony of Nova Zeelandia, Monday, Dec. 24, 1657. -The provisional contract between the cities of Middelburg, Flushing, and Vere, and the Directors, having been submitted for approval, it was approved without change and signed by the respective members of the committee, and is entered in these minutes under date of January 21, 1658, following hereafter. [Appendix to Case, ii, 33–34.] Control assumed by Middelburg, Flushing and Vere. Pomeroon settle efforts theretofore made to establish any settlement on ment planned. the Essequibo itself, looked around for a more promising location; and, disregarding Spanish rights, planned a settlement on the Pomeroon and Moruca rivers. What was actu ally done. Cornelis Goliat, an engineer, was sent out to survey the region and lay out the new colony. Great things were promised. "There was to be a town which should bear the name of Nieuw Middelburg. Above this was to be built an imposing fortress called, after the colony, Nova Zeelandia. Below the town, on the same side of the river, was to stand the House of the Height.'"* These proved to be mere air-castles. What actually happened was this: religion, were The enterprise The buildings planned were begun, but never completed; probably nothing was done beyond laying some of the foundations.† A few Portuguese Jew sugarplanters, driven from Brazil for their induced to settle on the Pomeroon. was neglected and soon languished. In September, 1660, the Jews complained, asking "whether the Commissioners [directors] propose to attend to the colony, since, if otherwise, they intended to depart and abandon it." In this same year, Vere was unable to pay its stipulated share of the costs. Before the end of 1663 the Managing Council in Zeeland had become so embarrassed that it broke up altogether.|| * U. S. Commission Report, i, 214–215. Netscher, taking the account from the Ryks Archief, says that they "at once began to fit up or build fort Nova Zeelandia, a few miles up the river, the village of New Middelburg and the Huis ter Hooge, which establishments, however, were probably never completed." [Geschiedenis van Essequebo, etc. 8°, 's Gravenhage, 1888, p. 73.] Netscher (P. M.) Geschiedenis van Essequebo, etc. 8°'s Gravenhage, 1888, pp. 74-75. § Rodway (J.) and Watt (T.) Annals of Guiana. Georgetown, 1888, i, 147. Appendix to Case, ii, 56; see also U. S. Commission Report, i, 215, note 3. |