Run for Manhattan
- Ameya Bagde
- Nov 11, 2020
- 4 min read
A regular Joe at the start of 16th century New-York would find himself in the new world trading outpost of lovely New - Amsterdam. He would wake up in a wonderfully cosmopolitan place, rich with beliefs and cultures dissimilar to his own.
He might head to his job at Fort Orange at the tip of the island of Manhattan to work as a trader in charge of a charter, or work at the ports as a stevedore, loading the grand dutch trading vessels with beaver skin, a highly profitable material at the time. After his shift, he would probably visit the 'Stadt Huys' for a drink before heading home. He would have dinner, chat with his family and then tuck his children in bed, singing them Trip a Trop a Tronjes (“The Father’s Knee is a Throne”) a rhyme still sung in the schools belonging to that wealthy and influential part of the world.
This would all change on a fateful Monday, 8 September 1664 when the English invasion would succeed and the town's governor, Peter Stuyvesant, would surrender the Dutch rights to New Amsterdam. The English would gain a foothold in the then New Netherlands (parts of, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Connecticut, with small outposts in Pennsylvania and Rhode Island), not out of the usual motivations of colonialism but out of a sense for vengeance.
This thirst for vengeance was borne out of a massacre which happened four decades earlier, in the opposite corner of the world. The Dutch East India Company had committed a series of heinous crimes on the island of Amboyna, now Ambon (present day Indonesia), against 10 Englishmen, 10 Japanese and a Portuguese. This massacre of 1624 was carried under the dubious pretext of the Local Dutch Governor, Herman van Speult, that the English traders with the help of the Japanese mercenaries, were plotting to assassinate him. Under this pretext, the governor carried out acts of torture forcing false testimonies furthering the plight of the accused.
The acts of torture captured as follows..
"They hoisted him up againe as before, and then burnt him with lighted candles in the bottome of his feete, until the fat dropt out the candles; yet then applyed they fresh lights unto him. They burnt him also under the elbowes, and the palmes of the hands, likewise under the arme-pits, until his inwards might evidently be seene"
Angered by these acts and the rivalry aggravated by the first two Anglo-dutch wars, James, Duke of York and King Charles II's brother, ordered the capture of New Amsterdam. Thus, critically altering the life of our regular Joe whose home would be promptly renamed as New York.
The English didn't stop there; they sent a convoy to claim the nutmeg laden island of Run from the Dutch as was promised to them in the Treaty of Westminster of 1654 (The treaty interestingly also promised reparations of 4000 pounds for the victims of Amboyna). Although, this liberation wouldn't last and Run would fall in Dutch hands a few months later.
The island of Run had been the centrepiece of the entire Anglo-Dutch conflict. A crown jewel of the trading scenes in the 17th century, The island was the premier source of nutmeg, a spice believed to hold medicinal properties to treat the plague. Evidently, it was as sought after as gold, and merchants from all over the world set out for Run to make enormous fortunes. The island did fulfil those aspirations while sparking numerous conflicts, one of them being the Anglo-Dutch wars.
The English capture of New Amsterdam sparkled the flames for the Third Anglo Dutch War. The war lasted two years, from 1665 to 1667, and with no conclusion in sight, it was agreed that in March 1667, the two parties should meet in Breda (in current day, Netherlands) to resolve their differences. A work of exquisite diplomacy, the Treaty of Breda tactfully named none of the islands (Run and Manhattan) that had been the centrepieces of the Anglo-Dutch Rivalry.
The treaty proclaimed..
"Both parties shall keep and possess herafter, with plenary right of sovereignty, propriety and possession, all such lands, islands, cities, forts, places and colonies...[as] they have by force of arms, or any other way whatsoever, gotten and detained from the other party"
Thus, New Amsterdam, now called New York, was reclaimed by the English and the Island of Run was retained by The Dutch Empire. The fate of the island of Run withered away in the following decades as nutmeg trees were planted in formal British colonies of Ceylon, Pinang, Bencoolen and Singapore. Juxtapose to that, the modest settlement under the English banner ended up becoming a premier financial center, and the biggest city in America by the 1776 War of Independence.
It's been over 300 years since the Treaty of Breda and today the island of Manhattan and the adjacent state of New York, serves the United States of America. Still, the Dutch heritage is vibrant enough to be seen if one chooses too. The names of Harlem, Brooklyn and Wall Street all are based on the dutch words Haarlem, Breukelen and Waal Straat. The Bowery, a busy street laden with cocktail bars was once called the Bouwerij literally translating to "farm" pointing out to pasture fields that once existed there.
The politicians present on that fateful day in 1667, could've hardly realized the gravity of the document they were signing, and the impact it would have on the history of their respective empires and the world. This simple notion, speaks volumes about how history is not just driven by haughty emperors, and their grand empires and conquests but, many times, small islands in far away worlds who happen to have just the right dainty plant growing on its shores.
Suggested reading if you want know more about the Treaty of Breda:
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