Two unpublished reports to King James I, complaining of “wrongs and abuses” perpetrated by the Dutch on English whale-hunters at Spitsbergen and on English merchants and sailors at Pola Run in the Spice Islands. Compiled in 1618 by the Muscovy and East India Companies from letters and statements of the victims.

CULMINATING WITH THE TRANSFER OF MANHATTAN TO ENGLAND

1: 1618. To the Kings most excellent Matie An humble and true declaration of yo[u]r highnes most dutifull Sub[jec]ts, the Gover[er]n[ou]r & Company of Merchants trading unto Muscovia, of the manifest wrongs & abuses done by the Hollanders & Zealanders unto yo[u]r Matie & unto yo[u]r] Mats Sub[jec]ts in Greenland this yeare 1618.

2: To the Kings most Excellent Matie An humble declarac[i]on of yo[u]r highnes most dutifull Subiects the Gov[e]rno[u]r & Company of Merchants of London trading to the East Indies, Of the manifest & unsupportable wrongs & abuses lately done by the Hollanders unto yo[u]r Matie & yo[u]r Mats sayd Sub[jec]ts in the East Indies.

Scribal Manuscript on Paper, approx. 1504 words (Muscovy Company) and 1515 words (East India Company). Written in brown ink in a secretary hand. Folio. [320 x 205 mm]. 5 ½ + 7 ¼ pages written on 4 bifolia (final leaf blank). Pot watermark. The pages lightly squared-up for writing with blind rules. First page a little dusty; old diagonal crease across the upper fore-corner; small dampstain in the extreme upper fore-corner, Disbound, edges uncut, stitch-holes in the gutter and a fragment of thread remaining near the foot. Formerly loosely bound with numerous other scribal tracts of similar date (see below). [London, c. 1618 -

 

The dramatic events at Spitsbergen during the whaling season of June and July 1618 and at the Island of Pola Run (‘Polaroone’) in the Spice Islands from 1616-18 described in these two accounts were the culmination of six years of increasingly fractious relations between English and Dutch merchants and sailors as both nations attempted to secure commercial advantage under the cover of early colonial expansion. The consequences were far-reaching and would culminate half a century later with the English acquisition of Manhattan Island from the Dutch.

 

When news of the events described here arrived in England it caused outrage and almost brought the country to war with the Dutch. The newsletter-writer John Chamberlain wrote to Sir Dudley Carleton, Ambassador at The Hague, on 13 August 1618 of, “lowde speach of yll measure offered by the Hollanders to our people both in the East Indies and in Gronland. Yf matters be so fowle as they are made, yt wilbe hard to reconcile them, and in the mean time yt breeds yll bloude.” (The Letters of John Chamberlain, ed. Norman E. McClure (Philadelphia, 1939), Vol. II, p. 166. Detailed accounts of the events on Spitsbergen and in the East Indies were later published in through original letters and documents by Samuel Purchas in Purchas his Pilgrimes (London, 1625), Book IV, Chapter 8 (Spitsbergen), and Book V, Chapter 3 (East Indies).

 

Of the present documents, one a direct appeal to King James from the Muscovy Company, and the other a direct appeal to King James from the East India company, both otherwise apparently known only in copies in the National Archives; the first is unpublished apart from one paragraph.

 

In combination, these two accounts of Dutch outrages at opposite ends of the earth became part of a process that led to a negotiated settlement with Dutch promises of reparation to the two English Companies. However, these promises would remain unfulfilled until 1667 when it was agreed in the Treaty of Breda that England would surrender its historic claim to the island of Pola Run in return for the island of Manhattan and the Dutch settlement of New Amsterdam, soon to be renamed New York.

 

A lengthy description is available upon request.

 

Stock Code: 246189