Coen also sets about establishing a monopoly…
1621 CE
Coen also sets about establishing a monopoly over the trade in nutmeg and mace, which can be obtained only from the Banda Islands.
The inhabitants of Banda have been selling the spices to the English, despite contracts with the VOC which oblige them to sell only to the VOC, at low prices.
He leads an armed expedition in 1621 to Banda, taking the island of Lonthor by force after encountering some fierce resistance, mostly by cannons that the natives have acquired from the English.
The orang kaya are forced at gunpoint to sign an unfeasibly arduous treaty, one that will in fact be impossible to keep, thus providing Coen an excuse to use superior Dutch force against the Bandanese.
The Dutch quickly note a number of alleged violations of the new treaty, in response to which Coen launches a punitive massacre.
Japanese mercenaries are hired to deal with the orang kaya, forty of whom are beheaded with their heads impaled and displayed on bamboo spears.
A large number of the inhabitants are killed or exiled to other islands.
The population of the Banda Islands prior to Dutch conquest is generally estimated to have been around thirteen thousand to fifteen thousand people, some of whom were Malay and Javanese traders, as well as Chinese and Arabs.
The actual numbers of Bandanese who were killed, forcibly expelled or fled the islands in 1621 remain uncertain.
Most survivors flee as refugees to the islands of their trading partners, in particular Keffing and Guli Guli in the Seram Laut chain and Kei Besar.
Shipments of surviving Bandanese are also sent to Batavia (Jakarta) to work as slaves in developing the city and its fortress.
Some five hundred and thirty of these individuals will later be returned to the islands because of their much-needed expertise in nutmeg cultivation (something sorely lacking among newly arrived Dutch settlers).
Whereas up until this point the Dutch presence has been simply as traders, that has sometimes been treaty-based, the Banda conquest marks the start of the first overt colonial rule in Indonesia, albeit under the auspices of the VOC.
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