Batavia's Graveyard (55 page)

Pass-times
Jeremy Green,
The Loss of the Verenigde Oostindische
Compagnie Retourschip
Batavia,
Western Australia 1629: An Excavation Report and
Catalogue of Artefacts
(Oxford: British Archaeological Reports, 1989), p. 177; Van
Gelder, op. cit., pp. 165–6; M. Barend-van Haeften,
Op Reis met de VOC,
pp.
66, 72.

“Sir Francis Drake . . .”
N. A. M. Rodger,
The Safeguard of
the Sea,
p. 325.

Scarcity of possessions
For example, among the dead of the
Belvliet
(1712), Mattys Roeloffsz left an estate comprising “a little tobacco, a few short
pipes, and some odds and ends, which altogether was sold by public auction . . . for 2
guilders and 10 stuivers” and gunner Steven Dircksz “a linen undershirt and
underpants, a blue-striped undershirt and pants, a watchcoat, an old mattress, an old
woollen shirt, two white shirts, a blue shirt, a pair of new shoes, an old English bonnet,
a handkerchief, a pair of scissors and a knife,” together worth 16 guilders, 18
stuivers. It is unlikely many of the men on the
Batavia
took with them more than
that. Playford,
Carpet of Silver,
pp. 51–2; see also Barend-van Haeften,
Op
Reis met de VOC,
pp. 60, 63.

Cornelisz discusses his ideas
LGB.

Ports of call
Bruijn et al.,
Dutch-Asiatic Shipping,
I,
60–1.

Sierra Leone
Adam Jones (ed.),
West Africa in the Mid-Seventeenth
Century: An Anonymous Dutch Manuscript
(London: African Studies Association, 1994);
Joe Alie,
A New History of Sierra Leone
(London: Macmillan, 1990), pp. 13–37;
V. D. Roeper (ed.),
De Schipbreuk van de
Batavia,
1629
(Zutphen: Walburg
Pers, 1994), p. 15.

Abraham Gerritsz
Verdict on Abraham Gerritsz, JFP 12 Nov 1629 [DB 232];
list of people on board the
Batavia
, nd (1629–30), ARA VOC 1098, fol. 582r. [R
220].

The Wagenspoor, the equator, and the Horse Latitudes
Bruijn et al.,
Dutch-Asiatic
Shipping,
I, p. 65 contains a description of the “cart-track.” Van Gelder,
op. cit., pp. 60, 165–6, discusses fun and games; Green, op. cit., p. 163, describes
the recovery of some of the
Batavia
’s pipes and tongs; the
Batavia
’s
likely route is detailed by Jaap Bruijn and Femme S. Gaastra, “The Dutch East India
Company’s Shipping, 1602–1795, in a Comparative perspective,” in Bruijn and
Gaastra (eds.),
Ships, Sailors and Spices: East India Companies and Their Shipping in
the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries
(Amsterdam: NEHA, 1993), p. 191 and Bruijn,
“Between Batavia and the Cape,” p. 255. For trapped animals, dried feces, and
melted candles, see M. Barend-van Haeften and A. J. Gelderblom, op. cit., pp. 70–1.
On the fear of fire at sea—it was a principal danger in the age of sail—see
Pérez-Mallaína, op. cit., p. 180. On washing in urine, see Rodger,
The Safeguard of
the Sea,
p. 107. On rats, see ibid., p. 70. On lice, see ibid., p. 132,
Ships,
Sailors and Spices
p. 203, Barend-van Haeften and Gelderblom, op. cit., p. 53 and Van
Gelder, op. cit., p. 159. On the Danish cockroach-hunt, see M. Boucher, “The Cape
Passage: Some Observations on Health Hazards Aboard Dutch East Indiamen
Outward-Bound,”
Historia
26 (1981): 24.

Scurvy
On the variety of contemporary treatments for scurvy, see, for
example, the English surgeon John Woodall’s book
The Surgeon’s Mate
(1617). “The use of the iuice of Lemons,” Woodall wrote, “is a precious
medicine and well tried, being sound and good . . . It is to be taken in the morning, two
or three spoonfuls . . . and if you add one spoonefull of Aquavitae thereto to a cold
stomacke, it is the better.” But the same surgeon also saw scurvy as “an
obstruction of the spleen, liver and brain,” and recommended an egg flip as a certain
prophylactic. Other passages in his book suggest that any astringent would be of equal
facility in battling the disease—barley water with cinnamon water was another cure
proposed. J. J. Keevil, C. S. Lloyd, and J. L. S. Coulter,
Medicine and the Navy,
1200–1900
(4 vols., Edinburgh, 1957–1963), I, pp. 220–1. One reason for
the VOC’s reluctance to investigate fruit juices as a possible cure was the
contemporary belief that citrus juices dangerously thickened the blood. F. J. Tickner and
V. C. Medvei, “Scurvy and the Health of European Crews in the Indian Ocean in the
Seventeenth Century,”
Medical History
2 (1958). See also Boucher, op. cit.,
pp. 26, 29–31; for the number of the
Batavia
’s dead, see Pelsaert’s
list of people embarked on board the ship, ARA VOC 1098, fol. 582r [R
220–1].

Sharks
Van Gelder, op. cit., pp. 167–8.

Homosexuality
Pérez-Mallaína, op. cit., pp. 164, 170–1; CR Boxer,
“The Dutch East-Indiamen,” pp. 98–9.

Women on board
On the number of women, see Pelsaert’s list of people
embarked on board the ship, ARA VOC 1098, fol. 582r [R 220–1]. They included Lucretia
and her maid, Zwaantie Hendrix; the
predikant
’s wife, Maria Schepens, three of
her daughters, and her maid, Wybrecht Claasen; a widow, Geertie Willemsz; a young mother
called Mayken Cardoes; and a pregnant girl named Mayken Soers, who were probably the wives
of noncommissioned officers or men among the soldiers or the crew; a French or Walloon
girl, Claudine Patoys; Laurentia Thomas, the corporal’s wife; Janneken Gist, Anneken
Bosschieters, and Anneken Hardens, all of whom were married to gunners; two sisters,
Zussie and Tryntgien Fredericxs (Tryntgien was the chief trumpeter’s wife); and the
wives of the cook, the provost, Pieter Jansz, and Claas Harmanszoon of Magdeburg. On the
VOC’s policy toward women, and encouragement of affairs with the women of the Indies,
see L. Blussé, “The Caryatids of Batavia: Reproduction, Religion and Acculturation
under the VOC,”
Itinerario
7 (1983): 60–1, 62–3, 65, 75; Taylor,
The
Social World of Batavia,
pp. 8, 12–14. The quotation from Jan Coen is cited by
Taylor, p. 12. The quotation from Jacques Specx is cited by Boxer, “The Dutch
East-Indiamen,” p. 100.

Ariaen and Creesje
Confession of Jeronimus Cornelisz, JFP 19 Sep 29 [DB
161].

The fleet at the Cape of Good Hope
The identity of the ships that arrived
in company at the Cape is revealed in a letter written by an anonymous survivor of the
Batavia
on 11 December 1629 and published in the pamphlet
Leyds Veer-Schuyts Praetjen, Tuschen
een Koopman ende Borger van Leyden, Varende van Haarlem nae Leyden
(np [Amsterdam:
Willem Jansz], 1630).

The Cape of Good Hope
The English and Dutch left records of these visits
in the shape of “post-office stones”—slabs of rock that they picked up on
the sea shore and engraved with the names of their ships, their skippers, and the date of
their arrival. Post-office stones had two functions. They marked the spots along the beach
where the crew of each East Indiamen deposited ships’ papers and letters for their
families at home, wrapped in waxed cloth to keep out the rain until a vessel
homeward-bound could find them and take them back to Europe. And they proved the men had
at least reached the Tavern of the Ocean safely—a matter of importance at a time when
it was all too common for ships to vanish without trace on the passage out or home. Often
the evidence of a post-office stone was all there was to show whether a vessel had been
lost in the Indian Ocean or the Atlantic. Cf. R. Raven-Hart,
Before Van Riebeeck:
Callers at South Africa from 1488–1652
(Cape Town: C. Struik, 1967), pp. 116,
207. On the situation at the Cape in 1629, the Hottentots and the wildlife, see ibid., pp.
14–21, 23, 38, 95, 120, 122–4, 175; Bruijn and Gaastra,
Ships, Sailors and
Spices,
p. 192; Boxer,
The Dutch Seaborne Empire 1600–1800,
pp.
242–6. For the fleet’s dates of arrival and departure, see Bruijn et al.,
Dutch-Asiatic
Shipping,
II, 60. For Pelsaert’s landing and the skipper’s drunkenness, see
Confession of Jeronimus Cornelisz, JFP 19 Sep 1629 [DB 161] and Pelsaert’s
“Declaration in short [of] the origin, reason, and towards what intention, Jeronimus
Cornelissen, undermerchant, has resolved to murder all the people, with his several plans,
and in what manner the matter has happened from the beginning to the end,” JFP nd [DB
162–3]. (In the former, the
Assendelft
is mentioned as one of the ships that
Jacobsz visited, but in the latter the vessel in question becomes the
Sardam.
I
prefer the original account.) For the average duration of visits to the Cape in the 1620s,
see Bruijn et al.,
Dutch-Asiatic Shipping,
I, 69. The other vessel in the
Batavia
convoy, the Hoorn chapter’s
jacht, Kleine David,
was bound for Pulicat in
India and does not appear to have called at Table Bay. Bruijn et al.,
Dutch-Asiatic
Shipping,
II, 60–1.

Jacobsz’s dressing-down
According to Pelsaert’s journals, the
skipper “excused himself that on the one hand he had been drunk, and on the other
hand that he did not know that one would take a thing like that so seriously.”
“Declaration in Short,” JFP nd [DB 248].

“ ‘By God . . .’ . . . It was a while before apothecary spoke .
. . ‘And how would you manage that?’ ”
Ibid. and confession of
Jeronimus Cornelisz, JFP 19 Sep 1629 [DB 162].

Chapter 4: Terra Australis Incognita

The only surviving material concerning the beginnings of the
Batavia
mutiny can be found in Pelsaert’s journals. Much of the information was extracted
under torture and—given the potential impact that the mutiny was likely to have on
the
commandeur
’s career—it is unfortunate that there is a total lack of
corroboration. The accuracy of the testimonies recorded thus remains open to question;
nevertheless, the account that emerges from the journals is internally consistent
and—in places—so outrageous that it seems unlikely to be outright
invention.

The beginnings of the
Batavia
mutiny
“Declaration in short
[of] the origin, reason, and towards what intention, Jeronimus Cornelissen, undermerchant,
has resolved to murder all the people . . . ,” JFP nd [DB 248–51]; interrogation
of Jan Hendricxsz, JFP 17 Sep 1629 [DB 178].

“In his journal . . .”
“Declaration in Short” JFP nd
[DB 249–51].

Ariaen Jacobsz’s guilt
It has been suggested, by Philippe Godard, in
The
First and Last Voyage of the
Batavia (Perth: Abrolhos Publishing, nd, c. 1993), pp.
81–5, that Jacobsz was innocent of the crime of mutiny and that events on the
Batavia
were solely the work of Jeronimus Cornelisz and his associates. It is true that the Dutch
authorities were later unable, even with the application of torture, to conclusively
establish the skipper’s involvement in the plot, and it is undoubtedly hard to
explain why a full-fledged mutiny did not break out on board soon after the
Batavia
left the Cape, when the ship was still within easy reach of havens such as Madagascar and
Mauritius. Some have also found it incredible that the skipper should allow Pelsaert to
survive the open boat voyage he and Jacobsz undertook after the wrecking of the ship. See
chapters 6 and 9 for a further discussion of these points. The case in favor of
Jacobsz’s guilt, which I tend to accept, lies in the allegations made by known
mutineers during their later interrogations. Jacobsz was accused of plotting mutiny by Jan
Hendricxsz and Allert Janssen as well as Jeronimus Cornelisz, and whispers of his
complicity reached both the
predikant
and the
commandeur.
None of these men,
with the exception of Pelsaert and Cornelisz, had much to gain by implicating the skipper,
and their accounts are strikingly consistent. In the absence of records of Jacobsz’s
interrogation at Batavia, which seem to have been lost, the matter will remain for ever
unresolved. Interrogation of Jan Hendricxsz, JFP 19 Sep 1629 [DB 178]; verdict on Allert
Janssen, JFP 28 Sep 1629 [DB 198]; Specx to Gentlemen XVII, 15 Dec 1629, ARA VOC 1009,
cited by Drake-Brockman,
Voyage to Disaster,
pp. 62–3.

“Though it was common for the masters of East Indiamen to chafe . .
.”
As Jan Coen, the greatest of all governors of the Indies, observed of the
VOC’s skippers, “ ‘The months go by,’ they say,” ‘[and] at
sea we are lords and masters, whereas we are only servants in India . . . let us see if we
cannot pick up a rich prize.’ ” Cited by C. R. Boxer, “The Dutch
East-Indiamen: Their Sailors, Their Navigators and Life on Board, 1602–1795,”
The
Mariner’s Mirror
49 (1963): 90.

Jeronimus Cornelisz’s reasons for not returning to the United Provinces
We
do not know what sort of relationship Cornelisz enjoyed with Belijtgen Jacobsdr, or
whether he loved her. The period following the death of a young child is naturally a
traumatic one for any parents, and in addition to the normal feelings of guilt and
despair, there may well have been recriminations between the parents concerning the choice
of a wet nurse for their son and the reasons for the poor state of their business. In
Cornelisz’s absence, Belijtgen was evidently impoverished and she was forced to move
to an alleyway in a much less desirable part of Haarlem (see chapter 9). It is not
unreasonable to suppose that husband and wife may have parted on bad terms.

Conditions for mutiny
Jaap Bruijn and E. S. van Eyck van Heslinga (eds.),
Muiterij,
Oproer en Berechting op de Schepen van de VOC
(Haarlem: De Boer Maritiem, 1980), pp.
7–8, 21–2, 26. For an equivalent study of Spain’s Indiamen, see Pablo
Pérez-Mallaína,
Spain’s Men of the Sea: Daily Life on the Indies Fleets in the
Sixteenth Century
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998), pp. 211–2.
The VOC experienced at least 44 mutinies during its two centuries in business, beginning
with one on board the
Middelburg
in 1611. The
Batavia
mutiny was by far the
bloodiest of them all. The rebellion that bore the closest resemblance to it occurred on
board the ship
Westfriesland
in 1652. This mutiny was led by the upper steersman,
Jacob Arentsen, who, thanks to his deficient navigation, had been passed over for
promotion when the skipper died. Arentsen gathered 60 men around him and plotted to kill
the other officers and sail the ship to Italy. Details of the plot leaked to the loyal
officers on board; the upper-steersman was shot and four of his confederates thrown
overboard. In this case, as in that of the
Batavia,
the presence of women on the
ship was held to be a partial cause of the trouble. On the
Windhond,
in the
eighteenth century, another group planned to seize the ship and turn pirate, and in this
case they actually succeeded.
Muiterij,
pp. 22, 31–4.