The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 — Volume 18 of 55 / 1617-1620 / Explorations by Early Navigators, Descriptions of the Islands and Their Peoples, Their History and Records of the Catholic Missions, as Related in Contemporaneous Books and Manuscripts, Showing the Political, Economic, Commercial and Religious Conditions of Those Islands from Their Earliest Relations with European Nations to the Close of the Nineteenth Century

by Unknown

Dutch Factories and Posts in the Orient

Account of the factories, and the posts garrisoned with infantry and artillery, that the Dutch enemies maintain in the islands of the East.

Item. From these factories are taken food and other provisions for Maluco, and a ship of a thousand toneladas of pepper every year.

Item. In the island of Caramandel they maintain two factories without a garrison. One of them is in the port and country of Achen,[1] and the other in the same island, which is called Chambi. There is sent from these factories a shipload of a thousand toneladas of pepper, gold, and jewels.

Item. In Negapatan they have a factory, without a garrison; from it are carried cloths, which the Terrenate Indians of Maluco wear.

Item. In the island of Jor[2] there is at present one factory, without a garrison; and 400 bares of pepper are shipped from it every year. A bare [i.e., bahar] is known to contain 600 libras.

Item. In Patane there is a factory, without a garrison; from it are shipped glazed earthenware, silk, and various drugs which come from China, and one shipload of more than 600 toneladas of pepper each year.

Item. In Cian [i.e., Siam] they have a factory, without a garrison; from it are carried jewels and various drugs of much value.

Item. In Borneo they have a factory, without a garrison. Thence are sent gold, jewels, and camphor.

Item. In Japon they have a factory, without a garrison. Thence are shipped military supplies and provisions for Maluco; and thus the Dutch greatly hinder the progress of Christianity in that country.

Item. In Macazar they had two factories; but have removed them thence because the king and the natives do not get along well with them.

Item. In the island of Banda they have a garrison, with artillery and troops. They gather there Masatrella nutmegs to the amount of more than 1,600 bares each year.

Item. In the island of Caramandel they have a fortress with a garrison and two factories, one called Masapotamia,[3] and the other Petapulli; from them is carried cloth to trade and barter in Maluco.

Item. In the island of Bachan they have a garrisoned fortress; more than a hundred bares of cloves are shipped thence each year.

Item. In the island of Maquian they have three garrisoned fortresses; and 1,200 bares of cloves are gathered there each year.

Item. In the island of Mutiel they have a garrisoned fortress. From this island they ship more than 350 bares of cloves each year.

Item. In the island of Tidore they have a garrisoned fortress, and his Majesty has another. The whole island yields each year about 600 bares of cloves, of which half, or a little less, is secured by the Dutch.

Item. In the island of Terrenate they have two garrisoned fortresses, and his Majesty has one. The island yields each year more than 700 bares of cloves; and the profitable part of it is gathered by the Dutch, as they have friendly relations with the natives, while his Majesty obtains never a pound—although it is true that the greater part is lost through war.

From these islands—Bachan, Maquian, Motiel, Tidore, and Terrenate—which are the ones that Don Pedro de Acuña won back and left in peace and quiet, with an amply sufficient garrison to maintain them, the enemy enjoys and obtains each year nearly two million pesos in profit. The reason for this loss to us was that, on account of Don Pedro’s death, so many quarrels arose between his adherents and those of the Audiencia that they spent all the time in making war against each other with ink and paper. In the meantime the enemy fortified themselves in Malayo, and took possession of the island of Maquian, and those of Motiel and Bachan, and the other ports which they now hold, without its costing them a drop of blood. But this burnened us with much ignominy; for we—being occupied in wasting paper and ink in lawsuits, which have continued to this day—both by this loss and that other which first arose from the dismantling of a fort in Mindanao which had been built in the port of La Caldera, have given the enemy an opportunity to take possession of so large a part of these islands. And the worst is, that these factions are lasting to this very day, and are causing the many losses and the great expenses which your Majesty now incurs; and these hatreds will not be lacking, for they are so deeply rooted. It is for us to apply a check to them, for from them has sprung the loss of respect to whomsoever should have it, and thence have come to this court reports so sinister.

What is recounted in this relation is from the mouth of General Pablos Blancar, who was our prisoner in Terrenate. Being grateful for the good treatment which he had and received from my hand, he gave me this, assuring me that it was altogether true; and I even agree with what he said, for, being disgusted with his countrymen because they did not help him, and feeling grateful for the friendship which he personally received in my house, he told me—as it were, in payment for that, and by way of vengeance on his own countrymen—all that I have recounted. As for the failures to serve your Majesty on the part of our people, I have restrained myself in many respects, for they are more important than I can express; but I advised Señor Don Diego de Ybarra of them in the year 1617. I am certain of everything which happened there, as I was present there in person, and saw these things with my own eyes, being in those islands as captain and sargento-mayor, and governing them in the absence of Don Jeronimo de Silva.[4]

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[1] Achen is at the northwest extremity of Sumatra, and Jambi is a state in the northeast part of the same island. Sumatra is the principal source of the black pepper of commerce. See articles “Sumatra,” “Jambi,” and “Pepper,” in Crawfurd’s Dictionary of Indian Islands. Negapatan is on the eastern coast of Hindustan, not far from Cape Comorin.

[2] Better known by its modern name of Johor; it is the Malay state at the southern end of the Malayan peninsula, and the British territory of Malacca and the Malay state of Pahang lie north of it. The town of Johor was founded in 1511, by the Malays who were then expelled from Malacca by the Portuguese. Johor was not an island, but part of the mainland: the text probably refers to one of the islands off its coast on which a Dutch post may have been located; some of these islands are still possessed by the Dutch.

[3] Apparently a corruption of the name Masulipatam, a city on the Coromandel coast of India—not, as Heredia calls it, an island.

[4] This last paragraph decides the authorship of this document, plainly indicating that of Pedro de Heredia, who filled the post he mentions in the last sentence, and captured the Dutch commander van Caerden.