The ship Joseph and Theresa, bound for the east coast of Africa, as also for the shores of Malabar, Coromandel, and Bengal, set sail from Leghorn in September, 1776, with a crew of 155 men. Unfavourable winds compelled Bolts to make the Brazilian coast, in order to take in fresh stores. Thence he lay a course for Delagoa Bay, on the S.E. coast of Africa, opposite the island of Madagascar, on which, on 30th March, 1777, he was so unfortunate as to get stranded, when he was compelled to start a portion of his cargo overboard. Bolts, however, turned to excellent account his stay on this coast, having purchased from two African kings, named Mohaar Capell, and Chibauraan Matola, a site of ground on both banks of the river Masoûmo, and, at a total expenditure of 126,267 florins (about £12,600), in which was included the cost of constructing the necessary vessels, founded a factory, for whose protection he also erected two small forts, which he furnished with cannon, and named after his two illustrious patrons, Joseph and Theresa.
After a more protracted stay on the coast of Malabar, where he purchased from the Nabob, the celebrated Hyder
Ali Khan, a number of plots of ground in the vicinity of Mangalore, Carwar, and Balliapatam, the very centre of the pepper trade, and erected a factory at an expense of 28,074 florins (£2800), this enterprising man set sail for the Coromandel Coast and the Bay of Bengal, and about the commencement of 1778 visited the Nicobar Islands, in order there also to found a factory. Unfortunately, of this visit there nowhere survive any detailed particulars, and the only document extant under Bolts' hand, which can throw any light on the subject, is a statement of the expenditure incurred in erecting a fort on the Nicobars, which, together with the purchase of a goëlette, and a snow, or two-masted vessel, for the coasting trade between Madras, Pegu, and the group of islands, amounted to 47,659 fl. 48 kr. (about £4760).
At the close of 1780 Bolts returned to Europe, and in May, 1781, cast anchor in the harbour of Leghorn. His exertions and his speculation had not been attended with the success anticipated, and despite fresh assistance afforded by the Austrian Government to the Association, which at first seemed to promise a more auspicious future for the undertaking, yet the political complications of the period, and especially the sudden, totally unlooked-for rupture of peace between France, England, and Holland, ere long entailed utter ruin on the trading company, which, in the year 1785, found itself compelled to stop payment.[5] Bolts died at Paris in April, 1808, in
utter destitution, and Michaud, in his Biographie Universelle, dedicated an article to this hardy and enterprising, rather than shrewd and prudent, adventurer.[6]
About two years after the appearance of the Austrian ship in the Nicobar Archipelago, the Danes endeavoured to found there a missionary station of Moravian Brothers. Towards the close of 1778 the missionaries, Hänsel and Wangemann, sailed from Tranquebar to Nangkauri, where they arrived in January, 1779. In 1787 the mission at Nangkauri was once more abandoned, when the only surviving Moravian Brother returned to Tranquebar, and shortly after to Europe.
In 1795 an Englishman, Major Symes, touched at Kar-Nicobar, while on his voyage as Envoy to Ava and Burmah. His observations there may be found in the second volume of "Asiatic Researches," p. 344, in an article entitled "Description of Carnicobar."
In 1831, Denmark once more made an attempt to colonize, by means of a missionary enterprise, the group formerly known as New Denmark, and occasionally as Frederick Islands. Pastor Rosen landed in August of that year on the
island of Kamorta, and first set up his establishment on the so-called Frederick Hill, then on the adjoining Mongkata Hill; somewhat later on the island of Trinkut, and lastly on the shore immediately beneath the Mongkata Hill. In December, 1834, after about a four years' stay, Pastor Rosen left the islands, and in 1839 published, at Copenhagen, his own experiences and personal observations, under the title: "Erindringen om mit Ophold paa de Nikobariske Oerne" (Recollections of my Residence on the Nicobar Islands).
In 1835, the Roman Catholic Bishop of the Straits of Malacca dispatched to Kar-Nicobar two French missionaries, the Fathers Chopard and Borie. But after a certain lapse of time, during which their missionary efforts gave promise of the most pleasing results, and when they had lived about a year on the island, the pious work fell through, owing to the credulity and prejudices of the natives, to whom the two missionaries were represented by the crew of a ship from the adjacent shores of the continent as English spies, whose object probably was to ascertain the products of the country, which thereupon would speedily be annexed by the English Government. The missionaries had to flee, and Borie expired in the arms of his companion before he could get off the island. Chopard afterwards, in the year 1849, published his adventures in this group of islands in the "Asiatic Journal of the Indian Archipelago," under the title, "A few Particulars respecting the Nicobar Islands."