Colony of New Netherland

Colonial province of the Seven United Netherlands located on the East Coast of North America.

• Coat of arms/Flag
• Capital – New Amsterdam
• Other Settlements –
• Languages –
  Dutch
• Religion(s) –
  Dutch Reformed
• Government –
• Legislature –
• Current Ruler –
• Other Notable residents –William Kidd

With settlements including New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Connecticut, with small outposts in Pennsylvania and Rhode Island. Conceived as a private business venture to exploit the North American fur trade. New Netherland was settled rather slowly, partially as a result of policy mismanagement by the Dutch West India Company and partially as a result of conflicts with Native Americans. The settlement of New Sweden encroached on its southern flank, while its northern border was re-drawn to accommodate an expanding New England. The colony experienced dramatic growth and became a major port for trade in the North Atlantic. The inhabitants are not necessarily Dutch, the term New Netherland Dutch all who have settled here including enslaved laborers and the Native Americans who quickly integrated to the society.

The Republic has become a haven to many intellectuals, businessmen, and religious refugees fleeing oppression as well as home to the world’s major ports in the newly developing global economy.

The capital of the province is the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the North River. They traded goods with the local population and reported they had purchased it, as is company policy. With a Fort at its southern tip know as “The Manhattoes”. The port city outside the walls of the fort, New Amsterdam, has become a major hub for trade between North America, the Caribbean and Europe. Sanctioned privateering has also contributed to its growth.

Willem Kieft became Director of New Netherland though the colony had grown somewhat before his arrival, it did not flourish, and Kieft was under pressure to cut costs. At this time a large number of Indian tribes who had signed mutual defense treaties with the Dutch were gathering near the colony due to widespread warfare and dislocation among the tribes to the north. At first he suggested collecting tribute as was common among the various dominant tribes, but his demands to the Tappan and Wecquaesgeek were simply ignored. Subsequently, when a colonist was murdered in an act of revenge for some killings that had taken place years earlier and the Indians refused to turn over the perpetrator, Kieft suggested they be taught a lesson by ransacking their villages. In an attempt to gain public support he created a citizens commission, the Council of Twelve Men. They did not, as was expected, rubber-stamp his ideas, but took the opportunity to mention grievances that they had with company’s mismanagement and its unresponsiveness to their suggestions. Kieft thanked and disbanded them, and against their advice ordered that groups of Tappan and Wecquaesgeek (who had sought refuge from their more powerful Mahican enemies, per their treaty understandings with the Dutch) be attacked at Pavonia and Corlear’s Hook. The massacre left 130 dead. Within days the surrounding tribes, in a unique move, united and rampaged the countryside, forcing settlers who escaped to find safety at Fort Amsterdam. For two years, a series of raids and reprisals raged across the province, until  Kieft’s War ended with a treaty. Disenchanted with the previous governor, his ignorance of indigenous peoples, the unresponsiveness of the VOC to their rights and requests, the colonists submitted to the States General the Remonstrance of New Netherland. This document condemned the VOC for mismanagement and demanded full rights as citizens of province of the Netherlands.

Director-General of Petrus Stuyvesant arrived in New Amsterdam the only governor of the colony to be called Director-General. Some years earlier land ownership policy was liberalized and trading was somewhat deregulated, and many New Netherlanders considered themselves entrepreneurs in a free market. During the period of his governorship the province experienced exponential growth. Demands were made upon Stuyvesant from all sides: the West India Company, the States General, and the New Netherlanders. Dutch territory was being nibbled at by the English to the north and the Swedes to the south, while in the heart of the province the Esopus were trying to contain further Dutch expansion. Discontent in New Amsterdam led locals to dispatch Adriaen van der Donck back to the United Provinces to seek redress. After nearly three years of legal and political wrangling, the Dutch Government granted the colony a measure of self-government and recalled Stuyvesant. However, the orders were rescinded with the outbreak of the First Anglo-Dutch War a month later. Military battles were occurring in the Caribbean and along the South Atlantic coast. In 1654, the Netherlands lost New Holland in Brazil to the Portuguese, encouraging some of its residents to emigrate north and making the North American colonies more appealing to some investors. The Esopus Wars are so named for the branch of Lenape that lived around Wiltwijck, which was the Dutch settlement on the west bank of Hudson River between Beverwyk and New Amsterdam. These conflicts were generally over settlement of land by New Netherlanders for which contracts had not been clarified, and were seen by the natives as an unwanted incursion into their territory. Previously, the Esopus, a clan of the Munsee Lenape, had much less contact with the River Indians and the Mohawks.

Society

The Dutch West India Company introduced slavery with the importation of slaves who worked as farmers, fur traders, and builders. Although enslaved, they had a few basic rights and families were kept intact. They can testify in court, sign legal documents, and bring civil actions against others. They are permitted to work after hours earning wages equal to those of other workers. The founding document of the Dutch Republic, stated “that everyone shall remain free in religion and that no one may be persecuted or investigated because of religion”. The Dutch settlers still maintain and recognised the laws of Holland which allows outlawed religious leaders, to take refuge in New Netherland. An example of Dutch rule prevailing is the official granting of full residency for dwarves in New Amsterdam.

Incursions

South River apart from the fort and the small community that supported it, settlement along the rivier was limited. The Dutch knew they would be unable to defend the southern flank of their North American territory and had not signed treaties with or purchased land from the natives. After gaining the support vikings chose the southern banks of the Delaware Bay to establish a colony calling it New Sweden. As expected, the government at New Amsterdam took no other action than to protest. Other settlements sprang up as the colony grew, mostly populated by Swedes, Finns, Germans, and Dutch. Fort Nassau was dismantled and relocated in an attempt to disrupt trade and reassert control, receiving the name Fort Casimir. Fort Beversreede was built in the same year, but was short-lived. Stuyvesant led a military expedition and regained control of the region, calling its main town “New Amstel”. During this expedition, some villages and plantations at the Manhattans (Pavonia and Staten Island) were attacked in an incident that is known as the Peach Tree War. These raids are sometimes considered revenge for the murder of an Indian girl attempting to pluck a peach, though it was likely that they were a retaliation for the attacks at New Sweden. A new experimental settlement was begun Franciscus van den Enden had drawn up charter for a utopian society that included equal education of all classes, joint ownership of property, and a democratically elected government. Pieter Corneliszoon Plockhoy attempted such a settlement near the site of Zwaanendael. The border with New England had been adjusted to 50 miles west of the Fresh River, while the Lange Eylandt towns west of Oyster Bay were under Dutch jurisdiction.

Few settlers to New Netherland made the Fresh River their home. English settlers from the Massachusetts Bay Colony began to settle along its banks some with the permission from the colonial government, and others with complete disregard for it. Developing simultaneously with that of New Netherland, the English colonies grew more rapidly. Initially there was limited contact between New Englanders and New Netherlanders, but with a swelling English population and territorial disputes the two provinces engaged in direct diplomatic relations. The New England Confederation was formed as a political and military alliance of the English colonies of Massachusetts, Plymouth, Connecticut, and New Haven. The latter two were actually on land claimed by the United Provinces, but the Dutch, unable to populate or militarily defend their territorial claim, could do nothing but protest the growing flood of English settlers.

The king of England resolved to conqure New Netherland, four English frigates, sailed into New Amsterdam’s harbor and demanded New Netherland’s surrender. They met no resistance because numerous citizens’ requests for protection by a suitable Dutch garrison against “the deplorable and tragic massacres” by the natives had gone unheeded. That lack of adequate fortification, ammunition, and manpower as well as the indifference from the West India Company to previous pleas for reinforcement of men and ships against, threats, encroachments and invasions of the English neighbors made New Amsterdam defenseless. In the Articles of Transfer, they secured the principle of religious tolerance under English rule. Although largely observed, the Articles were immediately violated by the English along the Delaware River, where pillaging, looting, and arson were undertaken under the orders of English Colonel Richard Carr who had been dispatched to secure the valley. Many Dutch settlers were sold into slavery in Virginia and an entire settlement was wiped out. Within six years the nations were again at war and the Dutch recaptured New Netherland with a fleet of ships. Nevertheless, after the conclusion of the war the historic “disaster years” in which the Dutch Republic was simultaneously attacked by the French, English, andothers had left the republic was financially bankrupt. The States of Zeeland had tried to convince the States of Holland to take on the responsibility for the New Netherland province, but to no avail.