Dutch Mauritius

Valdemar II

Banned
Mauretius was Dutch from 1638–1710, but failed to truly colonised the island, and at last gave up and left the Island, what if they had succed in colonising Mauritius?
 
Mauretius was Dutch from 1638–1710, but failed to truly colonised the island, and at last gave up and left the Island, what if they had succed in colonising Mauritius?

When I was back in school I rember arguing with this guy for like 3 years because he wouldn't belive me that Mauritius is in the Indian Ocean and not the Caribbean
 
When I was back in school I rember arguing with this guy for like 3 years because he wouldn't belive me that Mauritius is in the Indian Ocean and not the Caribbean

Wow, that guy sounds like one stubborn SOB :D

Holding Mauritius might enhance the Dutch position for a while, but (assuming they aren't butterflied away) during the Napoleonic Wars Britain would probably still grab it along with the Cape Colony to keep the French from getting it. I doubt the Dutch would get it back afterwards.
 
Holding Mauritius might enhance the Dutch position for a while, but (assuming they aren't butterflied away) during the Napoleonic Wars Britain would probably still grab it along with the Cape Colony to keep the French from getting it. I doubt the Dutch would get it back afterwards.

Why wouldn't they got it back? The British returned most of the Dutch colonies, including the Dutch outposts in India. I suspect the British would hand over the small island to the Dutch, which they would use as a halfway station on route towards Indonesia. This would be so useful wityh the loss of the Cape colony they would probably keep it (as in not sell it to England, like the Indian outposts, Malacca and the goldcoast outposts) and assuming a low butterfly scenario the island would turn into a sort of Netherlands Antilles/Aruba in the Indian ocean.

I don't think a Dutch Mauritius would change anything except butterflies. I don't think it would strengthen the Dutch position in Asia so much we would see a Dutch Indo-China or bigger Dutch India, it isn´t that important. It migth increase Dutch influence in Africa, maybe we could see a Dutch Madagascar, but I still think that is too unlikely.
 
Mauritius was an important stopover for the VOC on the way to the East Indies. Sick crew could be unloaded there, fresh victuals could be acquired, and moreover it was a blessed spot of land on the long journey between the Cape and Batavia. Honestly, I'm surprised that the island wasn't colonized more thoroughly by the Dutch.

A stronger hold on Mauritius would help lower manpower loss on the long journey between Amsterdam and Batavia, and thus probably strengthen the VOC's position in Java and Sumatra. There's a possibility that it could lead to greater Dutch colonization in the Indies (since fewer potential colonists would die on the voyage there), but not so much that it would lead to a Dutch majority on Java or summat.
 
Mauritius was an important stopover for the VOC on the way to the East Indies. Sick crew could be unloaded there, fresh victuals could be acquired, and moreover it was a blessed spot of land on the long journey between the Cape and Batavia. Honestly, I'm surprised that the island wasn't colonized more thoroughly by the Dutch.

I suspect that in the end it was more trouble than it was worth. Most Dutch colonies were created to make money, wether it was spices, slaves, sugar or fur (and various other things of course). Basicly the only Dutch colony that wasn't making money in such way was the cape colony (and maybe the New Netherlands, but that us why the Dutch didn't care for it when they lost it). I suspect that there was nothing of interest in Mauritius and that keeping an outpost running there, would cost more than the losses suffered without it.

A stronger hold on Mauritius would help lower manpower loss on the long journey between Amsterdam and Batavia, and thus probably strengthen the VOC's position in Java and Sumatra. There's a possibility that it could lead to greater Dutch colonization in the Indies (since fewer potential colonists would die on the voyage there), but not so much that it would lead to a Dutch majority on Java or summat.
True, but it would only mean a stronger presence within Indonesia. Maybe that could mean that the Dutch would kick the Portuguese out of Timor and their other colonies their. Or maybe a stronger presence in Malaysi leading to a Dutch Malaysia, but I think that is pushing it. The Netherlands already had Indonesia, it will probably remain Indonesia. No Dutch India or Australia with this POD (although butterflies might mean a Dutch Ceylon, Malyasia or other parts of Asia where the Dutch had been present but had to leave for some reason).

And no, of course this will not lead to a Dutch majority in Indonesia, at best you get a larger Christian part in Indonesia and I even doubt that.
 
I suspect that in the end it was more trouble than it was worth. Most Dutch colonies were created to make money, wether it was spices, slaves, sugar or fur (and various other things of course). Basicly the only Dutch colony that wasn't making money in such way was the cape colony (and maybe the New Netherlands, but that us why the Dutch didn't care for it when they lost it). I suspect that there was nothing of interest in Mauritius and that keeping an outpost running there, would cost more than the losses suffered without it.
Bah, the only reason the New Netherlands and the Cape weren't terribly profitable was because the GWIC and VOC were reluctant to encourage Dutch colonization; for the GWIC, it was because the Lords Nineteen weren't as bright as the Lords Seventeen and had utter confidence that the fur trade alone would support the New Netherlands colony, for the VOC it was because of bad experiences with colonization attempts in the East Indies and the fear that expanded colonization would lead to a de facto break on their trade monopoly in the area due to colonist meddling.

In both cases there were contemporaries who argued that this was daft and that increased manpower overseas would mean increased production, a greater variety of trade goods, and a stronger hold on the colonies.

I would argue that if management had taken a slightly different tack and had encouraged some colonization of the island and imported some materials for a short-term loss, they could've reaped the benefits within a decade by establishing sugar plantations, moderating the harvest of ebony tree bark to sustainable levels, and possibly introducing lemons (or some other citrus fruit) to further diversify the island economy and preserve the well-being of VOC fleets en-route to Batavia or the Cape.

Avoiding the bad luck with drowning governors, escaped slaves, hurricanes and all that whatnot that plaugued OTL Dutch Mauritius would've helped, too.

And no, of course this will not lead to a Dutch majority in Indonesia, at best you get a larger Christian part in Indonesia and I even doubt that.
There is the possibility that a greater Dutch population in Batavia and other VOC outposts would've helped preserve the Indonesian Dutch community moreso than OTL, which has been by-and-large assimilated into a more general Indonesian culture.
 
Why wouldn't they got it back? The British returned most of the Dutch colonies, including the Dutch outposts in India. I suspect the British would hand over the small island to the Dutch, which they would use as a halfway station on route towards Indonesia. This would be so useful wityh the loss of the Cape colony they would probably keep it (as in not sell it to England, like the Indian outposts, Malacca and the goldcoast outposts) and assuming a low butterfly scenario the island would turn into a sort of Netherlands Antilles/Aruba in the Indian ocean.

/snip/

I speculated that the British wouldn't give it back because they would want it as a way station to their own empire in India. But I don't know anything about the history of the Dutch colonies in the Napoleonic wars: did the Dutch government-in-exile have treaties with the British requiring them to return the colonies unless the British bought them?
 
Valdemar II,

I read a book about global trading earlier this year whose currently name escapes me. :( In it however was a discussion regarding the Dutch spice trade and how they managed to gain the level of control they did. It seems it wasn't only a matter of identifying the sources of the spices and then gaining control of them, rather than just being content to plug into the already existing spice trade in the Indian Ocean as the Portuguese had been. The Dutch also developed a faster way to get to and from the spice islands themselves.

First, as we all know, the Dutch developed a better ship with greater endurance which required a smaller crew. The author described it as the 747 of it's day.

Second, the Dutch were to first to discover and exploit the sailing potentials of the Roaring Forties. Everyone else had been swinging north after rounding the Cape, sailing up the coast of Africa, turning east to India, and then crossing the Bay of Bengal to reach the spice entrepots.

The Dutch learned to sail south leaving the Cape and, once they reached the edge of the Roaring Forties, turn east for a fast sprint with constant winds to a point where they'd turn north towards Indonesia. Their outbound trips were significantly faster because of this practice. (It's also why they spotted Australia first, go too far east and you essentially run into it.)

So, what has all this to do with Mauritius? Well, while the island is in the southern part of the Indian Ocean, it's not as far south as the Cape of Good Hope. It also doesn't lay on the Roaring Forties highway the Dutch were using to reach Indonesia. So, setting out from and/or refitting at the Cape allows ships to reach the "highway" faster than they can do from Mauritius and, as far as the Dutch are concerned, reaching Mauritius from the Cape means leaving the highway early or not taking it at all.

Simply put, there isn't enough on Mauritius or about her geographical position that makes the island important enough to colonize. I'd suspect the Dutch colony that did exist for those 80 years or so did so more out of inertia and a fear of losing the territory to another power than anything else.

Eventually, the VOC and others decided the colony wasn't worth the effort and everyone packed up.

I suspect that if the Dutch had managed to maintain a colony there, perhaps in the same manner the Cape was colonized with religious sectarians, Holland may still control the islands to this day. There's no resources that make them particularly attractive and, as I pointed out, their geographical location isn't helpful in either the sail or steam ages.


Bill

P.S. Found the book I mentioned in the beginning of the post: A Splendid Exchange by William Bernstein
 
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Bill,

Fair enough points overall regarding the importance of Mauritius in the scheme of things. I've only just started reading up on the early days of the VOC and the first routes they took, so I guess it makes sense that it'd change over time and they'd start to simply haul across the whole of the Indian Ocean to Batavia once they figured out a fast way to do it.

One small nitpick, though:
(It's also why they spotted Australia first, go too far east and you essentially run into it.)
The first Dutch sighting of Australia was because of a screwed-up survey of the New Guinea coastline, when the Duyfken abruptly turned south, passed through the Torres Strait, and stumbled upon the tip of Terra Australis, which the navigator assumed was an uncharted part of New Guinea.

Nothing at all to do with the usual Cape-Batavia trade routes.
 
The first Dutch sighting of Australia was because of a screwed-up survey of the New Guinea coastline, when the Duyfken abruptly turned south, passed through the Torres Strait, and stumbled upon the tip of Terra Australis, which the navigator assumed was an uncharted part of New Guinea. Nothing at all to do with the usual Cape-Batavia trade routes.


Ofaloaf,

True, but they didn't realize the bit they saw there was attached to the bigger bits they ran into after overshooting on the Roaring Forties for some time.

The Dutch "discovered" Australia a couple of times before putting all the pieces together.


Bill
 
I speculated that the British wouldn't give it back because they would want it as a way station to their own empire in India. But I don't know anything about the history of the Dutch colonies in the Napoleonic wars: did the Dutch government-in-exile have treaties with the British requiring them to return the colonies unless the British bought them?
Well if they really want an island for that purpose, they just keep Ile Bourbon (Reunion) instead along witht the Seychelles.
 
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