WI: Dutch Jamaica

As the tin says, what if the Dutch captured Jamaica from Spain instead of the English during the 1600s? What impact would this have on Dutch colonial ventures and on the Dutch navy?
 
Things are a bit dicey early on (Anglo-Dutch Wars). But that's settled pretty much "amicably" with the Dutch keeping Jamaica. I'm not sure having Jamaica undoes the surpassing of the Dutch by the British under William III, and by 1780 (another Anglo Dutch War) or the Napoleonic Wars it's likely that Jamaica might be given up (though the Dutch did hold the Antilles).
 
Would the Dutch be making a move on Jamaica in 1655 like the English did OTL? If that is the case then if the Dutch switched their focus from continental North America to the Caribbean then it would be quite interesting.
 
Would the Dutch be making a move on Jamaica in 1655 like the English did OTL? If that is the case then if the Dutch switched their focus from continental North America to the Caribbean then it would be quite interesting.

Well during the early 1600s the Dutch were at war with Spain and held on to Brazil for a couple decades as a result.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_Brazil

If the Dutch took Jamaica during this period, it might help soften the blow from losing Brazil in 1654.
 
Absolutely. If the Dutch invested in Jamaica like the British did OTL then they could potentially make quite a bit of money. Jamaica was the leading sugar exporter at one time from the sources that I have found. However, would they be willing to pass up on the fur trade on continental North America for the sugar trade out of the Caribbean?
 
The Dutch actually wound up giving up Nieuw Amsterdam for the Spice Islands, so they'd surely want to keep Jamaica.(I'd be curious if there were any beaver left in the Hudson valley by 1660). I'm just not sure what they'd have to give up further down the road: 1780s or Post Napoleonic War.
 
According to one source that I found, there was little to no sign of beaver from the Hudson River west to the Genesee River around the year 1640. The price of beaver skins dropped during the 1700's and beaver skin apparel was going out of style.
 
According to one source that I found, there was little to no sign of beaver from the Hudson River west to the Genesee River around the year 1640. The price of beaver skins dropped during the 1700's and beaver skin apparel was going out of style.

Seems like sugar would be a better investment
 
Things are a bit dicey early on (Anglo-Dutch Wars). But that's settled pretty much "amicably" with the Dutch keeping Jamaica.
The second and third Anglo-Dutch wars were basicly Dutch victories, so I assume Jamaica will be safe.
I'm not sure having Jamaica undoes the surpassing of the Dutch by the British under William III,
I have no idea what you mean by this, but I see no reason why the Netherlands would lose any colonies when they conquer England. Ok they were invited, so it wan't truly conquering England, yet my point still stands, why would the Netherlands lose Jamaica during the glorious revolution?
and by 1780 (another Anglo Dutch War)
The only colony lost by the Dutch after the 4th Anglo-Dutch war was a minor outpost in India. All other colonies were restored. I expect the same with Jamaica, assuming the British were able to conquer it, possible but not certain (obviously assuming the 4th Anglo-Dutch war isn't butterflied away).
or the Napoleonic Wars it's likely that Jamaica might be given up (though the Dutch did hold the Antilles).
Assuming these events aren't butterflied away (likely), you have to realise that most colonies were restored after the Napoleonic wars, including the Dutch Indian colonies (as in the Dutch colonies on the subcontinent of India). Only in very specific cases Dutch colonies were annexed by the British, like the Cape colony which was an important halfway station on route to British India, or Guyana, which had a large British population and basicly petitioned to be kept. All other colonies, including the Dutch Antilles, Surinam, Dutch Ghana, Dutch India, Indonesia and Dutch Malaysia were restored. The same will be happening to Jamaica. Those colonies simply weren't as important anymore, like they were a century before.


The Dutch actually wound up giving up Nieuw Amsterdam for the Spice Islands, so they'd surely want to keep Jamaica.(I'd be curious if there were any beaver left in the Hudson valley by 1660).
Actualy untrue. The Dutch traded Surinam for New Amsterdam, not the spice island (Rum I think). Ok 1 spice island, but all the others were already Dutch. It was mainly Surninam.
 
William III actually sort of transferred the Dutch navy to England, so from William III on the Dutch were playing catch-up. I was suggesting that the relative decline in their standing could have altered later treaties. I hadn't looked them up yet, so I was hedging. I also didn't go deeply into the 1780s Anglo-Dutch war, so I wanted to check on that as well. I'm good with your explanation.
 
The Dutch interests in the Western hemisphere and West Africa were controlled by the WIC a for profit company of shareholders with its own fleet of warships. Because it was controlled by shareholders, the company was much more calculated in its colonisation than say the Spaniards or Portuguese, and was driven soley by profit. In 1621 when Spain ended the Twelve-Year Truce with the United Provinces, the Netherlands were out of supplies of sugar and salt for herring, both of which had come from Portugal and Portuguese-controlled Brazil. During the truce, the Dutch had agreed that they would not establish colonies in the Americas, and they kept their word. The Dutch initially returned to the salt pans of Venezuela, but these were flooded by the Spaniards in 1632, and so they colonised Sint Maarten for the salt. In 1634-1636 they occupied the ABC islands which had been abandoned by the Spanish simply as a way to engage in contraband trade with Spanish Venezuela.

It was never as successful as the VOC in the East Indies and it is important to remember that they did not have as much success against the Spaniards in the Caribbean, and attempts to attack Puerto Rico failed. It's biggest victory was in 1628 when it captured a Spanish silver fleet at Matanzas. The company wanted sugar and initially attacked Salvador, in Brazil but was repulsed. In 1630 it managed to conquer lesser populated Northeastern Brazil, but being at a constant state of war made the company effectively bankrupt. There were attempts to merge the company with the VOC, but the shareholders wouldn't have it. Also, the company lent generously to Portuguese planters in Recife, who decided to join the revolt against the Dutch in 1642 so they wouldn't have to pay their debts. With the reestablishment of a truce in Europe between the Portugal and the United Provinces only Zeeland was willing to back the WIC financially, with Amsterdam buying Portuguese sugar from the rest of Brazil instead.

Spanish Santiago (Jamaica) had perhaps 2,500 inhabitants upon conquest and as a result produced little of value. The Dutch would have preferred a sugar colony that was already established with a population to work the sugar plantations. That was the reason the WIC chose Recife. At its greatest extent Dutch Brazil had some 25,000 Portuguese settlers already producing sugar along with perhaps 40,000 African slaves and Indians as workers. Few Dutch needed to settle there, and there were only around 1,000 Dutch around 1640, along with 2,000 Portuguese Jews who had moved from the Netherlands, with most in Recife itself. The WIC was loathe to spend money on sending settlers to the colony, and establishing a colony in Jamaica would have been more costly because it would have required to send settlers and slaves. Also, being in the heart of the Caribbean would have made it vulnerable to Spanish attacks, like Sint Maarten and cost far more to defend.
 
The Dutch interests in the Western hemisphere and West Africa were controlled by the WIC a for profit company of shareholders with its own fleet of warships. Because it was controlled by shareholders, the company was much more calculated in its colonisation than say the Spaniards or Portuguese, and was driven soley by profit. In 1621 when Spain ended the Twelve-Year Truce with the United Provinces, the Netherlands were out of supplies of sugar and salt for herring, both of which had come from Portugal and Portuguese-controlled Brazil. During the truce, the Dutch had agreed that they would not establish colonies in the Americas, and they kept their word. The Dutch initially returned to the salt pans of Venezuela, but these were flooded by the Spaniards in 1632, and so they colonised Sint Maarten for the salt. In 1634-1636 they occupied the ABC islands which had been abandoned by the Spanish simply as a way to engage in contraband trade with Spanish Venezuela.

It was never as successful as the VOC in the East Indies and it is important to remember that they did not have as much success against the Spaniards in the Caribbean, and attempts to attack Puerto Rico failed. It's biggest victory was in 1628 when it captured a Spanish silver fleet at Matanzas. The company wanted sugar and initially attacked Salvador, in Brazil but was repulsed. In 1630 it managed to conquer lesser populated Northeastern Brazil, but being at a constant state of war made the company effectively bankrupt. There were attempts to merge the company with the VOC, but the shareholders wouldn't have it. Also, the company lent generously to Portuguese planters in Recife, who decided to join the revolt against the Dutch in 1642 so they wouldn't have to pay their debts. With the reestablishment of a truce in Europe between the Portugal and the United Provinces only Zeeland was willing to back the WIC financially, with Amsterdam buying Portuguese sugar from the rest of Brazil instead.

Spanish Santiago (Jamaica) had perhaps 2,500 inhabitants upon conquest and as a result produced little of value. The Dutch would have preferred a sugar colony that was already established with a population to work the sugar plantations. That was the reason the WIC chose Recife. At its greatest extent Dutch Brazil had some 25,000 Portuguese settlers already producing sugar along with perhaps 40,000 African slaves and Indians as workers. Few Dutch needed to settle there, and there were only around 1,000 Dutch around 1640, along with 2,000 Portuguese Jews who had moved from the Netherlands, with most in Recife itself. The WIC was loathe to spend money on sending settlers to the colony, and establishing a colony in Jamaica would have been more costly because it would have required to send settlers and slaves. Also, being in the heart of the Caribbean would have made it vulnerable to Spanish attacks, like Sint Maarten and cost far more to defend.

So what do you think it would take to get the Dutch interested in Jamaica in the first half of the 1600s?
 
So what do you think it would take to get the Dutch interested in Jamaica in the first half of the 1600s?

Like the rest of the Spanish Caribbean, the island was used mostly for cattle ranching and provisioning crops for Spanish galleons, though this island was even less important. When the English took over they started importing slaves from the Dutch, and sugar production was still in its infancy there. I imagine for that reason they saw little interest in Jamaica. The ABC islands were of interest because of their lucrative contraband trade with the Spanish Main, particularly in slaves. Coupled with the fact that only Curacao had Spanish settlers (around 30), their conquest was relatively simple.

If Jamaica had already been producing sugar in large quantities, the Dutch might have been interested, though this was not the case. It is important to remember that Brazil already had an established sugar economy and between 1575 and 1650 Brazil was supplying Europe with almost all of its sugar. It would have been difficult for the Dutch WIC shareholders to see interest in Jamaica, as they would have to foot the bill for a costly invasion along with protection, and then the capital to settle and introduce sugar. Land would have had to have been cleared which would have taken at least a few years, the stalks take 18 months to grow, it would have to be bundled and prepared, also mills would have had to have been built and slaves imported.

Sugar production in the West Indies became only became dominant around 1660 and this was mainly due to improvements that the Dutch had learned as a result of their tenure Brazil. In Barbados the British had begun to produce sugar in 1646, and this was largely with the assistance of Dutch capital and slaves and Portuguese captives from Brazil brought there in 1643.

Simply put, Brazil was seen as a target worth raising the capital to invade, because it had an established sugar industry and unlike Jamaica it was not in an area heavily patrolled by the Spanish Armadas whereas Jamaica probably would not be. Even with this, Brazil turned out to have few years of profit for the WIC as the costs of ongoing wars with the Portuguese settlers in Brazil were a drain and by 1636 the company was 18 million guilders in debt. The slave trade was really the only lucrative source of revenue for the company, particularly in the 1660s. Jamaica would have been a much larger investment with fewer immediate returns. Though sugar had been introduced, it would not really become significant until the late 17th century on the island.
 
Like the rest of the Spanish Caribbean, the island was used mostly for cattle ranching and provisioning crops for Spanish galleons, though this island was even less important. When the English took over they started importing slaves from the Dutch, and sugar production was still in its infancy there. I imagine for that reason they saw little interest in Jamaica. The ABC islands were of interest because of their lucrative contraband trade with the Spanish Main, particularly in slaves. Coupled with the fact that only Curacao had Spanish settlers (around 30), their conquest was relatively simple.

If Jamaica had already been producing sugar in large quantities, the Dutch might have been interested, though this was not the case. It is important to remember that Brazil already had an established sugar economy and between 1575 and 1650 Brazil was supplying Europe with almost all of its sugar. It would have been difficult for the Dutch WIC shareholders to see interest in Jamaica, as they would have to foot the bill for a costly invasion along with protection, and then the capital to settle and introduce sugar. Land would have had to have been cleared which would have taken at least a few years, the stalks take 18 months to grow, it would have to be bundled and prepared, also mills would have had to have been built and slaves imported.

Sugar production in the West Indies became only became dominant around 1660 and this was mainly due to improvements that the Dutch had learned as a result of their tenure Brazil. In Barbados the British had begun to produce sugar in 1646, and this was largely with the assistance of Dutch capital and slaves and Portuguese captives from Brazil brought there in 1643.

Simply put, Brazil was seen as a target worth raising the capital to invade, because it had an established sugar industry and unlike Jamaica it was not in an area heavily patrolled by the Spanish Armadas whereas Jamaica probably would not be. Even with this, Brazil turned out to have few years of profit for the WIC as the costs of ongoing wars with the Portuguese settlers in Brazil were a drain and by 1636 the company was 18 million guilders in debt. The slave trade was really the only lucrative source of revenue for the company, particularly in the 1660s. Jamaica would have been a much larger investment with fewer immediate returns. Though sugar had been introduced, it would not really become significant until the late 17th century on the island.

What about capturing it to use as a base of operations to attack Spanish treasure fleets with privateers similar to what the English did and then later having it transition to a sugar/coffee/tobacco producing island?
 
What about capturing it to use as a base of operations to attack Spanish treasure fleets with privateers similar to what the English did and then later having it transition to a sugar/coffee/tobacco producing island?

Such an endeavour would have required an investment that the company was simply not willing to undertake. Keep in mind that the WIC was modeled after the much more successful VOC. That is a trading company with very efficiently run trading factories, with as few Dutchmen involved. It is for that reason that both companies were unwilling to send many settlers to their territories, with most having to pay for their own passage. Settling Jamaica like the British did would have been costly and returned little immediate profit.

It's possible for the Dutch to take Jamaica, but the cost was probably too high for too little immediate reward, and the company shareholders would have been angered by such a folly. The prices of tobacco on the European market shot up between 1621, but fell throughout the 1620s until 1633 when the recovered, and then fell sharply in 1637 and continued to fall until 1641, briefly rebounded in 1642 and were low until the 1650s, mostly due to the abundance of Chesapeake Bay tobacco. That is why the early tobacco plantations on Barbados, Antigua, Montserrat and Nevis gave way to sugar during the 1640s. The first coffee would not be planted in the West Indies until the 18th century, so it was probably something that the Dutch investors did not think about.

As for attacking Spanish shipping, the Dutch WIC was able to do so without establishing a settler colony that would be costly to defend (fortifications and a permanent army). Also, after Matanzas however, the Spanish spent large forces on armed convoys and fortresses in the Spanish Main, making this even more costly. Colonies were hugely expensive to maintain and defend, as the WIC would learn in Brazil. Many Dutch became freelance pirates during the period, and this was much more profitable.
 
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