Dutch Malabar

Although also motivated by the lucrative pepper trade on Malabar, the primary aim for the Dutch in capturing the coast from the Portuguese was to secure Dutch Ceylon from Portuguese invasions. After failed attempts to capture the main Portuguese fort of Goa in 1604 and 1639, the Dutch decided to aim for the secondary Portuguese trading posts on the Malabar Coast.

In the 1650s the Dutch possessed only the unfortified factories at Kayamkulam and Cannanore. They took Quilon (now known as Kollam) on 29 December 1658, but it was reconquered by the Portuguese on 14 April 1659. On February 10, 1661 the Dutch commander of Ceylon, Adriaan van der Meyden, came to Malabar with the intention of displacing the Portuguese, and at Ayyacotta he had an interview with the Calicut prince. It was agreed that Calicut, the most powerful ruler in Malabar and an enemy of the Portuguese, was to conduct an attack on the Portuguese fort at Cranganore by land backed up by the Dutch Navy. According to the treaty between the two parties, Fort Cranganore was to be made over to Calicut after its successful capture. Van der Meyden dispersed a Nair detachment sent to stop his advance on the way and appeared before Fort Palliport on February 16 1661. The Portuguese made no attempt to resist and fled by the backwaters.

On March 21, Rijckloff Van Goens signed a treaty with the local chief of Paliyam on a ship anchored off the coast. Dutch forces soon landed and attacked the palace of the queen at Mattanceri. Subsequently, the queen was taken as a prisoner. Later in December 1661, Portuguese Quilon was captured by a Dutch expedition under Rijckloff Van Goens. This is often regarded as the beginning of the Dutch presence in Malabar.

Capture of Cochin in 1663.

On January 3, 1662 Van Goens was joined by the Calicut army in a siege of Fort Cranganore in the tropical heat. After a fortnight, the fort surrendered (15 January), and the Dutch demolished the structure with the exception of the bastion, where they stationed a garrison. A new treaty was now signed between Calicut and Van der Meyden. Calicut agreed to cede Fort Cranganore and Vypin to the Dutch after the capture of the Portuguese fort at Cochin.

Capture of Quilon in 1661.

The allies moved towards Cochin and marched upon the palace of the Raja on 5 February 1662. The raja was killed in the subsequent battle along with two of his juniors. The Dutch installed another prince on the throne and proceeded to besiege the Portuguese fort. Cochin and the chief of Paliyam provided supplies to the Dutch, who faced heroic Portuguese resistance during the prolonged siege. The Native rulers of Porca and Cembakasseri kept the besieged supplied with provisions. Though disrupted by monsoon rains and the deaths of the ruler of Calicut and important Dutch officers, the garrison finally capitulated on January 8, 1663. The terms of the capitulation were that all the unmarried Portuguese residents were returned to Europe, and all married Portuguese and Mestiços were transferred to Goa. The last governor of Portuguese Cochin was Inácio Sarmento. It was said that about four thousand people were banished and decades of Portuguese supremacy in Malabar came to an end. Fort Cochin now became the primary trading post of the Dutch colony.

Kochi City around 1665.

Quilon in 1756.

The alliance between Calicut and the Dutch had no chance of crystallizing into a long-lasting friendship. The Zamorin of Calicut had sought Dutch cooperation so that he might once more recover his hold on the Cochin Raja (before the Portuguese arrival, Cochin was his vassal state). Hence his stipulation for the cession of Vypin and reduction of the Cochin Raja to the position of a Calicut tributary in the treaty of 1662. But the Dutch, having established themselves in Cochin and Calicut, asked them to fulfill their treaty obligations.

It was in these circumstances, Calicut welcomed the British and allowed them to establish a factory at Calicut in 1664. The Dutch authorities in Amsterdam were alarmed and wrote to their officers in India to "spare no pains" to secure the expulsion of the British from Calicut. The Dutch carried off four or five guns from Calicut and attacked Cranganore. The Dutch at once summoned their allies, Cochin, Thekkumkur, Vatakkumkur, Paravur, Chempakasseri and Mangatt. Calicut forces, including Moplahs and supported by a Portuguese named Pacheco, were at first successful. After a year of desultory fighting, the Calicut forces withdrew, and the Dutch destroyed the Fort Round and built a bastion near Cranganore.

The Bolgatty Palace, built in 1744 for the commander of Dutch Malabar, is one of the oldest existing Dutch palaces outside of the Netherlands.

Coin of the Dutch East India Company, 1744

In 1669, Dutch Malabar became a separate commandment of the Dutch East India Company (VOC); beforehand it had been governed from Batavia.[1] In 1670, the Zamorin of Calicut ruler was persuaded by his prince to go to Cranganore to encourage the Nairs. But, the Dutch made a surprise attack on the Zamorin's camp. Thirty Dutch lost their lives this raid, and in the confusion of the battle, the Royal Sword of Calicut was destroyed. The Calicut ruler fell back to Papinivattom, and the prince attacked the bastion and captured it. In 1673, VOC representative Hendrik van Rheede came to Cochin as its Commander. He re-occupied the bastion and demanded the cession of Chetwai - the route to Cochin from Calicut. He came to Port Ponani in 1678 and met with the Calicut ruler. Tired of the hostility shown by most of the natives, the Dutch opened negotiations with Calicut. The Commissary General of Batavia, the head of the Dutch Government in the East Indies, came to Ponani in 1696 without even stopping at Cochin. In the meantime, Calicut formed a large anti-Dutch alliance and signed a new treaty with the English. In the following years, they made raids deep into Cochin areas (1701–1710). The Dutch were forced to take part in these battles with Cochin and began to construct a fort for the security of Chetwai. Soon, Calicut sent a force to pull down the fortifications and expelled the Dutch from Chetwai (1714). The Chief of the English factory had a great hand in promoting this. Calicut resolved to follow up on this success by attacking Cranganore and Pappinivattom. But, the Dutch under Councillor William Bucker Jacobs retaliated by defeating the Calicut and English armies and on April 10, 1719 the Dutch formally took command of Fort William, as the fort at Chetwai was called then. This Dutch victory was a heavy blow to the English and Robert Adams.

The Dutch gradually began to consider their forts and garrisons in Malabar an economic burden, while the British East India Company dominance of commerce in Malabar increased. On September 10, 1691 the Dutch transferred Chetwai back to Calicut and reduced the size and strength of their forces across Malabar. The fear of Dutch forces in the minds of the native rulers began to fade. In 1721, the supreme council of the Dutch East Indies in Batavia agreed that it would no longer support its unfortunate native ally Cochin against Calicut.

Cochin

Quilon

Cannanore

Kayamkulam

Cranganore

Pallipuram

Purakkad

Map of the main forts on the Malabar Coast of India (Vengurla and Barselor not shown)

The Dutch never succeeded in establishing a pepper trade monopoly in Malabar and were all the more frustrated in their attempts when the young ruler of Travancore, Marthanda Varma, started to expand his kingdom. The Travancore–Dutch War that followed culminated in the Battle of Colachel, which proved disastrous for the Dutch. Eustachius De Lannoy, a naval commander in the Dutch army, was taken prisoner and subsequently became a commander in the Travancore army. De Lannoy later helped Travancore to establish an organized army, introduce better firearms and artillery, and to build European style forts in his state.

As a result of the Kew Letters, Dutch settlements on the Malabar Coast were surrendered to the British in 1795, in order to prevent them from being overrun by the French. Dutch Malabar remained British after the conclusion of the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814, which exchanged the colony for Bangka Island.

The Murugan temple at Thiruchendur was occupied by the Dutch East India company between the years 1646 to 1648, during the course of their war with the Portuguese. The local people tried during these 2 years to try and free their temple, with several futile attempts. The Dutch finally vacated the temple on orders from the Naik ruler. However, while vacating the temple, they hacked away and removed the idol of the main deity of the temple, and took it back to Galle, Dutch Ceylon. The idols was returned after many negotiations with the Madurai Nayakar.[2]