On 17 March 1824 a treaty was ratified that resolved outstanding issues in Anglo–Dutch relations after the Napoleonic Wars. This agreement set the stage for bilateral relations, especially in Asia, well into the nineteenth century. With reference to the Straits region the treaty achieved much more than that: it resolved a series of bilateral issues that had emerged since the stadtholder had instructed the Dutch colonies in 1795 to surrender peacefully to the British. It confirmed the transfer of former Dutch settlements in India to the British, and in Southeast Asia created British and Dutch spheres of interest. One of the most curious paragraphs is the text of article 12. This settled the dispute between the two powers over the founding of a British trading post on Singapore in 1819. Article 12 of the treaty reads:
His Netherlands Majesty withdraws the objections which have been made to the occupation of the island of Singapore, by the subjects of his Britannic Majesty. His Britannic Majesty, however, engages, that no British establishment should be made on Carimon [Karimun] isles or on the islands of Battam [Batam], Bintang [Bintan] or Lingin [Lingga] or any of the other islands south of the Singapore Straits nor any treaty concluded with British authority with the chiefs of those islands.Footnote 1
Via article 12, the Dutch had dropped their objections to the founding of Singapore, with far-reaching implications for the geopolitics of the archipelago. The reasons behind initial Dutch objections, and the timing and reason behind this eventual, but significant, acquiescence have been overlooked in what has been scholarship overwhelmingly (often exclusively) based on English language sources.
This article will address perspectives that emerge from the Dutch sources. Two main conclusions will be advanced: first, the Dutch argued that the British treaty establishing the trading post on Singapore in 1819 was in fact illegal. Second, unable to enforce what they believed to be their valid claims, the Dutch subsequently misappraised the significance of Singapore. The negotiations of 1823–4 induced the British and the Dutch to rethink their priorities and find a way out of a legal–political quagmire.
In reaching these conclusions I will be addressing two overarching questions: Why did the Dutch object to the founding of Singapore and what arguments did they produce to support their case? And why and when did the Dutch decide to drop their objections to the founding of a British trading post on Singapore? To this end I consult materials associated with the Dutch negotiators and their contacts in government: Cornelis Theodorus Elout, who served as commissioner-general of the Dutch East Indies and later also minister of finance, industry, and the colonies in the Netherlands; Baron Hendrik Fagel, the Dutch ambassador in London; Anne Willem Carel van Nagell, the Dutch minister of foreign affairs; Herman Mutinghe, the Dutch commissioner at Palembang; as well as Anton Reinhard Falck, who had served as a Dutch diplomat, minister of education, industry and the colonies. Additional materials will be adduced relating to the Dutch governor of Melaka Jan Samuel Timmerman-Thijssen, the Dutch governor-general at Batavia, Baron Godert van der Capellen, as well as Vice-Admiral Johan Constantijn Wolterbeek. The materials at hand have been written in four European languages, namely Dutch, English, French and German.Footnote 2
The main historical discourses published in English on the Dutch claims to Singapore fall into two categories: The first are by authors who consulted only English language materials, such as studies by John Bastin, Howard Malchow, Nicholas Tarling, Mary Turnbull and Nadia Wright.Footnote 3 Authors who also worked with non-English language sources include Reinhout Vos, Harry Marks as well as Pieter Hendrik van der Kemp.Footnote 4 Van der Kemp's studies (and his useful documentary appendices) remain sparsely known among historians of Singapore and Malaya, yet they contain valuable information for appreciating the course and certain details of the dispute, as well as the arguments advanced by the British and the Dutch negotiators between c.1814 and 1823.
Dutch objections to the founding of Singapore
To address the first question: ‘Why did the Dutch object to the founding of Singapore and what arguments did they produce to support their case?’ it is necessary to look at the developments leading up to the founding of the British colonial post on Singapore by Thomas Stamford Raffles and his associate, Major William Farquhar, in January 1819. Plans for a British post in the Straits region had been drawn up since the Treaty of Amiens (March 1802) that stipulated the return of colonies to Dutch rule, but intensified with the so-called London Convention of 13 August 1814, by which the British committed themselves in principle to return most of the colonies to Dutch rule (barring certain named exceptions). Around 1814 the British government under the premiership of Robert Banks Jenkins, the Second Earl of Liverpool, was walking a tightrope balancing domestic pressures at home and Britain's ballooning deficits, with the need to stay focused on the big picture. After the battle of Waterloo, one of the prime minister's concerns was lending the kingdom of the Netherlands (now in a union with what later would become Belgium) an opportunity to reconstruct itself in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars.Footnote 5 When the London Convention was signed, the Netherlands had only recently regained independence from the First French Empire to which it belonged between 1810 and 1813.
The London Convention of 1814
The legal instrument outlining the return of the colonies to the new Kingdom of the Netherlands was the 1814 London Convention.Footnote 6 The British foreign secretary, Robert Stewart Viscount Castlereagh, and the Dutch ambassador to London, Baron Fagel, led the crafting of this agreement.Footnote 7 It stipulated that the British return certain former colonies to the Dutch and also relinquish the island of Bangka (together with Belitung), which Britain had acquired in 1812. The two parties further pledged that they would work together to abolish the African slave trade and promote peaceful commerce. But the implementation of almost every provision contained in this agreement faced challenges.Footnote 8
The Netherlands were to have almost all of their old colonies restored to them so that they would have to ‘part with as little as possible’.Footnote 9 The critical date —1803, the first full calendar year following the ratification of the Treaty of Amiens — failed to adequately address those colonies like Melaka that had been taken over by the British in 1795 and held in trust for the duration of the war.Footnote 10 The question arose already before 1814 whether restoring Melaka to the Dutch was desirable, especially in view of its growing significance to British shipping.Footnote 11 The country traders vociferously opposed its return, citing Dutch hopes of re-establishing a monopoly of trade and navigation across the region. If the Dutch succeeded, Britain's burgeoning trade between India and China would be affected.Footnote 12 The long-standing question of Melaka's return to the Dutch continued to be opposed by country traders as late as 1818, and Raffles chimed in with his objection. An avowed enemy of past Dutch monopolies, Raffles sought to halt the return of Melaka to the Dutch.Footnote 13 He did not think that the Dutch were entitled to any places ‘where their flag did not fly on the 1st of January 1803’.Footnote 14
Governor Couperus and Vice-Admiral Wolterbeek
The debate surrounding the return of Melaka to Dutch rule had become entangled with the dispute over the status of Johor-Riau before 1795, the year the colony was placed in trust with the British. The basis of this dispute is a treaty between the Dutch and Johor-Riau signed on 10 November 1784, according to which full sovereignty over the whole of the Johor-Riau kingdom had been conquered in war and its rulers reduced to hereditary vassals.Footnote 15 The British denied that such a dependency had existed in their time in Melaka, and even if it had, such an arrangement would have surely lapsed, expired, or become ‘obsolete’ by the year 1814.Footnote 16
The role of Abraham Couperus, the Dutch governor at the time Melaka was placed in British trusteeship, is of such significance to the unfolding of events in later decades that it deserves elaboration. Richard Winstedt, a British colonial servant in Malaya and Singapore during the first half of the twentieth century, explained what Couperus had allegedly done: Around the time of the handover to the British, the governor had restored all of Johor-Riau to its ruler, Sultan Mahmud. But when Melaka was returned to the Dutch in 1818, some British agents (among them Raffles) claimed that only Riau had been restored and not Johor and Pahang on the mainland. Winstedt mused: ‘On each occasion the Dutch were trying to keep as much of the Johor empire as they could out of English hands.’Footnote 17 It is questionable how closely Winstedt had familiarised himself with the circumstances leading to Couperus’ 1795 letter to Sultan Mahmud, and he also does not reveal the source on which he based his explanation. Given, however, his emphasis on the word ‘restore’ it was most probably the study De Nederlanders in Djohor en Siak (The Dutch in Johor and Siak) by Elias Netscher. Here one encounters the letter written by Couperus and addressed to Sultan Mahmud dated 23 August 1795. Importantly, it features the counter-signatures of the two new British agents at Melaka who signed themselves as ‘H. Newcome and A. Brown’. The letter informs that the Dutch governor-general and council at Batavia wished to ‘restore’ the lands of Johor-Riau to the sultan and to this end the sultan was to take action as soon as possible as a ship was on its way to ‘evacuate Dutch troops and personnel’. The sultan arranged a thank-you note sometime before 2 May 1796, to which Batavia answered with a formal reply and some gifts. About a year later, on 28 April 1797, the sultan dispatched emissaries to Batavia to discuss the terms of a new treaty. The Johor emissaries returned to advise the sultan to wait until the ongoing conflict was over or until British rule in Melaka had ended. In late December 1797, in his annual report to Europe, the Dutch governor-general explained that the Asian princes, especially the ruler of Johor-Riau, continued to cultivate close relations with Batavia, and in turn Batavia maintained the goodwill of this and other rulers by supplying them with rice and other necessities. The cordial relations between Mahmud and the Dutch, Netscher assures his readers, were sustained over many years, perhaps up until the sultan's death on 12 January 1812.Footnote 18
In a letter to Timmerman-Thijssen and Wolterbeek dated 31 October 1818, Farquhar rejected the validity of the treaty of 10 November 1784 on account of the
measures that were adopted [by Governor Couperus] at the time for giving entire and complete effect to the absolute independence of Sultan Mohammed at Riouw, Lingen. etc. and that the exclusive control and hereditary possessions were secured to him by a pledge of British authority. No circumstance has since occurred to invalidate such a definitive negociation ….Footnote 19
During the discussions between the British and the Dutch in 1820, moreover, British foreign minister Lord Canning expressed his conviction that Couperus had surrendered or abandoned (opgegeven) Dutch suzerainty and sovereignty over Johor-Riau.Footnote 20 Never mind that certain key words such as sovereignty, suzerainty or even dependency were never employed in the surviving Dutch documentation that might lend support to such a position.
Unsurprisingly, the Dutch governor-general, Baron Van der Capellen, saw the matter in a different light. In a letter dated 25 February 1819 addressed to the Marquess of Hastings, the British governor-general of India, Van der Capellen sought to explain the actions of Couperus which had been made with full knowledge and cooperation of the British. Van der Capellen regarded Couperus’ letter as an instruction to withdraw the Dutch garrison and certain functionaries from Riau without requiring the sultan to further comply with certain conditions stipulated by the 1784 treaty.Footnote 21 In another letter dated 16 December 1818, Van der Capellen explained that between 1795 and 1818 the nature of Dutch Melaka's relations with Johor-Riau had never been discussed with the British authorities because no occasion had arisen that made this necessary. Along with Sambas and Pontianak, Johor-Riau had remained Dutch throughout the war, Van der Capellen argued, even if these territories had not been expressly placed under British trusteeship in 1795.Footnote 22 Judging by a letter of 25 January 1820, the secret committee at East India House in London concurred with Van der Capellen's take on these matters, noting: ‘[A]lthough we are not prepared, immediately upon the perusal of it, to express an unqualified concurrence in all these details of the reasoning which it contains, we have no hesitation in saying we believe it to be generally correct.’Footnote 23 In short, it would appear that sovereignty had neither been relinquished, nor returned, and the governor-general therefore continued to regard all of Johor-Riau as a Dutch dependency by virtue of the 1784 treaty.Footnote 24 Vice-admiral Wolterbeek's agreement of November 1818, moreover, expressly invoked the 1784 arrangements: in the preamble it confirms that Johor-Riau was a ‘lawful and perpetual fief’ of the Netherlands.Footnote 25 This renewal was countersigned by the Bugis Raja Muda, Raja Rafa'ar, as well as Abdul Rahman, the temenggong of Johor, who only a few weeks later would strike a deal with the British over Singapore.Footnote 26
Bangka and Belitung
A second flashpoint in the interpretation of the 1814 London Convention (with consequences for the founding of Singapore and the 1824 Anglo–Dutch treaty) erupted over the meaning of the toponym ‘Banca’.Footnote 27 Bangka and Belitung (Billiton), two medium sized islands located off central-eastern Sumatra, formerly belonged to the sultan of Palembang and had been acquired in 1812 by treaty, which ceded ‘Banca and its dependencies’ to the British.Footnote 28 The Convention required of the British to evacuate ‘Banca’, but Raffles refused to surrender the neighbouring island of Belitung, arguing that this island was separately mentioned in the text of the Convention. The Dutch retorted that Bangka, Belitung and their dependencies had been ceded to the British as a single entity and had to be treated as such to fulfil the terms of the 1814 Convention. The controversy disrupted British plans to retain Belitung and turn it into a base for the British East India Company (EIC). The Dutch reading of the treaty eventually prevailed.
With Melaka returned to the Dutch in 1818 (despite Raffles’ efforts to prevent this),Footnote 29 and given the prospect of losing Belitung, the British stepped up their search for a new base in the Straits region. This was to be ideally situated along the main shipping routes between India and China. A site in the southern Melaka Straits was favoured, as is well established.Footnote 30 The Dutch were cognisant of British interest in Bintan and the Karimuns as an excerpt dated 25 August 1818 testifies: ‘He [Farquhar] is alleged to be wanting to start establishments in Little Carimon or Great Carimon and Singapore, situated South of the Malay Peninsula’.Footnote 31 Evidently, Elout was aware that Farquhar had contemplated Singapore as a possible alternative to the Karimuns by late August 1818.Footnote 32
Raffles, too, mulled over suitable locations for the new British trading post. In fact, Singapore was not Raffles’ first choice: After Melaka (which was not to be retained), Raffles’ next choice was Semangka Bay (alias Keyser's Bay) near the Sunda Strait;Footnote 33 his other options then were Bintan, Karimun and finally Singapore.
Raffles’ scheme to establish a British post at Semangka Bay was scuppered by the Dutch as well as higher authority in Bengal.Footnote 34 Bintan was not a new option for the British, or indeed for Raffles. It was an established port of call in the Straits and enjoyed a thriving trading scene since at least the early 1700s, and arguably before. British designs to establish a base here reach back to the end of the fourth Anglo–Dutch War in 1784, and in Europe they haggled with the Dutch ‘in an effort to control Riau’ for over five years.Footnote 35 Raffles himself ogled Bintan as a potential site in 1813.Footnote 36 But again, this choice was preempted by the Dutch and impeded by higher authority. In the southern Melaka Straits, the Karimuns may or may not have been a very serious alternative for Raffles, but at one stage he openly conceded that ‘the Carimon Islands have great advantages’.Footnote 37 These islands were favoured by Farquhar, and the location was inspected for its suitability as a trading post just days before arriving at Singapore.Footnote 38 Raffles’ next choice fell on an island with around 2,000 inhabitants: Singapore.Footnote 39 He was well aware of the provocation he was about to commit, and in a letter penned before the founding of the British post on Singapore, Raffles conceded that the Dutch were bound to formally lodge objections. And they did, as soon as news had reached Batavia.Footnote 40
Now, Singapore's locational potential was known to the Dutch since the early 1600s.Footnote 41 In fact, Abraham Couperus, who as seen had served as the Dutch governor of Melaka, and after 1808 joined the Council of the Indies, informed his superior Marshal Herman Willem Daendels that Melaka had not lived up to its expectations from a military, financial or locational vantage point. In 1809, Couperus floated the idea of founding a new emporium around the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula. Singapore or Bangka, he reckoned, were to this end ‘far preferable’ to the old colony of Melaka.Footnote 42
Within weeks of the British founding the new trading post on Singapore, letters of protest were issued by the Dutch which for now elicited letters of regret and disavowal by the British.Footnote 43 In a postscript dated 6 March, 1819, Van der Capellen explained to Falck, who was serving as minister of colonies at the time:
According to reports received from Riau dated 1 March the English occupation of Singapore continues. I shall dispatch somebody to this region in order to ascertain the actual state of affairs. If you consult a map you will see that Singapore is situated between the island of Bintan (where Riau is situated) and the Malay peninsula. I shall refrain from making further comments.Footnote 44
A follow-up was written within a few days. Wary and weary of Raffles’ shenanigans, the Dutch governor-general reckoned that this time the Lieutenant-Governor of Bencoolen (Bengkulu) had gone too far. Nothing would please Raffles more, Van der Capellen informed, ‘than to have us finally lose our patience with his rabid deeds, and to see us fire the first shot’.Footnote 45 He continued to console himself and his minister in Europe that, after being fully apprised of the matter, the Marquess of Hastings would let justice take its course and order the abandonment of Singapore.Footnote 46 That hope, however, faded as time progressed, but not before receiving a reply from Hastings dated 14 January 1820. This not only expressed Hastings' alleged displeasure with Raffles, but also explained why no action had been taken over Singapore:
[Raffles] … was despatched to seek a port the occupation of which might prevent the future means of closing the straits of Melaka against us …. Should he find a fit harbor, he was to negotiate with the native chief for the privilege of our establishing a post there. In the fulfilment of this object, he was specially forbidden to take any step which should be a collision with the functionaries of the Netherlands government … This government censured Stamford Raffles for a departure from the principle of his instructions, he having learned what had taken place at Rhio, thou’ it was unknown to us. But the establishment could not be withdrawn without our acknowledgment of a right in your government which I regard as incapable of being asserted. Your treaty with Rhio gave no semblance (to my apprehension) of title over Singapore.Footnote 47
Hastings put his finger on the dilemma that would plague the British negotiators in Europe for years: yes, Raffles had overstepped his authority; but abandoning Singapore would be tantamount to acknowledging Dutch rights over Singapore, something the British were unwilling to do. But rumours circulating in the Straits region continued to paint a different picture: Van der Capellen informed Falck in late 1821 that in Penang and Melaka people were growing daily more convinced that ‘Singapore will be restored to us’ [the Dutch].Footnote 48 That prospect, too, faded over time. Repeatedly, Van der Capellen confessed to Falck that Singapore was a ‘thorn in my eye’ or a ‘nail in my coffin’, and that it was challenging even to think about Singapore ‘without becoming greatly infuriated’.Footnote 49 So when he received separate notes from Raffles and John Crawfurd in June 1823 informing that the latter had now assumed his duties as the new resident of Singapore, the governor-general rejected these missives: by accepting formal correspondence from authorities in Singapore, he would be implicitly accepting the legitimacy of British rule there. The letters were thus returned to sender unopened.Footnote 50
The Dutch drop their objections
Given the high stakes claimed by the Dutch over Singapore and Melaka, we arrive at our second main question: Why and when did the Dutch decide to drop their objections to the founding of a British trading post on Singapore? To answer this question we need to explore two issues: first how Anglo–Dutch negotiations progressed after July 1820; and second, the fact that British public opinion over the question of Singapore had begun to shift after September 1819.Footnote 51 Certain interest groups, and arguably also the general public, led London to reverse its earlier position on the Singapore question. If officials had initially felt that Singapore was an unwanted embarrassment, the mood had begun to shift after a critical publication in the second half of 1819.Footnote 52 The question of Singapore's legality moved into the background, giving way to evaluations of its usefulness to British commercial interests and British trade between India and China. London dug its heels in and declined to yield.Footnote 53
The negotiations of July 1820
The first meetings took place between July 20 and July 29, 1820, between Lord Castlereagh and Foreign Minister George Canning, and Fagel and Elout representing the Dutch.Footnote 54 For these talks Falck, serving as minister of colonies, did not bring in much expertise of those who had served in Asia. He justified this move on the grounds that the ‘larger and more essential interests of the two countries’ should not be influenced ‘by local considerations’.Footnote 55 With hindsight, that may have been a grave error because with the exception of Elout, none of the main Dutch negotiators had first-hand experience in East Indian affairs. By contrast, the British negotiators were being advised by a secret select committee of the EIC formed around this time.Footnote 56 Preparations had been under way since November of the preceding year and the proposed meeting in April 1820 had been delayed, among other reasons, by the passing of King George III, then George IV's accession, the divorce trial of Queen Caroline Amelia, and Falck's diplomatic undertakings in Vienna.Footnote 57
At the opening of the negotiations, the British and the Dutch through their representatives staked out their positions that would guide them through the rest of the negotiations. The Dutch position covered a broad range of issues, from the right to reoccupy the former colonies of Melaka, Padang, Palembang, Bangka and Belitung to issues of free trade in insular Southeast Asia.Footnote 58 Importantly the Dutch raised the violation of rights — of Sultan Abdul Rachman as well as their own — in light of the 1784 treaty and its renewal in 1818. In a 20-point writ outlining their negotiating position, point 1 in fact opens with the demand that the British acknowledge Dutch sovereign and property rights over Singapore.Footnote 59 This was in line with the instructions the Dutch negotiators had received from their king, Willem I, in which he demanded the evacuation of Singapore and the island's restoration to its previous status as an integral part of Johor-Riau.Footnote 60 The British counter-proposal of 21 points, on the other hand, presented the financially ailing Dutch nation with demands for the settlement of wartime debt.Footnote 61 Britain insisted on retaining Belitung, but were open to a deal over Bangka: ‘Upon the cession to the British Government of the Island of Banca by the Netherlands Government, the British Government will desist from the establishment of a factory on Singapore.’Footnote 62 Truth is, however, the British were stalling for time over Singapore by insisting that they were expecting important and more detailed information on Singapore and other questions.Footnote 63 ‘Meanwhile’ — Elout lamented to Falck — ‘they exploit our ignorance; that's how diplomacy works’.Footnote 64 Though some progress was made on minor issues during this first phase of the negotiations, it is also clear that both parties were digging in their heels over Singapore and Belitung.Footnote 65 The demand that the British acknowledge Dutch rights over Singapore and quit the island became what Falck would recall as the conditio sine qua non in this round of negotiations.Footnote 66 But Canning assured his counterpart on 26 July 1820 that the British offer ‘is the very utmost we could do, under present circumstances. It gives you, as you see, all that you can want, if you can be sound.’Footnote 67
The British bargained for more time, but it was becoming apparent that unless Britain could find an alternative (and it was by no means clear whether the tin-producing islands Bangka and Belitung could even serve as this alternative), they were unlikely to yield on Singapore. This aligned with the instructions of Lord Clancarty, the British ambassador to the Netherlands, who on 18 August 1819 explained that Britain would not grant the keys of the China route.Footnote 68 The hardening of the British line may have also been in response to mounting pressure from business groups and the London press.Footnote 69 The Anglo–Dutch negotiators parted company in early August and hoped to meet soon once more detailed reports had been received from India.Footnote 70 They were not to meet again for another three years.
Public opinion shifts
Three years seem quite long: Was this a deliberate strategy, and by whom? The delay was partially due to developments at home and serious disturbances in Italy,Footnote 71 but the British almost certainly dragged their feet in this segment of the negotiations.Footnote 72 There is evidence to suggest that Britain was playing for time, at least after the first months of 1822.
Even when Singapore land sales commenced in 1822 — something Raffles initiated against the opposition of Farquhar and to which the Dutch objected both in Calcutta as well as in London — the contracts issued reflect the mood of uncertainty hanging over the nascent settlement.Footnote 73 One agreement dated 2 December 1822 states that ‘in the event that the British government being withdrawn from Singapore within three years of the present date, the amount paid by the parties for the respective lots will be returned’; another dated 26 December reads: ‘the amount for which the respective lots may be disposed of will not be demanded until the final decision of the authorities in Europe regarding the permanent retention of the settlement.’Footnote 74 Uncertainty escalated in February 1823 when the troops of Sultan Abdul Rachman and the Raja Muda occupied Johor Lama, reportedly in punishment for the temenggong's disobedience and his treaty with the British.Footnote 75
Moreover, ‘the fact that Singapore was for legal purposes an Indian port gave it great importance for the China trade’.Footnote 76 The port and settlement arguably benefited in these early years from a regulatory loophole: ‘it was possible by transshipping exports from China and Singapore for private merchants to evade the English company's monopoly of the direct trade between Europe and China, for the Indian trade had been open since 1813.’Footnote 77 In addition to evading, or at least circumventing, the EIC's remaining monopoly, a glance at early trade statistics confirms that three of the main commodities transshipped through Singapore during these early years were tin, tea and opium. James Matheson, who visited Singapore on his way to China in May 1819, wrote in a letter to Hastings that ‘[Singapore's] principal staple article at present is tin, for which there is a melting house belonging to the Sultan of Johore.’Footnote 78 Moreover, according to statistics at hand, the opium transshipped here at Singapore originated in Bengal, Malwa, or the Ottoman Empire. As in Penang and elsewhere, opium became a significant cash generator for the nascent settlement on Singapore.Footnote 79 This position contrasts with the verdict of Wong Lin Ken who argued that opium exported from Singapore paled in comparison to shipments from India, but Singapore was doubtless ‘the most important centre for the distribution of opium in Southeast Asia’.Footnote 80 Still, Wong conceded that Singapore did serve as a ‘useful intermediate station for the opium country ships’ and while throughput may not have been as large as the aggregate value of British opium exports to China, one must remember that in the mid-1820s, the share of opium relative to Singapore's total trade volume amounted to not less than 17 per cent, only to be surpassed by tea.Footnote 81
Historians like Nicholas Tarling have argued that the British were trying to build up Singapore to be of such commercial significance that abandonment would be politically unwise and commercially unfeasible. Another view is that the British were desperate to find ways of impeding the Dutch legal challenges. The wait for more details from Calcutta over the Singapore question also gave time to spawn what sometimes appear to be curious and convoluted counter-arguments concocted on the British side. Hastings, for example, mused that the Malay rulers were always double-dealing, and thus opined that formal agreements and treaties with them were of little, if any, legal merit whatsoever.Footnote 82 Such a position not only undermined the Dutch claims based on their 1784 and 1818 treaties with Johor-Riau, but also the British ones, including significantly, Raffles’ agreement with Tengku Long (aka Sultan Husain) and Temenggong Abdul Rahman.
Charles Assey, the former secretary to Raffles when the latter served as lieutenant-governor of Java, published a booklet.Footnote 83 In the first of two editions, Assey called on the British to pre-empt the Dutch in re-establishing formal ties in the Straits region, but in the second edition he conceded:
Since the first edition of this pamphlet advices have been received from India which state that this mission has not been successful, the Netherlands’ government having already dispatched a force to Rhio previously to its arrival at the place and having compelled the raja to conclude a treaty, by virtue of which the island of Bintang is ceded to them. But the same accounts mention that a position has been obtained, and a British settlement has been formed in the Straits of Sincapore …. This position is moreover stated to be unconnected with those places of which the Netherlands government at Batavia has possessed itself and seems to have been overlooked by that government in its recent progress through the Straits of Melaka ….Footnote 84
Assey's explanation is interesting in the present context for the argument by which he sought to undermine the validity of the 1818 Dutch–Johor agreement. He insinuates that the treaty had been exacted from the ruler, Abdul Rachman Shah, under duress or by compulsion; and second, that the treaty of 1818 did not secure Dutch rights over all Johor-Riau, but restricted their authority to the island of Bintan. In a letter to John Adam on 13 January 1819 Raffles had expressed a similar view formed from a myopic reading of the 1818 treaty.Footnote 85 Anyone who reads the full text of the treaty will know that this is not the case.
More curious were arguments formulated by Thomas Courtenay, secretary of the Board of Control, who after December 1823 would attend the negotiations as an observer. Courtenay argued that between the British takeover of Melaka in 1795 and the return of Melaka to the Dutch on 21 September 1818, any rights the latter may have held over Johor-Riau had been in limbo. Since Farquhar had ratified a treaty with Sultan Abdul Rachman in August 1818, within the aforementioned period of suspended Dutch rights, the British treaty, Courtenay argued, would take precedence over other Dutch claims acquired either before or after this window of 23 years.Footnote 86 The Dutch sought to invalidate the Farquhar treaty based on articles 22 and especially 23, which states: ‘By the present agreement, which shall be the only in force, all the previous treaties are declared to have been abrogated, etc.’Footnote 87 By the term ‘all previous’ treaties the Dutch did not include their own 1784 agreement, but rather any treaty with another foreign (European) power forged at any time before the critical date 2 November 1818.
For the lack of a better legal explanation, Courtenay's approach, which assumed two and a half decades in which Dutch rights had been suspended and sidelined, was taken over as the basis of Britain's subsequent round of negotiations with the Dutch in December 1823. It was ‘hard to see how the Bengal administration could now concoct a convincing argument for the port's retention’;Footnote 88 but while the decision to retain Singapore for Britain and British interests may have been made in Calcutta, and not London, much lobbying later came from the main London agency houses that had also assumed seats on the East India trade committee formed in 1823. This advised the British negotiators in London and also informed the relevant standing committees of Parliament.Footnote 89
The three-year hiatus in negotiations helped sway hearts and minds in London; in addition to business groups and agency houses, Calcutta was aided by the London press. The tables were now turned on the Dutch: the Singapore question had moved on from focusing on the legality of the settlement to an issue of expediency, business, empire and British public opinion. From Canning's memorandum of 31 July 1823, Falck observed that the Singapore question had become ‘a matter of special concern’ to British public opinion,Footnote 90 which, coupled with business interest, became a far superior negotiating tool for London than any explanation about legality. Evidently Canning came to see things in a similar light.
Falck reviews Dutch priorities
The first signs of a shift in the Dutch negotiating position surfaces in a letter to King Willem dated 27 September 1822. In this Falck raises the issues of the stalled negotiations with the British and explains that Dutch needs had changed significantly over the previous two years, triggering a prudent reassessment of the Dutch position. The time had come to restart the negotiations with the British via the Dutch ambassador in London, and Falck had decided (allegedly at his discretion and initiative) to revisit his terms of reference for the negotiations and drop the demand that the British quit Singapore.Footnote 91 Falck intimated in his memoirs that he did not dare suggest or insinuate to his co-negotiators that dropping Dutch demands over Singapore was even an option. ‘I had to keep this in the innermost of my heart’, Falck reminisced, lest he might be labelled a ‘bad patriot’ and an ‘Anglophile’.Footnote 92
The Dutch had solicited feedback on the Singapore question from contacts around Asia. In this context, a testimony by a Singapore-based merchant became pivotal,Footnote 93 for it left a deep impression on Falck and led him to question not only his own, but also the British assumptions underpinning the negotiations:
The commercial advantages of the island [Singapore] as affording a new and immediate outlet for our trade and manufactures have been much overrated. While the Dutch exacted such enormous impolitic duties on their ports the native trade naturally flowed here from all quarters and caused an immense traffic, but now the Dutch have taken off their duties, even already some differences have begun to be felt and it will, I think, prevent this place from ever [again] possessing the monopoly it has enjoyed.Footnote 94
By late July 1823 Falck conceded in a memorandum: ‘after considering all these developments, after consultations with officials and officers, even with the native population and [their] regents, I no longer placed a special price on the return of Singapore’.Footnote 95 Regarding Singapore, he thought that it was time to look at alternatives. Calculating strategically, he toyed with the idea of exchanging Dutch possessions on the Malay Peninsula for British interests on Sumatra.Footnote 96
Negotiations resume in December 1823
After the summer of 1823, Falck no longer insisted on legality and the evacuation of Singapore as per the brief of 1820.Footnote 97 He now aimed to use the British valuation of Singapore as a bargaining chip to secure more concessions during the negotiations with London: ‘Whether Singapore is unimportant, as we think, or as important as the British think, we should accept their appraisal as the higher, and seek to exact the maximum in compensation for the surrender of our indubitable but unenforceable rights.’Footnote 98 Even though as late as 8 October 1823, Dutch foreign minister Van Nagell had instructed his negotiators to demand the British abandonment of Singapore in the strongest possible terms,Footnote 99 Falck's shift proved crucial in restarting the Anglo–Dutch negotiations in the closing weeks of 1823, where meetings were conducted in London by Lord Canning and Charles Williams-Wynn, President of the Board of Control, for the British side, as well as Falck and Ambassador Fagel for the Dutch.
The negotiators had parted in 1820 in the understanding that the British were expecting more detailed information on the Singapore question, and the East Indies generally. This information had arrived, but Singapore was only mentioned ‘in general terms’.Footnote 100 As Lord Canning would later explain on 17 June 1824: ‘As facts and documents are necessary for a clear title, I individually was certainly of opinion, that we could not substantiate our title.’Footnote 101 In view of their inability to disprove Dutch legal claims to Singapore, on 15 December 1823, the British declared that they were willing to offer the Dutch financial compensation, the amount of which remained unspecified at the time. Van der Kemp claims that this represented an offer to buy Singapore from the Dutch.Footnote 102 Irrespective of whether the offer was understood as a purchase or compensation, the British were signalling that they were unable to conclusively refute Dutch legal claims over Singapore.
The financial offer was considered, but the Dutch considered it more advantageous to relinquish Singapore for a more consequential territorial swap.Footnote 103 That swap was almost identical to the one proposed by Falck to his king in 1822. This swap, however, and not the earlier financial offer is what Canning explained to Parliament in June 1824. It foresaw the division of the mainland and the islands into British and Dutch spheres of interest with the Dutch obtaining the island of Sumatra. The deal implicates a key concession by the British, and required them to surrender both Bengkulu and Belitung. The Dutch had far less difficulty in permanently surrendering Melaka to the British, not least because it continued to be a loss-making trading post and thus represented a drag on the already strained Dutch colonial finances.Footnote 104
As has been seen from the 1809 proposal of Couperus, the idea of letting the British keep Melaka was not new. Van der Capellen reminded Falck on 6 August 1819 that in the event the British manage to retain Singapore, ‘one should not imagine that Melaka can be of any value to us’.Footnote 105 In addition to the territorial exchanges, the Netherlands was also expected to make a cash payment of 100,000 pounds sterling to be settled before the end of 1825.Footnote 106 This payment was what remained after Falck had bargained the British down from earlier demands that mentioned the sum of six million pounds.
Haggling over the wording of article 12
No account of the negotiations over Singapore made during the Anglo–Dutch treaty of 1824 would be complete without taking into account the comments received from the Dutch negotiators as well as from Elout, who had succeeded Falck as minister of colonies. The negotiators at London agreed that the cession of Singapore in article 12 be expressed in the most economical manner possible.Footnote 107 It was to be aligned, moreover, with the wording of the preceding article 11 that stipulated Britain's cession of Belitung to the Dutch.Footnote 108 Taken together, the articles were to give the impression of a quid pro quo.Footnote 109 As seen, however, the underlying reality was very different. There was concern, moreover, that the British might at some point in the (near) future seek to expand their influence over other islands in and around the Singapore Straits. The Dutch sought to ensure that article 12 be formulated in a way that prevented such a future scenario. Elout also weighed in on this matter and recommended that the wording be changed from ‘the other islands belonging to the old Empire of Johor’ to ‘the other islands in these parts’. This was to thwart a future disagreement as to whether a given island was, or ever had been, part of the old Empire of Johor (Johor-Riau).Footnote 110
As stated earlier, article 12 enshrines the position that the Dutch had withdrawn their objections to the British presence on Singapore, but it does so without the need for Britain to confirm the legal validity of these Dutch objections. The final wording closely follows an earlier draft which stated that: ‘His Netherlands Majesty withdraws the objections which have been made by His Majesty or on part of his allies to the occupation and possession of the island of Singapore by the troops and subjects of His Britannic Majesty.’Footnote 111
While article 12 mentions Singapore, there are two more provisions that should be mentioned in the present context. The first is the proposed division of the mainland and the islands by a notional line that creates two spheres of interest. That line ran from 6 degrees northern latitude (at Kedah) through the Melaka and Singapore Straits, and according to Falck ended at the eastern entrance of the Singapore Straits.Footnote 112 The second provision seeks to prevent a repeat of the Singapore question. Article 6 declares that ‘order shall be given by the two Governments to their officers and agents in the East, not to form any new settlement on any of the islands in the Eastern Seas without previous authority from their respective Governments in Europe’.Footnote 113 The latter terms, ‘in Europe’ were evidently meant to close the door on senior colonial officials on both sides engaging in high-handed empire-building; in other words there could not be another Raffles. In a similar vein, article 15 stipulates that in the event ‘the said possessions being abandoned by one of the present Contracting parties, the right of occupation thereof, shall immediately pass to the other’.Footnote 114 Without expressly saying so, this provision considered the possibility (as recognised by Falck) that Singapore might not survive. Should the British decide to bail on Singapore (or Melaka) and relinquish possession of the colony, the Dutch would be entitled by treaty to (re-) occupy it.Footnote 115
By early March the draft of the final treaty was ready for review by a select committee of the Board of Control, and the treaty was ratified shortly thereafter.Footnote 116 In an explanatory note signed by Canning and Williams-Wynn, the British settled a few more things that had not been taken into the main text of the treaty. This included, for example, a definition of the geographic name ‘Moluccas’, an affirmation that the British cancel Raffles’ treaty with Aceh,Footnote 117 and a commitment to respect the rights of the (former) Dutch citizens of Melaka. Laying to rest speculation about Dutch intentions for the archipelago, the signatories expressed their ‘sincere pleasure’ at the ‘solemn disavowal on part of the Netherlands Government of any design to aim, either at political supremacy, or at commercial monopoly, in the Eastern Archipelago.’ The agreement, it was further attested, was ‘negotiated and concluded with great cordiality’ and ‘calculated to promote the most perfect freedom of trade between the subjects of the two crowns and their respective dependencies in that part of the world’.Footnote 118
Without Falck's quiet change of heart between 1822 and 1823, a resolution to the Singapore question would probably have assumed a different form than the one it did in March 1824. Moreover, he made his decision to negotiate a territorial exchange without awaiting further particulars from Batavia, without deferring to Van der Capellen's brief of May 1823, and by ignoring express caution against dropping objections to the British occupation of Singapore. Falck's move was seen critically by his co-negotiators in London and also by Van Nagell (who had stepped down as foreign minister at the end of 1823). Elout was unhappy with several clauses of the draft treaty, including article 12.Footnote 119 He warned that dropping objections to Singapore and handing it over to the British would weaken Malay respect for the Dutch with longer-term consequences that were unfathomable. He also warned that commercial shipping was likely to experience a higher rate of attacks by pirates in and around the Singapore Straits.Footnote 120 Even King Willem, when he had read the briefs on the 1824 treaty, admitted in hindsight that Falck's approach did not yield the strongest negotiating position:
I am persuaded that with the knowledge in greater depth of the matter, and on paying more attention to what the governor-general [Van der Capellen] had written with much insistence from Batavia, we could have treated more advantageously.Footnote 121
Conclusion
Raffles’ founding of the British post on Singapore in 1819 was, simply put, illegal. This was the view taken by the Dutch and by Raffles’ own superiors. Right until the end British negotiators in Europe were unable to convincingly invalidate Dutch claims to the island.Footnote 122 In the words of Falck: ‘The occupation of Singapore by Sir Stamford Raffles was — apart from being illegal — also a matter of concern with regard to the time at which it happened’, that is, within weeks of the Dutch treaty with Johor-Riau in November 1818.Footnote 123 John Alexander Bannerman, the British governor of Penang, wrote in a letter dated 3 April 1820: ‘the establishment of Singapore cannot be supported by reason or justice’.Footnote 124 Van der Capellen repeatedly wrote to his British counterpart in Bengal and deplored the occupation of Singapore as illegal.Footnote 125 ‘Illegal possession’ (onwettig…in bezit gehouden) is also the expression used in the resolution of the Dutch governor-general and council at Batavia on 3 June 1823.Footnote 126 Over time, however, arguments surrounding Singapore's legality gave way to deliberations about utility, expediency, locational value, and especially public opinion. All that Raffles had done to the embarrassment and dismay of his superiors in 1819 became validated by the Anglo–Dutch Treaty of March 1824, not on the strength of Britain's legal case, but because the Dutch decided to let go of Singapore.
To achieve his goal, Raffles took calculated risks. He knew well that the Dutch would object to the founding of a British post on Singapore. A contempt for the Dutch certainly clouded his sound judgement. His carpings were hardly in line with Britain's attitude toward the Netherlands in Europe at the time, and certainly not a sober assessment of Dutch trade policies after the Napoleonic Wars. Much had changed since the days of the VOC, but Raffles either failed to or simply refused to recognise this. In the search for a creative solution to a dwindling set of options for founding a forward base in the archipelago, Raffles acted ultra vires, at Singapore. He had interfered in succession disputes of another country and ascended on the stage as a kingmaker at Singapore:Footnote 127 Tengku Long, alias Sultan Husain, together with Temenggong Abdul Rahman who resided at Singapore, were neither entitled by Malay custom nor European international law to sign the treaties they did.Footnote 128 The Dutch — especially Elout — were cognisant of the convenient cover that the intervention in the Johor-Riau succession dispute had offered: ‘In order to fulfil his scheme, the British agent Raffles has acknowledged another member of the family as sultan.’ Raffles, moreover, had disobeyed express and repeated instructions to refrain from actions that would lead to friction with the Dutch.Footnote 129 His founding of Singapore violated multiple international treaties, and as the injured party, the Dutch, responded swiftly, vigorously but without bloodshed. The ‘Dutch were furious’ over the founding of the British trading post on Singapore.Footnote 130 But nobody wanted a repeat of the incident at Palembang that had ended in the butchering of the Dutch garrison there, a massacre that had been committed (it is said) at the encouragement of none other than Raffles.Footnote 131
Timmerman-Thijssen the Dutch governor of Melaka had suggested the option of armed intervention in communication with Governor-General Van der Capellen, but it was dropped as unfeasible and undesirable.Footnote 132 Cooler heads prevailed as the matter was referred to the slow and cumbersome channels of international diplomacy, both in Asia as well as in Europe. Elout informed Falck on 12 March 1819 that the British had ‘made a very nice compliment on account of the moderation’ with which the Dutch officials responded to the founding of Singapore; that is, they showed restraint and did not resort to violence.Footnote 133 Reflecting on the developments over Singapore, Falck thought that Van der Capellen's correspondence with Hastings was anything but helpful, since it had caused much embarrassment both in Calcutta as well as in London. The tipping point, Falck reckoned with the benefit of hindsight, came with Charles Assey's pamphlet of 1819. Law, Falck recalled, started to give way to commercial expediency and British public opinion.Footnote 134 From this point onward in 1819, developments saw the confluence of different decisions and negotiation strategies. The British played the delaying game under the pretext of obtaining better and more detailed information, but it is also suspected that they may have wanted to present the Dutch with a fait accompli that could not be easily reversed.Footnote 135 They sought to cobble together some legal arguments in response to the Dutch ones, but the British legal counter-claims were flawed and feeble. By December 1823 the British negotiators found themselves in a bind: public opinion and the business lobbies were against surrendering Singapore, but the further particulars received from India said nothing sufficiently substantive to strengthen British legal rights to a presence on Singapore. Unable to convincingly refute the Dutch claims to Singapore, the British decided to offer money. The term employed on several occasions in the Dutch foreign ministry documentation is financieele vergoeding (financial compensation). In plain English, the British offered money to ‘buy out’ the Dutch over Singapore.
So why did the Dutch negotiators drop their claims over Singapore? Historians working predominantly or exclusively with English language materials have until now largely been unfamiliar with the Dutch side of the story. In short: it has to do with the way the Dutch came to appraise Singapore's role and future. They surprisingly concluded that Singapore had no real value and ceding it would therefore not amount to a real loss. Since this assessment and position remains unfamiliar in Singapore historiography up until now, the different decisions and developments feeding into this unexpected — and dare one say with the benefit of hindsight also false — conclusion have been detailed in this article. In sum the following points merit mentioning in the present context.
In 1823 the Dutch were aware that the nature of the dispute over Singapore had shifted since the beginning of the negotiations in 1820. Like any responsible negotiating team, the Dutch revisited earlier assumptions and negotiating briefs. They asked what they would lose by dropping their objections to the British occupation of Singapore and concluded that they would lose nothing.Footnote 136 One searches in vain in the working papers and memoirs of Falck for clues that Singapore offered any locational or even natural advantage. The island was not deemed to be fertile, it was unsuited for farming, and lacked natural resources. In Falck's own words: ‘As a produce-yielding territory Singapore has no value.’Footnote 137 Its strategic value as a forward military base was equally questioned: ‘Such value as it [Singapore] may have as a naval station and as a transfer point between Bengal and China is, in my opinion, appraised far too high.’Footnote 138 Its only possible value therefore was one as a trading post. But that too was problematic according to Falck. The settlement had thrived on certain policy loopholes; it benefited from the vice and opium trade; and trade policies that sustained the port could be either discontinued or replicated elsewhere. With reference to Falck, Harry Marks observed: ‘[Singapore's] prosperity depended upon the Netherlands regulations affecting trade and commerce, and once these were liberalised, the affluence of Singapore would dry up.’Footnote 139 Other than being a free port, Singapore's success was not so much driven by policy, but policy-loopholes. Policies can change easily and with them, Singapore's success story. That line of reasoning was the clinching one for Falck. Why then continue with the demand that the British quit Singapore? The Dutch had changed tack in their negotiations to accommodate to an evolving picture, but with hindsight there were doubts whether the negotiators had sufficiently leveraged on the Singapore question as a bargaining chip. That was the question posed by the Dutch king, Willem I.
Once decided, in March 1824 British Singapore's existence became fully legitimised with legal objections and remaining doubts cast aside. The archipelago and the peninsula became Dutch and British spheres of influence respectively, with the Singapore and Melaka Straits functioning as the marker. But getting the Malay nobles to accept the permanent division of Johor-Riau and acknowledge the former Tengku Long as sultan was now perhaps the more challenging task. On the Dutch side that task had been delegated to an experienced old hand and translator, Christiaan van Angelbeek. He had served the VOC before the Revolutionary Wars and was dispatched in 1824 to the courts at Penyengat (Bintan) and Kuala Daik (Lingga) to explain the March 1824 treaty and its political consequences.Footnote 140 New realities had been created with a permanent division of the historic empire agreed upon by the British and the Dutch in faraway Europe, neither side consulting with their Malay allies and treaty partners.
