Journalist Leandert van der Valk She wrote for NRC Handelsblad about the first Africans to be traded under the Dutch flag. He tells his story to Isabella and Antonio, residents of the Kingdom of Ndongo who walk in chains to the coast of Angola in 1619. He chose Isabella and Antonio because they later had a child who would be the first American to have African parents.
Dutch ship raids a slave ship
While Antonio and Isabella were on their way with other slaves to Veracruz, Mexico, the Spanish ship in the Caribbean was attacked by two pirates. One of these must be the English captain John Job, one of the pirates of the mayor of Flesingen, De Moore, who sailed with the ship of the White Lion under the Dutch flag in the Caribbean.
Van der Valk suspects that the pirates especially wanted to obstruct the Spanish ships. The Twelve Years Armistice, the twelve-year period of armistice during the Eighty Years’ War, was in effect, but the boundaries were pushed back. Van der Valk says: “The main prize was gold and silver, as we know from the treasure fleet, which they were looking for exactly, we have no resources for it.” Slaves were viewed as bycatch.
Music journalist delves into the past of slavery
Leandert van der Valk is a music journalist mainly “I’m very busy with African and Caribbean music but also American. For a book I created on American music, I wondered when I would first hear African music in America, which is very important for music. Go to research and then in 1619.” , When the Africans first arrived in America. To my amazement, there was a kind of footnote mentioned that this happened to a Dutch ship. So why don’t I know anything about it so that I have the time and space to discover it. Even for many historians that I’ve talked about. Only professional people know that. It’s not general knowledge. So I thought I should find it next. “
According to Van Lu, the mayor of Vlissingen was interested in the trade. In 1614, for example, he had all trade options investigated and searched for goods that could be imported tax-free. In his research, he happened to come across a slave trader in the Caribbean through one of his kidnappers.
The captains who overpowered the ship divided the Africans between the ships. Antonio and Isabella landed a white lion that later arrived in Virginia and is the first to bring Africans to America. The white lion was about to run out. “After that, slaves were more or less substituted for food,” Van Luo says. The archivist believes that in the end De Moore didn’t have much left.
Hear Zeeuwse Kamer below, as Van der Valk and Van Loo talk about the past of slavery in America and the role of then-mayor Jean de Moore.
Zeeland room circa 1619
