The treasure of the Maria de Medici lost 1641

[Crow]

There is a shipwreck on the coast of Vietnam that might contain millions upon millions in treasure a Dutch merchantman sunk in 1641

The Maria de Medici was a return ship of the VOC, built in 1638 at the Amsterdam Chamber's own shipyard. The return ship is named after the ex-Queen of France and is therefore also called Queen Maria or simply Maria.
Maria de Medici was in Amsterdam in September 1638 in transit from Brussels, where she was in exile, to England. She visited, among other things, the VOC house in Amsterdam. It is not entirely clear why the city of Amsterdam and the Directors feted her so much - in addition to a grand reception, she also received various gifts.
The fleet with De Maria de Medici did not sail until April 29, 1639. The long delay in the winter near Texel was seen as the cause of the large number of 56 deaths during the journey. Because of the many sick people, she was forced to visit both St Vincent and Table Bay.

The ship arrived in Batavia with 255 of the more than 300 passengers who had left the Netherlands on December 18, 1639. It immediately left with the return fleet, which usually departed from there around the turn of the year.

To be continued.......

Crow

 

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[Crow]

From July 20 to September 22, 1640, the ship was again at Texel to unload cargo with the help of barges and to be equipped for a new voyage to Asia. On March 13, 1641, the Maria de Medici was again in Batavia. A remarkably efficient deployment for return ships.
The Maria de Medici could now sail again to the Netherlands with the next return fleet, but was first deployed within Asia. The ship sailed to Japan via Siam and by the end of that year she was on her way back via Taiwan to Batavia. The rich cargo consisted mainly of silk (goods) and sugar. There were 90 crew members on board. In addition, 31 Chinese 'guest workers' sailed to Batavia.

Here is painting of Batavia below. Modern day Jogjakarta Indonesia today.

On November 21, 1641, the Maria de Medici was stranded by a heavy storm on the coast of Vietnam, south of the current tourist destination of Hoi-an. At the time it was called Phayfo by the VOC. The Gulden Buis, which departed from Taiwan at the same time, also beached on this coast.

About half of the crew on both ships died. Among them the skipper of the Maria de Medici, Jacob Jansz. 52 castaways came ashore from that ship. 20 people on board the Gulden Buis managed to get ashore. The 72 Dutchmen who had landed alive from both vessels were taken as prisoners to Phayfo.

The Dutch East India Company (VOC) had conflicted with Nguyen-ruled Cochinchina (southern Dai Viet) since 1641 because of their alliance with Trinh lords in the north who was fighting in a civil war against their rivals, the Nguyen clan in the south.

As the two domains' war raged, lord Trịnh Tráng welcomed the VOC arrival in northern Dai Viet in 1637 while the Nguyens were hostile to the Dutch, but allied with the Dutch's main rival, the Portuguese.

In 1639 Trịnh Tráng sent his envoys to van Diemen's VOC base in Batavia, sought for establish a military alliance with the Company in exchange for trading privileges for the Dutch in his Tonkin domain.

In the same year he also sent letter to Dutch governor of Formosa Van der Burch to assist his military campaign against the formidable Nguyen. Finally, as tension mounting between the Nguyen domain and the company (the Nguyen jailed several Dutch representatives and sailors)

the VOC headquarter in Batavia agreed to ally with the Trinh lords and began to get involved in the war.

To be continued.......

Crow

 

[Crow]

The relationship between the VOC and the rulers of Quinam, as that part of Vietnam was called by the Company at the time, was bad around that time. In the power struggle that prevailed in that area, the Company had chosen northern Tonquin.

This meant that the VOC actively attacked shipping that it displeased near the coast of Quinam. The surviving Chinese 'guest workers' from the Maria had told what the Dutch called “lies” about this to the local authorities.

The first report in Batavia of the stranding of both ships also came from Chinese passengers who apparently had been allowed to leave freely. Not only the news of the captivity, but especially the seizure of much salvaged cargo and artillery, prompted the Governor General and his Council in Batavia to organize a retaliatory expedition to Quinam.

The rulers in Quinam declared that according to the rules in force there, the salvaged goods from a shipwreck belonged to them.

Despite the hostile actions of the VOC against Quinam, after a number of months a junk was made available to the shipwrecked people to sail to Batavia. Under the leadership of the skipper of the Gulden Buis, 50 Dutch people left. The rest had so little confidence in that journey that they preferred to stay in Quinam.

Indeed, the junk fared poorly; who was robbed and set on fire. Only a few survivors reached Champa, the area of present-day Cambodia. The last six survivors of the stranding of both ships did not reach Malacca, which was in the hands of the VOC, until 1645.

To be continued......


Crow

 

[Crow]

This was a problem much more often for the Company, and not only in Asia. The recovery of cargo and inventory after a shipwreck often depended on the permission and cooperation of the local population and authorities.

Much more was recovered from many wrecks than ultimately ended up in the hands of the Company. Much salvage work took place without the knowledge of the VOC in an often lengthy period after the sinking and is therefore not mentioned in the VOC sources.

What is interesting is follow document below gives the value of cargo in dutch guilders below.

Here is area of the wreck. one thing for sure the wreck was never fully salvaged.

So perhaps still much of cargo still lies on the bottom of sea floor off the coast of Da Nang?

It makes on wonder how much is left from the vessel?

Crow

 

[releventchair]

From July 20 to September 22, 1640, the ship was again at Texel to unload cargo with the help of barges and to be equipped for a new voyage to Asia. On March 13, 1641, the Maria de Medici was again in Batavia. A remarkably efficient deployment for return ships.
The Maria de Medici could now sail again to the Netherlands with the next return fleet, but was first deployed within Asia. The ship sailed to Japan via Siam and by the end of that year she was on her way back via Taiwan to Batavia. The rich cargo consisted mainly of silk (goods) and sugar. There were 90 crew members on board. In addition, 31 Chinese 'guest workers' sailed to Batavia.

Here is painting of Batavia below. Modern day Jogjakarta Indonesia today.

View attachment 2172628

On November 21, 1641, the Maria de Medici was stranded by a heavy storm on the coast of Vietnam, south of the current tourist destination of Hoi-an. At the time it was called Phayfo by the VOC. The Gulden Buis, which departed from Taiwan at the same time, also beached on this coast.

About half of the crew on both ships died. Among them the skipper of the Maria de Medici, Jacob Jansz. 52 castaways came ashore from that ship. 20 people on board the Gulden Buis managed to get ashore. The 72 Dutchmen who had landed alive from both vessels were taken as prisoners to Phayfo.

The Dutch East India Company (VOC) had conflicted with Nguyen-ruled Cochinchina (southern Dai Viet) since 1641 because of their alliance with Trinh lords in the north who was fighting in a civil war against their rivals, the Nguyen clan in the south.

As the two domains' war raged, lord Trịnh Tráng welcomed the VOC arrival in northern Dai Viet in 1637 while the Nguyens were hostile to the Dutch, but allied with the Dutch's main rival, the Portuguese.

In 1639 Trịnh Tráng sent his envoys to van Diemen's VOC base in Batavia, sought for establish a military alliance with the Company in exchange for trading privileges for the Dutch in his Tonkin domain.

In the same year he also sent letter to Dutch governor of Formosa Van der Burch to assist his military campaign against the formidable Nguyen. Finally, as tension mounting between the Nguyen domain and the company (the Nguyen jailed several Dutch representatives and sailors)

the VOC headquarter in Batavia agreed to ally with the Trinh lords and began to get involved in the war.

To be continued.......

Crow

The Portuguese Dutch war was a factor for sure.
In the Dutch approximately 90 year high watermark of economy and power...The VOC had a major hand in it.

[In practice, the VOC became virtually a “country” unto itself outside of Europe, particularly after about 1620 when the company’s governor-general in Asia, Jan Pieterszoon Coen, founded Batavia (the company factory) on Java. While Coen and later governors-general set about expanding the territorial and political reach of the VOC in Asia, the Heren XVII were most concerned about profits, which they repeatedly reinvested in the company much to the chagrin of investors. In Asia, the strategy of the VOC was to insert itself into the intra-Asian trade (much like the Portuguese had done in the sixteenth century) in order to amass enough capital to pay for the spices shipped back to the Netherlands. This often meant displacing the Portuguese by waging war in Asia, while trying to maintain peaceful relations within Europe.

Over the long term, the VOC was very profitable during the seventeenth century despite the company’s reluctance to pay cash dividends in first few decades (the company paid dividends in kind until about 1644). As the English and French began to institute mercantilist strategies (for instance, the Navigation Acts of 1551 and 1660 in England, and import restrictions and high tariffs in the case of France ) Dutch dominance in foreign trade came under attack. Rather than experience a decline like domestic industry did at the end of the seventeenth century, the Dutch Asia trade continued to ship goods at steady volumes well into the eighteenth century. Dutch dominance, however, was met with stiff competition by rival India companies as the Asia trade grew. As the eighteenth century wore on, the VOC’s share of the Asia trade declined significantly compared to its rivals, the most important of which was the English East India Company.]

https://eh.net/encyclopedia/the-dut...Golden Age lasted from roughly 1580, when the