| |
HISTORY OF SURINAME
SURINAME, THE FORMER DUTCH GUYANA, BECAME INDEPENDENT ON THE
25 TH OF NOVEMBER, 1975, AFTER BEING A COLONY OF HOLLAND (THE
NETHERLANDS), FOR OVER 300 YEARS.
SURINAME WAS INHABITED FROM ABOUT 3000 BC. BY THEN, THE FIRST
INDIANS CAME TO SURINAME. THE MOST IMPORTANT INDIAN TRIBE IN
THAT PERIOD, WAS THE AROWAK TRIBE.
THE INDIANS LIVED FROM HUNTING AND FISHERY. MOST OF THEM WERE
NOMADS. ONLY A FEW STAYED LIVING AT ONE PLACE, IN ORDER TO LIVE
FROM AGRICULTURE. LATER, OTHER INDIAN TRIBES CAME TO SURINAME.
TILL THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY THE ONLY INHABITANTS OF SURINAME WERE
THE CARAIBEN, AROWAK EN WAYANA INDIANS. THE LAST GROUP IS THE
MOST PRIMITIVE GROUP OF NATIVE INDIANS, IN SURINAME. THEY ARE
LIVING IN THE SOUTH OF SURINAME, EVEN PARTLY IN BRASIL.
IT WAS IN THIS CENTURY, THAT SPAIN TOOK THE COAST OF SURINAME.
IN 1667 SPAIN TRADED SURINAME WITH THE NETHERLANDS FOR NEW YORK.
FROM A HISTORICAL POINT OF VIEW, SURINAME WAS A TROPICAL COLONY
WITH AN PLANTATION ECONOMY. THIS ECONOMY WAS BASED ON SLAVERY
AND WAS TRANSFORMED AROUND 1863 TO AN PLANTATION ECONOMY, BASED
ON CONTRACT LABOUR.
NOWADAYS THE PLANTATIONS ARE REPLACED BY SMALL FARMS AND MINING,
IS OUR MAIN INDUSTRY.
AFTER CHRISTOFFER COLUMBUS DISCOVERED AMERICA, MANY EUROPEANS
CAME REGULARLY TO SURINAME. MOST OF THEM CAME LOOKING FOR
‘ELDORADO’, THE CITY OF GOLD, THAT ACCORDING TO LEGENDS, IS
SITUATED IN THE INTERIOR OF SURINAME.
THE FIRST EUROPEANS SETTLED IN SURINAME, IN 1650. BUT MOST OF
THESE EUROPEANS, DID NOT LAST LONG IN SURINAME THEN. THE MANY
UNKNOWN DISEASES AND ATTACKS BY INDIANS, DECREASED THEIR
NUMBERS, SIGNIFICANTLY.
SURINAME WAS OCCUPIED IN THIS PERIOD OF TIME, BY SEVERAL
EUROPEAN NATIONS. SPAIN, PORTUGAL, ENGLAND, FRANCE AND HOLLAND,
ALL DID OCCUPY SURINAME, ONE TIME OR ANOTHER, IN OUR HISTORY.
THE FIRST ENGLISH SETTLERS WHO TOOK OVER SURINAME, WHERE SEND BY
LORD WILLOUGHBY, GOVERNOR OF BARBADOS. IT WAS THE DUTCH CAPTAIN,
ABRAHAM CRIJNSEN, FROM ZEELAND, WHO INVADED WILLOUGHBY’S
SETTLEMENT IN SURINAME.
YEARS OF WAR BETWEEN SEVERAL EUROPEAN COUNTRIES IN NORTH AND
SOUTH AMERICA FOLLOWED.
IN THE PEACE TREATY KNOWN AS ‘THE TREATY OF BREDA’, WHICH WAS
SIGNED IN 1667, BETWEEN ENGLAND, SPAIN AND HOLLAND, THE DUTCH
GAINED SURINAME FROM SPAIN BUT LOST THEIR COLONY NEW YORK, IN
NORTH AMERICA.
THE DUTCH COLONISTS UNDERSTOOD THAT IT WAS NOT CHEAP, TO PROTECT
THE MANY PLANTATIONS IN SURINAME, FROM HOSTILE ATTACKS FROM BOTH
NATIVE INDIANS AND OTHER HOSTILE EUROPEANS.
THEREFORE THE ZEALANDERS SOLD THE COLONY SURINAME, IN 1683, TO
THE DUTCH TRADE COMPANY, NAMED, ‘THE WEST INDISCHE COMPANY’ AND
THE POWERFULL DUTCH FAMILY, VAN SOMMELSDIJCK.
THE HEAD OF THE VAN SOMMELSDIJCK FAMILY, CORNELIS VAN AERSSEN,
BECAME GOVERNOR OF SURINAME. IT WAS VAN SOMMELSDIJCK WHO
IMPROVED THE SECURITY OF THE PLANTATIONS.
STILL VAN SOMMELSDIJCK WAS KILLED IN A MUTINY, IN 1688.
AFTER A VERY TROUBLESOME PERIOD AT THE END OF THE SEVENTEENTH
CENTURY AND THE BEGINNING OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY, AGRICULTURE
FLOURISHED IN SURINAME AND THE PLANTATIONS DONE VERY WELL.
HOWEVER, MOST OF THE WORK ON THE PLANTATIONS WAS DONE BY AFRICAN
SLAVES, WHO OUTNUMBERED THEIR ‘EUROPEAN MASTERS’. THE
PLANTATIONHOLDERS TREATED THEIR SLAVES WORSE THAN ANIMALS. IN
THE CARIBBEAN, THE ‘DUTCH MASTERS’ HAD THE WORSED NAME DURING
SLAVERY.
THAT IS WHY MANY SLAVES RUN FROM THE PLANTATIONS AND FLED TO THE
JUNGLE. THESE SLAVES WERE LATER KNOWN AS ‘THE MARRONS’. THE
MARRONS, OFTEN ATTACKED THE PLANTATIONS.
THE DUTCH GOVERNORS, MAURITIUS AND CROMMELIN SUCCEEDED IN MAKING
PEACE TREATIES, WITH SOME MARRON TRIBES. BUT STILL OTHER MARRON
TRIBES KEPT ON ATTACKING THE PLANTATIONS.
THE BEST KNOWN MARRON LEADERS IN THE HISTORY OF SURINAME ARE,
BARON, BONI AND JOLIE COEUR.
IT WAS THE FRENCH REVOLUTION IN 1789, THAT LED TO ABOLITION OF
SLAVERY IN SURINAMES EASTERN NEIGHBOUR COUNTRY, FRENCH GUYANA.
THIS ABOLITION OF SLAVERY BY THE FRENCH, SHOCKED THE DUTCH
PLANTATION AND SLAVE HOLDERS, IN SURINAME.
IN 1799, SURINAME WAS AGAIN OCCUPIED BY THE ENGLISH, AFTER
HOLLAND BECAME PART OF FRANCE. APART FROM THE PERIOD BETWEEN
1802 AND 1804, SURINAME REMAINED ENGLISH TERITORY, UNTIL 1816.
THE ENGLISH ABOLISHED SLAVERY IN 1808. THIS IMPROVED THE
POSITION OF THE SURINAME SLAVES, BY THAT TIME. BUT AFTER THE
DEFEAT OF NAPOLEON, HOLLAND GOT BACK THEIR COLONY IN SOUTH
AMERICA.
SO IT WAS SLAVERY AS BEFORE. IT WAS UNTILL THE FIRST OF JULY,
1863, THAT THE DUTCH, ABOLISHED SLAVERY. HOLLAND WAS THE LAST
EUROPEAN COUNTRY, TO ABOLISH SLAVERY.
TEN YEARS BEFORE THE ABOLISHING OF SLAVERY, THE DUTCH PLANTATION
HOLDERS STARTED ‘IMPORTING’ LABOURERS, FROM OTHER CONTINENTS.
THE FIRST LABOURERS WERE CHINESE PEOPLE. BUT THESE CHINESE
LABOURERS LEFT THE PLANTATIONS IMMEDIATELY, AFTER A FIVE YEAR
OBLIGATORY WORKING PERIOD. THAT WAS THE REASON WHY THE DUTCH
FARMERS FORCED THE NOW SO – CALLED FREE SLAVES, TO CONTINU
WORKING ON THE PLANTATIONS, FOR A PERIOD OF TEN (10) YEARS.
THEY WERE STILL TREATED BAD. THE ONLY REAL DIFFERENCE BETWEEN
THEN AND THE TIME THEY WERE SLAVES WAS THAT BY NOW THEY GOT SOME
KIND OF PAYMENT, FOR THEIR HARD WORK.
IN 1873, THE FORMER SLAVES, LEFT THE PLANTATIONS AND WERE
REPLACED BY THE DUTCH, BY HINDUSTANI LABOURERS FROM INDIA, MOST
FROM AROUND CALCUTTA. AS WITH THE CHINESE IMMIGRANTS, THESE
LABOURERS FROM INDIA, WERE REQUIRED TO WORK ON THE PLANTATIONS
FOR SOME YEARS.
AFTER THIS PERIOD, THEY COULD CHOOSE TO EITHER SIGNED A NEW
CONTRACT WORKING AT A PLANTATION, OR RETURN TO INDIA. THERE WERE
ABOUT 37.000 HINDUSTANIS IMPORTED TO SURINAME, FROM INDIA.
THE IMMIGRATION FROM INDIA CAME TO AN ABRUPT END, WITH A
MOVEMENT IN 1916 IN INDIA, LED BY THE FAMOUS, MAHATMA GHANDI.
BUT THE DUTCH PLANTATION OWNERS DIDN’T GIVE UP. THE IMMIGRANTS
FROM INDIA WERE IMMEDIATELY REPLACED BY LABOURERS FROM
INDONESIE, ANOTHER DUTCH COLONY. ABOUT 33.000 INDONESIANS CAME
TO SURINAME, BETWEEN 1900 AND 1940.
LIKE THE HIDUSTANI LABOURERS, MOST OF THESE IMMIGRANTS FROM
INDONESIE, LEFT THE PLANTATIONS, AFTER FULLFILLING THEIR
CONTRACTS AND STARTED SMALL FARMS THERESELF.
THE PLANTATIONS LOST THEIR IMPORTANCE FOR THE ECONOMY OF THE
COUNTRY. FOR EXAMPLE. THE NUMBER OF SUGAR PLANTATIONS DECREASED
FROM 80 IN 1863 TO ONLY 4 IN 1940.
THAT IS WHY IN THE FIRST HALF OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY, SURINAME
STARTED WITH THE EXPLORATION OF OTHER NATURAL RESOURCES. GAINING
RUBBER, GOLD AND BAUXIET, BECAME VERY IMPORTANT FOR THE ECONOMY
OF SURINAME.
IT WAS IN THIS PERIOD THAT THE AMERICAN BAUXITE COMPANY, ALCOA,
GOT A CLAIM ON A VERY LARGE PART OF THE INTERIOR OF SURINAME,
FOR A PERIOD OF FORTY (40) YEARS.
THE BAUXITE GAINED BY ALCOA’S DAUGHTER COMPANY IN SURINAME,
SURALCO, WAS THE MOST IMPORTANT CONTRIBUTION OF SURINAME TO THE
ALLIED FORCES, DURING WORLD WAR II.
ALUMINUM MADE FROM BAUXITE, WAS THE MOST IMPORTANT MATERIAL, FOR
THE CONSTRUCTION OF AIRPLANES.
|
|
|
|
Official Carifesta Carrier
|
 |
|
|
