Nathaniel's Nutmeg: Or the True and Incredible Adventures of the Spice Trader Who Changed the Course of History Paperback – July 1, 2000

You should be aware of a couple of things before reading “Nathaniel’s Nutmeg: Or, The True and Incredible Adventures of the Spice Trader Who Changed the Course of History.” First, despite the title, this book has little to do with Nathaniel Courthope and his reputed adventures. In fact, Courthope doesn’t even appear in the narrative until page 202 in chapter 7, and then only as a peripheral character. Chapter 10 concentrates on his four-year ordeal from December 1616 to October 1620 fending off Dutch attempts to physically wrest control of the tiny but valuable nutmeg-producing island Run from the British. Second, Courthope’s purported role in changing the course of history is rather circuitous and certainly debatable. In short, in 1667, the British and Dutch signed the Treaty of Breda, “one of the most significant documents in history,” according to author Giles Milton, which swapped British claims upon Run for the future rights to Manhattan. “In exchanging a tiny island in the East Indies for a much larger one on America’s eastern seaboard, England and Holland had sealed the destiny of New York.”Perhaps a more accurate title for this book would be “Tough Nuts: The East India Companies and the Anglo-Dutch Rivalry for Control of the Spice Trade.” It is difficult to exaggerate the value and influence of the spice trade to Western Europe in the early seventeenth century. Clove, mace and especially nutmeg are finicky plants. They grow naturally in only a few places on earth. Four hundred years ago nutmeg was only found on a few tiny islands between present-day Indonesia and Australia, an archipelago so minuscule that they don’t appear on large modern maps of the region. The most bountiful natural forest of nutmeg plants grew on Run, an island just two-miles long and half-a-mile wide. It was once, yard-for-yard, the most valuable piece of real estate in the world. “Run was the most talked about island in the world,” according to Miles, “a place of such fabulous wealth that Eldorado’s gilded riches seemed tawdry by comparison.”Why? Because all sorts of fabulous (and clearly fraudulent) attributes had been ascribed to the nut, including the ability to ward off the dreaded plague. “Nutmeg … was the most coveted luxury in seventeenth-century Europe, a spice held to have such powerful medicinal properties that men would risk their lives to acquire it.” Indeed, in the early 1600s nutmegs were rarer and more valuable than gold or diamonds. A spirited and violent contest erupted between the Dutch and the British for access to – and ultimately unabridged control over – the islands that produced this invaluable commodity.Milton tells the story of this rivalry almost exclusively from the British perspective. Both nations chartered an “East India Company” (London in 1600, Amsterdam in 1602) possessing the exclusive right to trade with the Spice Islands. Each regarded the claims of the other as invalid. Swashbuckling merchant captains – British and Dutch alike – raided native villages, burned down rival warehouses, bribed local chieftains, plundered spice-laden cargo ships, and unilaterally claimed sovereignty over nutmeg-producing islands. It was all quite a messy business, to say the least. Trade missions to the East Indies were known for their squalor and mortal danger. It was fully expected that half of the crew would be killed during the expedition, while the other half could expect to return barely clinging to life. But for many, it was all worth the risk. The riches to be had in the event of a successful trip were incredible. The markup on nutmeg prices between Run and London could be over 60,000%. An illiterate sailor could return with a small pouch of nuts and literally retire on the proceeds.The war for control over the Spice Islands raged for decades, with the Dutch emerging more-or-less victorious. From their regional headquarters at Bantam, a port city 50 miles west of modern-day Jakarta, the Dutch East India Company dominated the major plantations in the region, including the nutmeg-producing Banda Islands, having ambushed and killed the heroic Nathaniel Courthope to take control of Run in 1620.The aggressiveness of the Dutch would prove to be, in the end, a little too aggressive. In 1623, on the clove-producing island of Amboyna, the Dutch commander reacted violently to a rumor (false, as it turned out) that the small cadre of English traders on the island were plotting to seize the local stronghold of the Dutch East India Company, Fort Victoria. All eighteen Englishmen on the island were arrested, tortured and eventually executed, some by having their arms and legs blown off with gunpowder. Understandably, this caused an uproar in England. “There was only one possible way for the Dutch to atone for the Amboyna Massacre,” Milton writes, “and that was to hand back the tiny island of Run.” (It seems to me there were many other ways for the Dutch to atone for the incident!)The British and Dutch East India Companies eventually learned to “play nice” with one another. By the end of the seventeenth century, the Spice Islands had lost much of their value after the British had successfully developed spice farms on Sri Lanka and Singapore. The wooded island at New York would prove to be a much better long-term investment than Run.

This is an account of the rise of the English and Dutch East India Companies in the 17th century. They originally supplanted Portugal, and at one time the countries were even allies, but they came into open conflict over the rights to the lucrative spice trade, at one time dominated by Venice. It perhaps illustrates how a small area can blaze into importance for a brief period of history. Today it is Kuwait and oil; 400 years ago it was the Banda Islands and nutmeg, an area that has become so insignificant today most people could not find it on a map (the author includes helpful maps). In 1600, immense profits could be made from spices. A cited example was a cargo of cloves purchased in the East Indies for £3,000 and sold in London (circa 1605) for £36,000, at a time when a working man might be paid £12 per year. Nutmeg, highly valued at that time, cost virtually nothing in the Banda Islands, the only place where the trees could be found, and reached a value of £500 per ton in London. This is equivalent to a working man paying a week's wages for a pound of spice. The extent of the profit is illustrated in the book - the Dutch traded Manhattan Island, then the gateway to the Hudson River fur trade, for a clear title to Run Island, the most insignificant of the Banda Islands. The profits were retained by the merchants who financed the ships. Very little went to the merchant seamen who risked their lives, it not being uncommon for 50 percent to die from disease during a voyage. The title of the book is misleading as it covers much more than the nutmeg trade. However, there is a focus on the Dutch attempt to completely control the Banda Islands as well as the rest of the Spice Islands. The book also describes the attempts to find a Northeast or Northwest Passage through the Arctic, the earliest attempt to set up an English trading post in India (opposed by the Portuguese), and other contacts between Europe and the East Indies. The book seems a little disorganized, with events out of chronological order and the accounts of Arctic expeditions and such stuck in here and there, but overall is a good historical account. The self interest of various individuals, the lack of control over people far from home and their governments, the attitudes and actions of people who found themselves with absolute power and became petty dictators, and the massacres and acts of piracy are well documented.

This book is called "NATHANIEL'S Nutmeg". I kept waiting and waiting to meet Nathaniel. When he finally shows up in the book, it's brief. The information in the book was fascinating, but the premise that Nathaniel had some great role in the spice trade was misleading and confusing.

Love reading history and found this book fascinating in its detail and the way Milton wove his story to end with Nathaniel becoming an unknown historical figure

I was born in Holland, but had no idea of the behaviour of the Dutch in the spice islands, so this book was a shock. It was at times quite a difficult read... The Durch treatment of the natives and of the English too was quite appalling. Finally the story of the founding of New York capped it all. If it weren't so tragic, I'd have said it was an absurd joke. However, the book is an excellent background to an obscure period of history that nevertheless underpins our current world.

The book starts with the adventurous tales from the age of exploration and the search for new ways to the spice Islands. It goes onto to tell some of the early history of the East India Company and their confrontation with the Dutch in the East Indies. It finally details the violent history of the Banda Islands ending in how claims to Run a tiny islet in Banda over which much blood has been spilt is exchanged for Manhatten in a peace treaty between the English and Dutch.

A nice light read introducing a less well-known phase of the early colonial period.

Our generation's leading historian:THE BEGINNING!When documentary history reds like the most passionately interesting novel, somebody has decoded the way to capture readers' attention!!!