75th Independence
The siege that ended Portuguese rule
View(s):- The Dutch take over (1656-1658)
There, however, came a turn in the tide when history began to move quickly in Europe. Spain in union with Portugal bestrode the world. They had declared the oceans under a mare clausum as solely theirs. Holland presented a united front to circumvent it. They decided to beat the enemy at their own commercial game and boldly sought to wrest their secrets by intruding on the sea-routes the Portuguese had blazed to the Far East, round the Cape of Good Hope.
Equipping ships to make the hazardous voyage and navigating by strange stars in hostile seas, the Dutch reached the Spice Islands of the Malay Archipelago and returned to the Fatherland with their shiploads full of rich cargo. Encouraged by the results of their exploratory voyages at the turn of the 16th century, they heard the East calling loudly in their ears.
About this time, too, there had succeeded to the throne at Kandy, a young prince who had proved his valour in many skirmishes with the enemy and was bitterly hostile to the Portuguese. He had been crowned the King of Ceylon, and in order of accession came to be called Raja Sinha II. Forced to the conclusion that there could be no hope of any permanent peace in his kingdom with the Portuguese at his doorstep, this warrior-king called to his aid the Dutch East India Company – who had by now installed themselves in Sumatra and Java, to help him in driving the Portuguese out from Ceylon.
Thus began a chain of events which linked Ceylon and the Netherlands. The forts on the eastern and southern coast, together with the Portuguese forts at Negombo and Kalutara were stormed and garrisoned by the Dutch. When in September 1655, Herr Gerard Hulft put into Galle with a fleet of 16 ships and 2,500 men and took command as Director-General of the Company, it was considered time to render the Emperor and King, Raja Sinha II, the long desired service of storming Colombo.
Within three weeks of Hulft’s arrival, the Dutch were ready to make their attack. The door was wide open to an advance since the fort at Kalutara which had been re-occupied by the Portuguese had been recaptured by them. Thus the Dutch were in a position to throw their full weight into fighting force to the assault on Colombo.
A Portuguese force — numbering 700 picked men flushed with confidence by a recent great victory in the mountains over the King of Kandy — marched out of the forts to meet the Dutch advance.
History tells us that the Portuguese lost all but 200 of their soldiers. After this action, all the Portuguese regular troops were withdrawn and detailed to stations within the walls of Colombo. In all they numbered about 1,300 of whom only 500 were regular troops – many of them Porto Sinhalese born in Colombo.
The Dutch forces concentrated their attack on the eastern flank of the fortress. General Hulft took occupation on a ‘fine residence’ on a hillock overlooking the city which still bears his name ‘Hulftsdorp’……
Perceiving that the eastern ramparts and parapets of the city had been partly demolished, Herr Hulft and the Council resolved to storm Colombo by both land and sea…….
What the Dutch General had expected was a quick and glorious offensive by a multipronged assault. Realising he could not achieve this without reinforcements, General Hulft played a waiting game. He sat back to see what famine would do. Five months elapsed. The city had been reduced to see the extremes of misery. Nevertheless, the Portuguese fighting with the stubborn hardihood of their race continued to frustrate and harass attempts by the Hollanders to undermine their bastions and ramparts and impeded the progress of operations by throwing down fire-pots, stinkers, and firebrands smeared with pitch in order to set the galleries they were endeavouring to construct on fire.
On the 7th of May (1656) the Hollanders made another concerted assault on the bastion of St Joao which resulted in a breakthrough after protracted resistance. Their losses exceeded 400 men, exclusive of a large number who had been wounded or burnt. On the following morning, the flag of the Prince of Orange was planted on the bastion.
Howbeit, the city was not yet taken. The Portuguese, lacking in men, food, ammunition and any means of defence other than their gallantry and loyalty, held out by blocking the streets within the ring of fortification. It proved of no avail against the brutal energy of the attacking forces who moreover had swelled with reinforcements of the King’s Lascoreens who had come to help.
In their despair, the Portuguese had planned to blow up the city with all the besieged left in it. But finding themselves with powder ‘insufficient even for two more loadings’ they were compelled to send out the same day, a bearer with a flag of truce.
On the 12th of May, 1656, 90 bedraggled men, haggard and woebegone staggered out of the breastwork to lay down arms and surrender the city. A hundred more non-combatants hobbled out with them.
The Portuguese were never able after the fall of Colombo to concentrate their forces and seize any initiative. The scramble for territorial aggrandizement in Ceylon ended with the fall of Jaffna which also capitulated in 1658.
(Extracts from Dr. R.L. Brohier’s
‘Changing Face of Colombo’)