On February 23, 1623, the authorities of the Dutch East India Company (VOC) in Amboyna (present-day Kota Ambon) arrested Shichizo, a Japanese mercenary whom the Dutch suspected of treachery. Under torture, Shichizo named his co-conspirators, who were all brought in for questioning. Two weeks later, he was beheaded. But along with Shichizo, the Dutch decapitated twenty others, including twelve members of the English East India Company (EIC). Hence a routine investigation quickly become an international incident.
Once the news reached Europe, the English were outraged, because in 1619, both nations had agreed to share the expenses and the profits in the East Indies. Both companies duly printed rival explanations, the English emphasizing the grand guignol aspects and the Dutch their “most civil” torture. The English insisted that it had all been a plot directed from Batavia, if not Amsterdam, to eliminate awkward trading rivals, while the Dutch maintained that the...
