A letter from Captain Light to Lord Cornwallis dated 20th June, 1788. Communicated C.E. Wurtzburg
Francis Light, the founding administrator of Penang, addressed this letter to Lord Cornwallis, Governor-General of India, on 20 June 1788, just two years after the island’s acquisition. Published by C. E. Wurtzburg in the Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (1938), the document presents Light’s diagnosis of the commercial collapse in the Straits of Malacca and his proposal for a bilateral treaty with the Dutch to restore regional trade.
Summary
Light opens by conceding that Penang cannot yet generate sufficient revenue to defray its own costs, as the settlement’s inhabitants are still clearing land and building houses. He argues against imposing import or export duties, warning that collection costs would consume most of the revenue and that smuggling would follow. His central contention is that the Dutch, under the pretext of protecting the spice trade, have systematically destroyed the Bugis and Malay maritime networks that once sustained the commerce of the entire Bay of Bengal region. The Dutch employed undermanned and poorly commanded vessels to intercept prows from Celebes and Borneo, which degenerated into piracy; the Bugis retaliated with massacres of Dutch personnel; and the Dutch responded by destroying the Bugis trading posts at Rhea (Rhio) and Selangor, thereby eliminating the very merchants whose trade had generated revenue for all parties (pp. 116–118).
Light traces the former scale of this trade in considerable detail, describing how Bugis prows, Javanese vessels, Coromandel coast ships, and Chinese junks formed an integrated exchange network linking India, the Malay world, and China. He argues that the Dutch monopoly policy—restricting all Europeans to Batavia and Malacca as the sole points of trade—has created a vicious cycle: chiefs deprived of commercial revenue resort to exactions and monopolies, which breed revolt, which the Dutch suppress by force, further depressing commerce. He proposes a specific treaty framework: Britain would recognise Dutch sovereignty over the Spice Islands and Celebes, while the Dutch would evacuate Rho, Mompava, and Succadanea, restore free navigation to Bugis and Malay vessels (excluding spice sales), and cede Negapatam to the Dutch, thereby restoring the commercial equilibrium that existed in 1776 (pp. 119–120).
In the absence of such a treaty, Light is frank that Penang can serve only as a safe harbour for ships in distress, a refuge for displaced natives, and a small mart for transferring cargoes between country vessels and China-bound ships. He warns that the Dutch plan to become sole purchasers of all eastern productions will produce expenses rather than profits and multiply enemies, with the distress radiating to all trading ports of India (pp. 121–122).
Key Findings
- Seventy Bugis prows (15–25 tons, crewed by 40–50 men each, valued at 20,000 Spanish dollars apiece) formerly visited the Straits of Malacca, returning with cargoes of opium and piece goods worth 1.5 million dollars (p. 120).
- Chinese merchants imported annually to the value of 250,000 dollars and returned with double that value in tin, pepper, rattans, and other articles (p. 120).
- Javanese shipping of approximately 4,000 tons carried rice, sugar, arrack, tobacco, salt, sago, brass artillery, and cloth, with cargoes valued at about 250,000 dollars (p. 120).
- The Coromandel coast employed over 40 vessels in Straits trade, with imports valued at 5 lac pagodas and returns exceeding one-third in gold; Siam imported 3–4 lac rupees in piece goods annually (p. 120).
- Opium consumption figures cited: China 2,500 (units), Batavia and Eastern Islands 2,000, Malay Peninsula and Sumatra 1,750, with Chinese demand increasing “with astonishing rapidity” (p. 21).
- Light notes that a force of only 200 men joined to the Malays at Rho would have caused the loss of Malacca and placed Batavia in grave danger (p. 119).
Conclusion
Light’s definitive historical takeaway is that the Dutch monopoly policy is self-defeating: by destroying the very trading networks that generated revenue, they have impoverished both themselves and their neighbours, and no amount of military force can substitute for the organic commerce of free navigation. He positions Penang not as an immediate revenue source but as the strategic node from which a restored trade could be rebuilt, contingent upon a rational Anglo-Dutch settlement of commercial boundaries.
Context
- Light wrote as the de facto governor of Prince of Wales’s Island, addressing the Governor-General of India in a capacity that blended colonial administration with commercial advocacy; the letter is essentially a policy memorandum seeking metropolitan support for his settlement.
- The letter was communicated to the MBRAS by C. E. Wurtzburg, a Straits-based historian and antiquary, and published without editorial commentary, preserving Light’s original spelling and orthography.