20191124_Suriname_0022 Paramaribo sRGB
Bastion Veere (bastion 3) at Fort Zeelandia was the site of the December Murders, the execution of 15 prominent critics on 8 December 1982 by the military government of dictator Dési Bouterse. [Bouterse was later elected president in 2010. On 29 November 2019 he was convicted of the December Murders and sentenced to 20 years in prison.]
Fort Zeelandia started around 1644 as just a set of palisades on the left bank of the Suriname River. The British captured the site in 1650 and after initially doing merely some reinforcement, built a replacement stone fortress christened Fort Willoughby after the local English commander in chief (Lord Francis Willoughby, Governor of Barbados). The pentagonal fort had three bastions facing the river and two facing inland where a wall and moats provided additional protection. In 1667, after a three-hour battle when munitions ran out, the fort was lost to forces led by Admiral Abraham Crijnssen from the Dutch province of Zeeland who renamed it Fort Zeelandia. The fort’s strategic value was questioned when in 1712 the French eschewed a heroic battle to take the fortress and attacked the plantations directly. Eventually a new fort, Fort Nieuw-Amsterdam, was built in 1747 at the mouth of the river where it could protect both the city and the plantations. Fort Zeelandia deteriorated. Tearing it down was considered in 1772 but was deemed too expensive. Starting in 1781 several of the bastions were demolished to provide material to shore up the riverbank. The site’s role shifted to garrison with troop barracks and storage buildings. By 1838 the stone fortress was primarily a prison. Between 1968 and 1972 a painstaking renovation was conducted by the government to create a museum.
Following Suriname independence in 1975, the army took possession of the fort. In 1982 during the military dictatorship of Dési Bouterse, 15 prominent young critics were rounded up on December 7 and brought to Fort Zeelandia (Bouterse’s headquarters) to stand trial. By December 9 the men had been tortured and shot dead under circumstances still not completely clear. The December Murders provoked international outrage. [Bouterse was later elected president in 2010. On 29 November 2019 he was convicted of the December Murders and sentenced to 20 years in prison.]
Fort Zeelandia is again a history museum today.
Paramaribo (pronounced ‘par-uh mar-ee boh’), the capital and commercial center of Suriname, lies on the left bank of the Suriname River roughly 15 kilometers (9.3 miles) inland from the Atlantic Ocean where the Dutch established a trading post in 1613. The trading post had been abandoned by the time British settlers arrived in 1650 and established a town on the site. The Dutch conquered Paramaribo in 1667 during the Second Anglo-Dutch War which ended with the Netherlands acquiring the colony of Suriname with Paramaribo as its capital. The city suffered devastating fires in 1821 and in 1832. Its population saw a dramatic increase after 1873 when emancipated African slaves were finally able to leave the plantations.
Suriname (or Surinam) is the smallest sovereign nation in South America and the only nation outside Europe where Dutch is spoken by a majority of the population (although Sranan Tongo, an English-based Creole language, is widely spoken).
Suriname saw lots of visits by European explorers after Columbus arrived in the area, but the British were the first to establish an actual colony: Marshall’s Creek along the Suriname River. A second colony named Willoughbyland after Lord Francis Willoughby, Governor of Barbados, was founded in 1650 (lasting only until 1674). In the 1667 Treaty of Breda ending the Second Anglo-Dutch War, Britain took New Amsterdam (to be renamed New York City) while the Dutch took the developing plantation colony of Suriname. Those plantations grew primarily sugar cane, cotton, and indigo, all overtaken by coffee in the early 18th century, using African-slave labor. The Netherlands abolished slavery in 1863 with a 10-year transition period when the slaves would get minimal pay before truly being freed in 1873. To work the plantations then, indentured laborers were imported from the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia today)—especially the island of Java—and from India in an arrangement with the British. During World War II, the United States gained the agreement of the Netherlands government-in-exile from the Germans to occupy Suriname in order to protect the bauxite mines, a critical input for aluminum production. In 1975 Suriname gained independence from the Netherlands which continued to provide crucial foreign aid for the next decade.
The Historic Inner City of Paramaribo was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2002.
On Google Earth:
Bastion Veere (bastion 3) 5°49'30.05"N, 55° 8'58.57"W
Fort Zeelandia 5°49'30.70"N, 55° 8'59.09"W
20191124_Suriname_0022 Paramaribo sRGB
Bastion Veere (bastion 3) at Fort Zeelandia was the site of the December Murders, the execution of 15 prominent critics on 8 December 1982 by the military government of dictator Dési Bouterse. [Bouterse was later elected president in 2010. On 29 November 2019 he was convicted of the December Murders and sentenced to 20 years in prison.]
Fort Zeelandia started around 1644 as just a set of palisades on the left bank of the Suriname River. The British captured the site in 1650 and after initially doing merely some reinforcement, built a replacement stone fortress christened Fort Willoughby after the local English commander in chief (Lord Francis Willoughby, Governor of Barbados). The pentagonal fort had three bastions facing the river and two facing inland where a wall and moats provided additional protection. In 1667, after a three-hour battle when munitions ran out, the fort was lost to forces led by Admiral Abraham Crijnssen from the Dutch province of Zeeland who renamed it Fort Zeelandia. The fort’s strategic value was questioned when in 1712 the French eschewed a heroic battle to take the fortress and attacked the plantations directly. Eventually a new fort, Fort Nieuw-Amsterdam, was built in 1747 at the mouth of the river where it could protect both the city and the plantations. Fort Zeelandia deteriorated. Tearing it down was considered in 1772 but was deemed too expensive. Starting in 1781 several of the bastions were demolished to provide material to shore up the riverbank. The site’s role shifted to garrison with troop barracks and storage buildings. By 1838 the stone fortress was primarily a prison. Between 1968 and 1972 a painstaking renovation was conducted by the government to create a museum.
Following Suriname independence in 1975, the army took possession of the fort. In 1982 during the military dictatorship of Dési Bouterse, 15 prominent young critics were rounded up on December 7 and brought to Fort Zeelandia (Bouterse’s headquarters) to stand trial. By December 9 the men had been tortured and shot dead under circumstances still not completely clear. The December Murders provoked international outrage. [Bouterse was later elected president in 2010. On 29 November 2019 he was convicted of the December Murders and sentenced to 20 years in prison.]
Fort Zeelandia is again a history museum today.
Paramaribo (pronounced ‘par-uh mar-ee boh’), the capital and commercial center of Suriname, lies on the left bank of the Suriname River roughly 15 kilometers (9.3 miles) inland from the Atlantic Ocean where the Dutch established a trading post in 1613. The trading post had been abandoned by the time British settlers arrived in 1650 and established a town on the site. The Dutch conquered Paramaribo in 1667 during the Second Anglo-Dutch War which ended with the Netherlands acquiring the colony of Suriname with Paramaribo as its capital. The city suffered devastating fires in 1821 and in 1832. Its population saw a dramatic increase after 1873 when emancipated African slaves were finally able to leave the plantations.
Suriname (or Surinam) is the smallest sovereign nation in South America and the only nation outside Europe where Dutch is spoken by a majority of the population (although Sranan Tongo, an English-based Creole language, is widely spoken).
Suriname saw lots of visits by European explorers after Columbus arrived in the area, but the British were the first to establish an actual colony: Marshall’s Creek along the Suriname River. A second colony named Willoughbyland after Lord Francis Willoughby, Governor of Barbados, was founded in 1650 (lasting only until 1674). In the 1667 Treaty of Breda ending the Second Anglo-Dutch War, Britain took New Amsterdam (to be renamed New York City) while the Dutch took the developing plantation colony of Suriname. Those plantations grew primarily sugar cane, cotton, and indigo, all overtaken by coffee in the early 18th century, using African-slave labor. The Netherlands abolished slavery in 1863 with a 10-year transition period when the slaves would get minimal pay before truly being freed in 1873. To work the plantations then, indentured laborers were imported from the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia today)—especially the island of Java—and from India in an arrangement with the British. During World War II, the United States gained the agreement of the Netherlands government-in-exile from the Germans to occupy Suriname in order to protect the bauxite mines, a critical input for aluminum production. In 1975 Suriname gained independence from the Netherlands which continued to provide crucial foreign aid for the next decade.
The Historic Inner City of Paramaribo was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2002.
On Google Earth:
Bastion Veere (bastion 3) 5°49'30.05"N, 55° 8'58.57"W
Fort Zeelandia 5°49'30.70"N, 55° 8'59.09"W