Ron van Maanen
After the French occupation the Netherlands became an independent kingdom and the trade shipping towards the Dutch East Indies was gain possible. However in 1814 didn't the Dutch East Indies Company exist anymore and what was left of her ships was sold after 1801 to private entrepreneurs. The war between the French empire and countries like England made it nearly continuous impossible to use these ships. In 1814 there was just a cargo capacity of 10.000 lasten available in the Netherlands. To compensate this ships had to be bought or build abroad, mainly in the Baltic area, England and the United States. The Dutch government encouraged the Dutch merchant shipping and building along with other measures with subsidies (Fonds Nationale Nijverheid) and freights (Nederlandsche Handels Maatschappij). Slowly the yards at Rotterdam, Dordrecht but also in Middelburg and Zierikzee begun to built new East Indiamen. An increasing number of ships was build.
15 February 1842. Zierikzee, 14 February. Due to the shipwrecking of the Stad Zierikzee (1) was it planned to lay down the keel of an new ship with the same name and for the same owners as the Dutch king.
15 March 1842. Zierikzee, Saturday 12 March. Today was at the city yard the keel laid down by C. Mak of the Stad Zierikzee (II) to replace the first Stad Zierikzee wrecked 3 months earlier.
18 April 1843. Zierikzee, Saturday, 15 April. Today was at the city yard with success by C. Mak the coppered 2-decks bark ship Stad Zierikzee of 400 Java lasten (1) launched. She destined for the trade towards the Dutch East Indies. Her master was J.C. Hoek.
Note
1. In 1826 was the standard to calculate the cargo capacity of a ship the so-called roggelast (rogge=rye) of 2.075 kilo’s. In 1827 made the Nederlandsche Handels Maatschappij a list of all colonial products with their weights corresponding with the space needed for one roggelast. This became known as the Java last. For instance the weight of a Java last tea was 1.000 kilo, of pepper 1.600, of rice 2.000 and of coffee 1.500 kilo (in the practice in fact 1.800).
