MAILRAPPORTEN/MAIL REPORTS

FROM THE NETHERLANDS EAST INDIES, 1869-1940

National Archives of the Netherlands, The Hague

on microfiche

Historical background

With the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, the authorities of the Ministry of the Colonies in The Hague were quick to seize the possibility of improving communications with the East Indies, which the lengthy sea route around the Cape of Good Hope had hampered until that point. Henceforth new rapid English and later Dutch mail boats plied the route through the Mediterranean and Suez to the East assuring regular and reliable postal services for the first time in the history of the colony. Previous instructions to the governor general to report on a regular basis, which had largely remained a dead letter, were revived and revised to bring about a frequent and swift flow of information from the Indies to the Netherlands. By royal decree of 28 May 1869, the governor general was required to report on all important events, proceedings, proposals and other issues separately, sending where necessary transcripts of the relevant supporting documents.

The first of the so-called Mailrapporten were dispatched in September 1869 from Batavia (Jakarta) to The Hague, thus initiating a steady flow of information to the Dutch Ministry of the Colonies up to the eve of the Second World War on a weekly or more frequent basis. Unlike the Memories van Overgave, which were a snapshot of the situation at a particular point in time, the Mailrapporten permit the study of the development of events in their continuity. Parts I-III contain the "Public" (Openbare) Mailrapporten; part IV the series of "Secret" (Geheime) Mailrapporten initiated in 1914.