Historical Organization
Dutch East India Company
Dutch East India Company
Also known as: VOC
Details
Organization Timeline
The VOC establishes a settlement at the Cape
📅 6 April 1652Jan van Riebeeck arrived at Table Bay to establish a Dutch East India Company refreshment station. The settlement occupied land used by Khoikhoi communities and became the base of settler colonial...
Abraham, an enslaved stowaway, reaches the Cape
📅 2 March 1653Abraham arrived aboard the Malacca after escaping his enslaver in Batavia. His arrival illustrates that enslaved people were present before the first large VOC slave shipments.
The Amersfoort brings enslaved Angolans to the Cape
📅 28 March 1658The Amersfoort anchored in Table Bay with 174 surviving captives taken from a Portuguese slave ship. This shipment entrenched chattel slavery in the developing Cape Colony.
The Hasselt brings enslaved West Africans to the Cape
📅 6 May 1658The VOC slaver Hasselt arrived with 228 enslaved people taken from the West African coast. Together with the Amersfoort shipment, their arrival expanded forced labour at the Cape.
Van Riebeeck creates a burgher militia
📅 1 May 1659The colonial administration organized free settlers into an armed commando shortly before open conflict with Khoikhoi communities. The militia strengthened settler control over land and livestock.
Khoikhoi resistance begins the First Khoikhoi-Dutch War
📅 19 May 1659Khoikhoi fighters led by Doman raided settler herds in an attempt to recover cattle and land appropriated along the Liesbeeck River. The raids opened the first sustained anti-colonial war at the Cape.
British forces attack the Dutch position at Muizenberg
📅 7 August 1795British forces attacked the Cape during the French Revolutionary Wars. The battle began Britain's first occupation and transferred colonial power without consulting the indigenous or enslaved...
The Cape Colony capitulates to Britain
📅 16 September 1795Dutch colonial authorities surrendered the Cape to Britain. Indigenous communities and enslaved people remained subjected to colonial rule under a new imperial power.