Chapter 5: Fort Nassau – 1725–1735
By 1725, Stadthaven had grown into a town of five thousand souls. Ships crowded its harbour; warehouses lined its quays. But prosperity brought predators. Pirates from Madagascar preyed on the shipping lanes; French privateers based in Mauritius saw easy prey.
Hendrik Van der Berg, now twenty years old and newly appointed governor, stood with Karl von Stauffen on the headland overlooking the bay. The old Swedish engineer leaned on a cane, but his eyes still held the fire of a man who had built fortresses for the Habsburgs.
"Here," von Stauffen said, tapping the rocky promontory with his stick. "The walls must be twelve feet thick. The guns must reach any ship that dares enter the bay. If we build it right, no navy in the world will take this harbour."
Hendrik squinted at the horizon. "And the cost?"
"More than your grandfather's bank holds." Von Stauffen smiled grimly. "But the alternative is to watch the French sail in and take everything we have built."
Hendrik appointed Adriaan van Rijn, a young Dutch cartographer who had arrived as an indentured servant, to survey the site and manage the logistics of construction. Van Rijn was meticulous, patient, and utterly devoted to the colony's future. He had mapped the coastline and knew every rock and reef.
"Mijnheer van Rijn," Hendrik said, handing him a set of von Stauffen's plans, "you will oversee the work. I want a fortress that will stand for a hundred years."
Van Rijn studied the drawings. "It will take a decade, Your Excellency. And we will need stone, lime, and labor."
"Take whatever you need," Hendrik said. "The safety of this colony is worth any price."
The fortress took eight years. Von Stauffen drove the workers mercilessly, sleeping on site, inspecting every stone. When a young mason complained of the heat, the engineer's voice cracked like a whip. "Do you think the French will care about the heat when their cannonballs are crashing through your walls? Work faster, or we will all be dead."
The mason muttered something about tyrants, but he worked.
Stone was quarried from the hills; lime was burned from seashells; timber was hauled from Eastwood's forests. The walls rose slowly, foot by foot. Van Rijn kept meticulous records, noting every delay and every triumph.
In 1733, the last cannon was mounted. Von Stauffen did not live to see it—he had died the previous winter, his final words a critique of the gun emplacements. But his apprentices had finished the work. The fort stood proud, its guns commanding the bay.
A week after the fort's completion, a French frigate appeared on the horizon. It flew no colors, its intentions unclear. The captain of the fort, a veteran of von Stauffen's campaigns, ordered the gun crews to stand ready.
The frigate circled the bay for an hour. Through a glass, Hendrik could see the French captain studying the walls. Then the ship turned and sailed away.
That evening, Hendrik sat in the governor's house with his wife, Raden Ayu Kartini, a Javanese princess whom he had married to strengthen ties with the East Indies. She was a woman of quiet intelligence, fluent in Dutch, Malay, and Javanese, and she had become his most trusted advisor.
"They will come again," she said softly, pouring him wine. "The French, the English, the Dutch. They all want what we have."
Hendrik took the cup. "Then we will be ready. My grandfather bought an island. My father built a town. I will build a nation."
She touched his hand. "And what will our son build?"
He looked out the window toward the fort, its walls already weathering into the landscape. "Whatever he dreams. By then, no one will dare to take it from him."
The next morning, a letter arrived from Amsterdam: Cornelius Van der Berg had died at eighty-two. The flag of Zeelandia was lowered to half‑mast, then raised again. The kingdom had lost its founder, but the foundation was strong.
Hendrik stood on the ramparts of Fort Nassau, watching the sun rise over the bay his grandfather had claimed. He thought of the words that would be carved on Cornelius's tombstone: Hier ligt een man die een koninkrijk begon—Here lies a man who began a kingdom.
Then he turned to the business of ruling.