Daendels
Governor-General of the East Indies in the Napoleonic era, who conscripted laborers to build the 1,000 km Great Post Road.
Life
Patriot officer
Daendels was a Dutch Patriot officer who had fought in the French Revolutionary Wars. In 1808, with the Netherlands under Napoleon's control, he was sent to Java as Governor-General with the task of guarding against a British attack.
Iron-fisted governor-general
He overhauled the colonial government with an iron hand, curbed the power of Java's princes, and conscripted tens of thousands of laborers to build the 1,000 km "Great Post Road" running along Java's north coast from Anyer to Panarukan; large numbers of laborers died on the project.
Great Post Road
He was recalled in 1811, and the British occupied Java that same year. He died in 1818 on the Dutch Gold Coast (present-day Ghana).
Legacy
The Great Post Road built by Daendels is still a main transport artery of northern Java, but it was built at the cost of a great many laborers' lives.
Did you know? The Indonesian writer Pramoedya Ananta Toer devoted an entire book, The Great Post Road, to the road's history of blood and tears.
Key dates
- 1808Became Governor-General of the East Indies
- 1809Began building the Great Post Road
- 1811Recalled
- 1818Died on the Gold Coast