Everything about Jacob Le Maire totally explained
Jacob Le Maire (c.
1585,
Antwerp -
December 22 1616, at sea) was a
Dutch mariner, who circumnavigated the earth in 1615-16. He discovered the strait between
Tierra del Fuego and
Staten Island, Argentina; that strait is now named the
Le Maire Strait in his honour. He was the first person to round
Cape Horn, proving that
Tierra del Fuego wasn't a continent.
Le Maire was one of 22 children of Maria van Walraven and
Isaac Le Maire (1558-1624), then already a prosperous merchant in Antwerp. Isaac and his family fled Antwerp after the Spanish siege of the city in 1585, the same year Jacob is thought to be born, to settle in
Amsterdam. Isaac was very successful in Amsterdam, and became one of the founders of the
Dutch East Indies Company (VOC). However, in 1605 Isaac Le Maire was forced to leave the company after a dispute and for the next decade tried to break the company's monopoly on the trade to the East Indies.
By 1615 Isaac had established a new company (the
Australian Company) with the goal to find a new route to the
Pacific and the
Spice Islands, thereby evading the restrictions of the VOC. He outfitted two ships, the
Eendracht and
Hoorn, and put his son Jacob in charge of the expedition. The experienced sailor
Willem Schouten was captain of the
Eendracht.
On
June 14 1615 Jacob le Maire and Willem Schouten sailed from
Texel in the
United Provinces. On
January 29 1616 they rounded
Cape Horn, which they named for the
Hoorn, which was lost in a fire. The Dutch city of
Hoorn was also the birthplace of Schouten. After failing to moor at the
Juan Fernández Islands in early March, the ships crossed the Pacific in a fairly straight line, visiting several of the
Tuamotus. Between April 21 and 24 1616 they were the first Westerners to visit the (Northern)
Tonga islands: "Cocos Island" (
Tafahi), "Traitors Island" (
Niuatoputapu), and "Island of Good Hope" (
Niuafo'ou). On April 28 they discovered the
Hoorn Islands (
Futuna and
Alofi), where they were very well received and staid until May 12. They then followed the north coasts of
New Ireland and
New Guinea and visited adjacent islands, including what became known as the
Schouten Islands on
July 24.
They reached the Northern Moluccas in August and finally
Ternate, the head quarters of the VOC, on September 12, 1616. Here they were enthusiastically welcomed by
Governor-General Laurens Reael, admiral
Steven Verhagen, and the governor of
Ambon, Jasper Jansz.
The
Eendracht sailed on to
Java and reached
Jacatra on October 28 with a remarkable 84 of the original 87-crew members of both ships on board.
Although they'd opened an unknown route,
Jan Pietersz Coen of the VOC claimed infringement of its monopoly of trade to the
Spice Islands. Le Maire and Schouten were arrested and the
Eendracht was confiscated. After being released, they returned from Jacatra to Amsterdam in the company of
Joris van Spilbergen, who was on a circumnavigation of the earth himself, be it via the traditional
Strait of Magellan.
Le Maire captained the ship the
Amsterdam on this journey home, but died en route. Van Spilbergen was at his dying bed and took Le Maire's report of his trip and included it in his book "Mirror of the East and West Indies". Jacob's father Isaac challenged the confiscation and the conclusion of the VOC, but it took him until 1622 until a court ruled in his favor. He was awarded 64,000 pounds, could retrieve his son's diaries (which he then published as well), and his company was allowed trade via the newly discovered route. Unfortunately, by then, the
Dutch West Indies Company had claimed the same waters.
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