Nathaniel's Nutmeg

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not much bigger than a garden pea it scarcely had the same appeal as a golden ducat or finely hewn sapphire. I'm not sure how you were supposed to "take" the wine/saffron combo once you were no longer living, but presumably few people were wealthy enough to find out. I now have a better knowledge and understanding of the race for domination of the Spice Islands, the development of the East India Company and the subsequent British Empire.

For five years Courthope and his band of thirty men were besieged by a force one hundred times greater - and his heroism set in motion the events that led to the founding of the greatest city on earth. Many thanks to the person who reviewed it on 50bookchallenge in 2008 and brought it to my attention. The way it is unthinkable for people to die for nutmeg trade back then is akin to our desire for oil trade today. Consider the humble jar of nutmeg pushed to the back of your kitchen cupboard, among all the other spices that you hardly ever use. Drawn from original letters, journals and personal diaries, Nathaniel's Nutmeg sheds light on an extraordinary and little-episode in world history.Lots of interesting, sometimes incredible, true tales of adventure and discovery, but put together in a dry fashion and which, to me, lacked continuity. Against incredible odds, the last of the merchants sent to establish a toehold in the island group, he rallied his men and the natives daily and held Run against the Dutch, under the most brutal conditions, for four long years. Milton did a good job depicting the chaotic, winner-take-all quality of the times, and made it all seem as fun to read as a nineteenth-century adventure story. Bantam (modern day Banten) was once a hot smelly, disease-filled port, “infamous in the East for its loose women and lax morals and an air of profligacy hung over the town like the plague of typhoid that frequently descended on its inhabitants” (98). Brutality was undeniable on both sides, but Nathaniel Courthope's valiant stand on the island of Run made the English claim seem justified.

Throughout most of the book Milton does an admirable job using plenty of primary documents, but when it comes to Courthope, Milton shrugs off academic rigors and paints a picture of a selfless savior. Relying on the wit that had so enamoured him to his adoptive father, he quickly foresaw the danger of Arctic pack-ice. The most wonderful, improbable, intriguing stories are lurking in our history books, if we have the patience and wit to find them. Whereas stories of the exact same kind of plotting and scheming on the part of the British are met either with excuses on Milton's part, or with outright approval. As Milton wittily remarks, although Courthope's death "robbed England of her nutmeg, it gave her the biggest of apples".

Nathaniel Courthope and his small band of adventurers were sent to Run in October 1616, and for four years held off the massive Dutch navy. Henry Hudson was originally looking for this Northeast passage when he decided to throw the chain of his funders and head west to America. the added benefit of avoiding conflict with the Portuguese who had been sailing the eastern route for almost a century and had established fortified bastions in every port. Milton's cause-effect historical ironies, coming only in the final chapter, made sticking with this account unusually rewarding.