VOC Era Orphanage Criticized Similar To Pig Cage

A lithography by Johan Nieuhof entitled T' Weenshuys op Batavia, depicting a Dutch woman giving alms to two orphanage children. (Mutual Heritage Atlas)

JAKARTA - Licensing is the estuary of the birth of children outside of marriage. This phenomenon has become a common secret. Moreover, in the early phase of Dutch colonialism. Dutch trading airlines, VOCs to villages. Strict rules are perpetuated. In fact, the death penalty for those who are proven to have committed adultery.

Still adultery is not lost. Problems arise. Children born outside of marriage are piled up. The Company takes a stand. Many orphanages were established as moral responsibility. Instead of a flood of praise, the presence of orphanages was instead criticized as resembling pigpens.

Life away from their hometowns often makes someone darken their eyes. The narrative represents a portrait of the life of the Dutch in Batavia (now: Jakarta) in the early phase of Dutch colonialism. Those who incidentally work as lowly compeni employees are reluctant to be dizzy with moral matters.

The absence of European women is the reason. Those who are allowed to take their wives to a limited colony country to high-ranking officials only. This fact makes adultery the most reasonable option to satisfy business.

The Dutch then perpetuated adultery everywhere. The women they met in the colony were targeted. Some satisfactorily went to the prostitution house. There are also those who choose to buy female slaves from various ethnic groups to help guide them regarding bed and kitchen matters.

The narrative had angered the founder of Batavia, Jan Pieterszoon Coen. The governor-general, who twice served in 1619-1623 and 1627-1629, described the morale of his employees as broken.

Coen considered the damage because of the actions of the Company's shareholders in the Netherlands like grocery workers who did not want to spend large amounts of money. They refused to send European women from good families.

Coen also tactics. He perpetuates strict rules. Anyone who perpetuates adultery will receive severe punishment, even the death penalty. Coen's decision was taken because he saw for himself how impudent his subordinates were.

Children born outside of sexual intercourse. Likewise with the increasing number of abortions in Batavia. Coen thought the morale of the Dutch should be maintained. The trial worked for a while. However, that condition got crazy again when Coen's power ended.

At first there was little that could be done to control the situation. The soldiers and sailors have been swept away from their homeland, lack of women, and placed in remote trading offices in areas with foreign civilizations,"

They heard rumors of a harem originating from the initial meetings of senior traders with the daughters of Asian aristocrats. While their own superiors took the slaves for personal needs. In such circumstances, the moral values they brought from their homeland began to fade and could no longer be expected, "said Jean Gelman Taylor in the book Social Life in Batavia (2009).

The Company is also dizzy by the high birth rate of children outside of marriage. They don't want the orphans to grow up on education. The Geraja Council took a stand and began to build shelters for orphans, orphanages in Batavia.

The construction of the orphanage was deliberately perpetuated because the Company wanted orphans to live in tandem. They also get access to education according to Christian norms. The Company is also trying to guarantee that orphans will have a better fate.

It is planned that orphans will be employed by the Company to prosper. Even though not everything materializes. The orphanage did not mix orphans carelessly. They put groups of European boys and girls in one place. While they are boys and Indo-Dutch women in different places.

Problems arise. In fact, coaching the beach to take care of children born outside of marriage is not considered the best. The Dutch actually advised many children born out of marriage to be raised by adopted families, rather than being accommodated by orphanages.

The narrative arose because the Council of Churches recorded many dirty orphanages in 1723. Orphanages managed by the widow of Wetgens, for example. Instead of getting a good education, orphans who are in orphanages live a long time, and are in poverty.

The church council did not even hesitate to label the orphanage like a pigpen. All because the rooms in the orphanage are dirty, it's no joke. Orphans don't even have many change of clothes.

Therefore, many orphans hope to get out of the orphanage soon. The only hope for orphans is to grow up soon and get a decent job. Other hopes arise from orphans. They hope to be proposed soon by a rich husband in order to get out of the orphanage.

Girls sleep in a narrow room that looks more like a pig coop than a bedroom. They don't sleep in bed or above the case, but sleep like in a zoo, each with a dirty and disgusting small pillow.

"It turns out that the Mrs. Wetgens has sold the orphans' equipment and sleeping clothes to others. Women's orphans are only given two upper clothes and two bottom skirts or sarongs so it is impossible to clean themselves and change clothes. At night, they have to sleep in a room without lighting like animals," explained historian Hendrik E. Niemeijer in the book Batavia: Colonial Society of the XVII Century (2012).