WD3001

Distant view of Government House, Buitenzorg (Bogor), Java 1816

By Mary Fendall (1794-1886).

Inscribed on front in pencil: ‘A distant view of the Govt. Ho. Buitenzorg, Gunung Gédé & the River Chidami’.

Pencil; 28.8 by 40 cm.

Note: A duplicate of WD3000. but with a lighter pencil. The two drawings are of interest since they afford a virtually unique view of the environs of Governmnent House before the Botanical Garden began to be laid out by Professor C.G.C. Reinwardt in 1817. During the British period private estates surrounded Government House which had virtually no public lands of its own since they had been sold off by Governor-General H.W. Daendels between 1808 and 1810. These lands had customarily been purchased during the previous half-century by each succeeding Governor-General from his predecessor at a low price, and Daendels acquired them from Governor-General A.H. Wiese in April 1808 on that basis. He then broke with tradition and began disposing of them for his personal gain to private proprietors. His excuse was that the system of purchase by successive Governors-General at low prices discouraged investment and was therefore inimical to improved cultivation. The lands known as Kampong Baru and Pondok Gede were sold in April 1808 to one Dutch proprietor, and two years later those Buitenzorg lands to the east and west were sold to a small syndicate of proprietors, yielding to Daendels an enormous profit. The owner of Kampong Baru, the estate most immediately connected with Government House, died in September 1819, at which time Raffles discussed with one of the large Dutch estate proprietors the possibility of acquiring the estate for himself in the event of quitting his post as Lieutenant-Governor. Later he accounted for this curious conversation in a-different way, stating that as the Government House had no lands of its own it was suggested that he should purchase Kampong Baru on account of Government and use the estate as a farm. Nothing, however, was done, and during the British period the lands attached to Government House at Buitenzorg remained small.