Editing Dutch West India Company (section)

===Involvement in Brazil===

There were conflicts between directors from different areas of The Netherlands, with Amsterdam less supportive of the company. Non-maritime cities, including [[Haarlem]], [[Leiden]], and [[Gouda, South Holland|Gouda]], along with Enkhuizen and Hoorn were enthusiastic about seizing territory. They sent a fleet to Brazil, capturing [[Olinda]] and [[Pernambuco]] in 1630 in their initial foray to create a Dutch Brazil, but could not hold them due to a strong Portuguese resistance.<ref>Israel, ''The Dutch Republic and the Hispanic World'', pp. 201–02.</ref> Company ships continued privateering in the Caribbean, as well seizing vital land resources, particularly salt pans.<ref>Israel, ''The Dutch Republic and the Hispanic World'', p. 203.</ref> The company's general lack of success saw their shares plummet and the Dutch and The Spanish renewed truce talks in 1633.<ref>Israel, ''The Dutch Republic and the Hispanic World'', p. 204.</ref>

In 1629, the GWC gave permission to a number of investors in [[New Netherland]]s to found [[patroonships]], enabled by the [[Charter of Freedoms and Exemptions]] which was ratified by the [[States General of the Netherlands|Dutch States General]] on 7 June 1629. The patroonships were created to help populate the colony, by providing investors grants providing land for approximately 50 people "upwards of 15 years old", per grant, mainly in the region of New Netherland.<ref name="WDL2"/><ref name="WDL">{{cite web |url = http://www.wdl.org/en/item/4066/ |title = Conditions as Created by their Lords Burgomasters of Amsterdam |website = [[World Digital Library]] |year = 1656 |access-date = 2013-07-28 |archive-date = 2013-06-05 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20130605151543/http://www.wdl.org/en/item/4066/ |url-status = live }}</ref> Patroon investors could expand the size of their land grants as large as 4 miles, "along the shore or along one bank of a navigable river..." [[Rensselaerswyck]] was the most successful Dutch West India Company patroonship.<ref name="WDL2"/>

[[File:FortsGoldküste.JPG|thumb|Forts of the Gold Coast (map circa 1700)]]

The New Netherland area, which included [[New Amsterdam]], covered parts of present-day New York, Connecticut, Delaware, and New Jersey,<ref name="WDL2"/> with Manhattan and [[Fort Amsterdam]] serving as the first capital.<ref name=jones17>[[#jones1904|Jones, 1904]], p. 17</ref> Other settlements were established on the [[Netherlands Antilles]], and in South America, in Dutch Brazil, [[Suriname]] and [[Guyana]]. In Africa, posts were established on the [[Dutch Gold Coast|Gold Coast]] (now [[Ghana]]), the [[Dutch Slave Coast|Slave Coast]] (now [[Benin]]), and briefly in [[Dutch Loango-Angola]]. It was a neo-[[feudal system]], where patrons were permitted considerable powers to control the overseas colony. In the Americas, [[fur]] (North America) and sugar (South America) were the most important trade goods, while African settlements traded the enslaved (mainly destined for the plantations on the Antilles and Suriname), gold, copper and ivory.