SUNDAY REVIEW / NEW AMSTERDAM=NEW YORK

GUEST BLOG / By Jesse Greenspan, freelance journalist writing for History.com--On this day in 1664, the Dutch surrendered New Amsterdam to the British, who in turn renamed it New York. On Sunday it was New Amsterdam and a day later, Sept 8 it was New York. 

At its peak, only about 9,000 people lived in the Dutch colony of New Netherland, leaving it vulnerable to attack from the English, who fought three wars against the Dutch, their main commercial rivals, between 1652 and 1674 and who vastly outnumbered them in the New World. 

 The breaking point came in March 1664, when English King Charles II awarded the colony’s land to his brother, James Stuart*, the Duke of York, even though the two countries were then technically at peace. A few months later, four warships with several hundred soldiers onboard arrived in New Amsterdam’s harbor and demanded that the Dutch surrender. Though Dutch leader Peter Stuyvesant at least outwardly prepared to fight, prominent city residents persuaded him to stand down, and on September 8 he signed the colony over without any blood being shed. 

 However, In 1673, during the Third Anglo-Dutch War, the Dutch re-conquered Manhattan with an invasion force of some 600 men. But they gave it up the following year as part of a peace treaty in which they retained Suriname in South America. “They thought that was going to be worth more,” Fabend said. “They were wrong.” 

* Duke of York James Stuart, brother to King Charles II,
became King James II in 1685.