It was 2 Oct 1629, Dutchman Jeronimus Cornelisz was noosed along with 15 other men by the Dutch East Indies Company for a reign of terror that included mutiny and murder off the coast of Australia.* Six others would eventually hang in the infamous affair, two marooned on the Australian mainland, and many more punished for the gruesome atrocities committed on the Southern Ocean. Cornelisz was not such an assuming character when he boarded the vessel Batavia in 1628. Rather, he was a marginally failed merchant, someone who could buy his way on board as an under-merchant** and sail to...
