Founding of Modern Singapore - Raffles' Landing and Arrival

Raffles' Landing and Arrival

In 1818, Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles was appointed as the Lieutenant Governor of the British colony at Bencoolen. Raffles believed that the British should find a way to replace the Dutch as the dominant power in the archipelago, since the trade route between China and British India, which had become vitally important with the institution of the opium trade with China, passed through the archipelago. Furthermore, the Dutch were stifling British trade within the region; the British were prohibited from operating in Dutch-controlled ports, with the exception of Batavia, where unfavourable prices were imposed. Raffles reasoned that the way to challenge the Dutch was to establish a new port in the region. Existing British ports were not suited to becoming major trading centres. Penang was too far away from the Straits of Malacca, the main ship passageway for the India-China trade, whereas Bencoolen faced the Indian Ocean, overseeing the entrance to the Sunda Straits, a much less important area. Many other possible sites were either controlled by the Dutch, or had other problems.

In 1818, Raffles managed to convince Lord Hastings, the then governor-general of India and his superior at the British East India Company, to fund an expedition to establish a new British base in the region. Raffles then undertook weeks of lengthy searching and found several islands that seemed promising but were later revealed unfit for use either because they were already occupied by the Dutch, or could not function as a port for reasons such as having too shallow a harbour. Eventually, after contemplating several maps, Raffles happened upon the island of Singapore, which upon investigation, seemed to be a natural choice. It lay at the southern tip of the Malay peninsula, near the Straits of Malacca, and possessed an excellent natural harbour, fresh water supplies, and timber for repairing ships. Most importantly, it was unoccupied by the Dutch.

Raffles' expedition arrived in Singapore on 29 January 1819 (although they landed on Saint John's Island the previous day. He found a small Malay settlement at the mouth of the Singapore River, headed by a Temenggong (governor) of Johor. The island was nominally ruled by Johor, but the political situation there was extremely murky. The current Sultan of Johor, Tengku Abdul Rahman, was controlled by the Dutch and the Bugis, and would never agree to a British base in Singapore. However, Abdul Rahman was Sultan only because his older brother, Tengku Hussein, also known as Tengku Long, had been away in Pahang getting married when their father died.

Between the 16th and 19th centuries, the Malay archipelago was gradually taken over by the European colonial powers, beginning with the arrival of the Portuguese at Malacca in 1509. The early dominance of the Portuguese was challenged, during the 17th century, by the Dutch, who came to control most of the region's ports. The Dutch established a monopoly over trade within the archipelago, particularly in spices, then the region's most important product. Other colonial powers, including the British, were limited to a relatively minor presence.