Jewish merchants

Jewish merchants

Editorial history

08/11/12: CSG, created page

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Purpose of page

The MarineLives project is seeking to link and enhance HCA 13/71, not just to transcribe it. Jewish merchants feature in a number of HCA 13/71 cases and depositions.

All associates, facilitators, advisors and PhD Forum members are encouraged to contribute to this page from their knowledge of the material, and from their broader knowledge and interest in the topic.

• What trading activities are described involving Jewish merchants?
• Where are the Jewish merchants located, and with whom are they networked commercially and socially?
• Can you identify Portuguese merchants of possible Jewish faith, who conceal their religion for commercial reasons?

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Andrew and Christofer Munez (alias ?Meyenberg)

Christopher Boone and the Munez/Meyenberg(h) family

The London merchant Christopher Boone was deposed on the behalfe of the Amsterdam based Jewish merchants, Andrew and Christofer Munez, alias Meyenberg, regarding the alleged embezzlement of goods on the wonderfully named Hare in the ffeild. Boone was the London correspondent of the Munez/Meyenberg family.

Christopher Boone (b. c. 1615, d. 1686) was from Taunton, in Somerset origin. He worked as a factor in Seville in the 16XX, prior to returning to London. He was brother or cousin of Thomas Boone, also a merchant, and both were involved in the Spanish trade. Christopher Boone was also a cousin of Sir George Oxenden, who was President of the East India Company in Surat (1662-1669).

Both Christopher and Thomas Boone appear frequently in the correspondence of the Spanish merchant, John Paige. Paige was associated with Maurice Thompson in the 1650s in several ventures in the East Indies. Thomas Boone had been involved with Maurice Thompson in the late 1640s in advancing the Asssada plantation off Madagascar.

Christopher Boone's deposition in a case involving the Dutch ship the Hare in the Fields makes mention of the restrictions on trade for Jewish merchants in Spain. He was later resident at St Leonard, Bromley, Middlesex (1666) and at All Saints, Lee, West Kent (1686).

• "The said Andrew and Christofer were of the Jewish Profession of Religion and therefore not free to trade in Spaine"

- HCA 13/71 f.220r Case: On the behalfe of the foresaid ?Meyenberg alias Andrew and Chr Munez, touching goods embeazled out of the hare in the ffeild ; Deposition: 4. Christofer Boone of London Merchant, aged 38 yeeres: Date: XXXX

The Hare in the field

Additional traces of the Hare in the field in various printed primary source include:

• Letter dated 'Nieuport, the Dutch ambassador in England, the gressier Ruysch' (ca. September 10th, 1655):

Referring to "secondly, the excess which is daily committed in bringing in ships and goods belonging to the said subjects into the ports and harbours of England, as well by private men of war, as the ships in the service of this state", the Dutch ambassador went on to state: "To the second, concerning some particular complaints, I desired, that the ship the Hare in the Field, also the Frog, might both be released, being both of Middleburgh..."

• Letter dated 'Admiral De Ruyter to the states-general, from aboard the ship Amsterdam, the 8th of April 1657

The Hare in the field continued to be involved in trading English goods, with an ambiguous national identity, as can be seen in in letter from Admiral de Ruyter to the states-general, written from his vessel in the western Mediterranean, off the coast of Spain, and dated April 8th 1657:

This day I received a letter from their noble great lordships of the fifth of January, concerning the ship the Hare-in-the-field, about which I was on the third instant by the governor, who caused the same to be brought in, and I also spoke with the consul Van Hove about it, who thought that the governor had right for what he had done, and said, that the goods were laden most in England and France, and consequently were lawful prize. But after I had spoken with the duke de Medina Celi, he seemed to be more mild, and promised to write a letter to the king of Spain about it, and to send it by an express.