Of the many mercantile adventures that marked European exploitations of Asia, one of the most entertaining is that of the French in Siam. This is a well-known story that has been told by many historians, among them Maurice Collis, E.W. Hutchinson and Michael Smithies himself. All have chronicled this classic failure, which began with the seeking of converts and trade and ended with troops, occupation and abject withdrawal.
In this, his most recent book, Smithies has discovered an intriguing new angle from which to view the carnage: the viewpoint of a sober-sided merchant, Francois Martin, in Pondicherry, India. Though he stayed on his own side of the Bay of Bengal and never went to Siam, Martin was the head of the French trading post there and thus privy to all the correspondence that passed through. In addition he kept a diary, in which he recorded and pondered over what information he got.
These diaries, nearly 2,000 pages of them, languished in various places until they were finally published between 1931 and 1934. It is this edition that Smithies has used as the source for his own book.
Martin, he found, "had a unique viewpoint. He was duty-bound to support French activities, but he was a prudent soul and had a businessman's instincts . . . of what would work and what would not." Thus he could record the colonial blunders of his countrymen and at the same time wonder at their efficacy.
Things got off to a shaky start. The emissary of France, mindful of dignity, refused to make his appearance before the king of Siam in the manner required of other national representatives, that is, "crawling on the ground and on their knees and elbows, their heads bowed." Rather, he sat with legs crossed and, when the king appeared, "inclined his body somewhat."
Nonetheless, King Narai looked with apparent favor on the new envoy, did not seem displeased with the conversions at once attempted by the accompanying priests, and apparently took as a personal attention the gift of a stray lion. This animal ended up in the royal menagerie, and later French visitors noted that it looked just like the late Marshal Turenne, "perhaps more on account of his style in wigs rather than in leonine physiognomy."
All, however, was not well. There were the British and the machinations of the East India Company; there were the Dutch and the French, all buzzing about the gold-filled country; and within there was the redoubtable Greek adventurer Phaulkon (Constantine Gherakis), who had obtained the king's ear. Of him Martin wrote that even his many enemies "conceded that he was a very clever person, but his ambition, his intolerable vanity, which went as afar as requiring everything to submit to him, greatly tarnished all these fine qualities."
Phaulkon played Dutch against English, English against French, and Siam against all. Jesuitic plans to convert the king were themselves easily subverted, and even the massacre of the English at Mergui was turned to good account. Among the many results was that the French (alternately encouraged and forbidden by the perfidious Phaulkon) finally decided on what passed as a military occupation of Bangkok.
This served as partial pretext for a coup d'etat, and the negligent King Narai was deposed and his line destroyed in many a picturesque incident. His half brothers, for example, were "put into sacks of scarlet cloth and beat [to death] with clubs," the color of the sacking apparently chosen to limit the horror of the courtiers.
The deposed king died, Phaulkon was executed and his wife was submitted to various outrages. (This lady was Japanese by birth and, as Martin notes, "this people is dauntless in the face of adversity." Her story would be an intriguing one for some interested historian to take up.) Meanwhile, the usurper Petracha took the throne, and the impotent French rattled their sabers.
Nonetheless, terrible things happened to them. The missionaries were "dispersed in common prisons, the 'cagne' round their necks, their feet and hands in the stocks." Their bishop "was imprisoned in a bamboo hovel covered with straw or leaves." Others were "chained to criminals and taken to work, carrying bricks . . . and not a grain of rice for food."
The remainder of the military embarked upon what Smithies calls a "fruitless expedition to Phuket led by their incompetent Gen. Desfarges," and eventually dribbled home. The great colonial adventure of the French in Siam had come to an end.
Martin himself ended up somewhat better. Though his post was taken by the Dutch, he made his way to Batavia with his whole family, was well received, later lived with his son-in-law in Bengal and at the end of a full and useful life returned to Pondicherry, where he expired on the last day of 1706.
His journal-memoirs offer us an oblique but unique view of the great events of his time, and Smithies, by judiciously sharpening the focus and comparing Martin's view with those of his contemporaries, has given us a valuable and entertaining view of one of history's many fiascoes.
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.