Stephanus Versluijs or Versluys (20 August 1694, in

Middelburg Middelburg may refer to: Places and jurisdictions Europe * Middelburg, Zeeland, the capital city of the province of Zeeland, southwestern Netherlands ** Roman Catholic Diocese of Middelburg, a former Catholic diocese with its see in the Zeeland ...

– 27 February 1736, in

Batavia, Dutch East Indies Batavia was the capital of the Dutch East Indies. The area corresponds to present-day Jakarta, Indonesia. Batavia can refer to the city proper or its suburbs and hinterland, the Ommelanden, which included the much-larger area of the Residency ...

) was the 21st

Governor A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...

Dutch Ceylon Dutch Ceylon ( Sinhala: Tamil: ) was a governorate established in present-day Sri Lanka by the Dutch East India Company. Although the Dutch managed to capture most of the coastal areas in Sri Lanka, they were never able to control the Kandyan ...

. Versluijs was the son of Adriana de Muncq and Cornelis Versluijs, mayor of Middelburg and the director of the

Dutch East India company The United East India Company ( nl, Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, the VOC) was a chartered company established on the 20th March 1602 by the States General of the Netherlands amalgamating existing companies into the first joint-stock ...

Zeeland , nl, Ik worstel en kom boven("I struggle and emerge") , anthem = "Zeeuws volkslied"("Zeelandic Anthem") , image_map = Zeeland in the Netherlands.svg , map_alt = , m ...

Chamber. At the age of 19 he started to serve the company, arriving in the East Indies on the ship ''De herstelde Leeuw'' in 1713. He started as under-merchant in Paliacatte and moved in 1717 to Batavia, where by 1722 he had become upper-merchant. In June 1724 he was appointed Governor of Amboina in

Ternate Ternate is a city in the Indonesian province of North Maluku and an island in the Maluku Islands. It was the ''de facto'' provincial capital of North Maluku before Sofifi on the nearby coast of Halmahera became the capital in 2010. It is off the we ...

, in 1727 Extraordinary Council of the East Indies in Batavia, and in 1729 as Governor of Ceylon in

Colombo Colombo ( ; si, කොළඹ, translit=Koḷam̆ba, ; ta, கொழும்பு, translit=Koḻumpu, ) is the executive and judicial capital and largest city of Sri Lanka by population. According to the Brookings Institution, Colombo me ...

to replace Pieter Vuyst, who had been summoned to Batavia for his tyrannical rule (Vuyst was executed in 1732 for his cruelties). In 1732 Versluys was also dismissed as governor, for financial malpractice, and had to appear before the Council of Justice in Batavia. He was imprisoned, but on 5 June 1734 was released on 50,000

rijksdaalder The ''rijksdaalder'' (Dutch, "Imperial dollar") was a Dutch coin first issued by the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands in the late 16th century during the Dutch Revolt which featured an armored half bust of William the Silent. It was the ...

s bail. In 1736 he died in Batavia, without having returned to the Netherlands. Versluijs was married to Adriana de Haan, daughter of

Mattheus de Haan Mattheus de Haan (1663–1729) was Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies from 1725 to 1729.His portrait can be seen a He was born in Dordrecht in 1663. On 26 October 1671 he left for the Indies, where his father had been appointed as Underbuy ...

Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies The governor-general of the Dutch East Indies ( nl, gouverneur-generaal van Nederlands Indië) represented Dutch rule in the Dutch East Indies between 1610 and Dutch recognition of the independence of Indonesia in 1949. Occupied by Japanese fo ...

from 1725 to 1729. She died in Batavia July 22, 1727."Historische-Genealogische-Heraldieke aantekeningen over Ceylon"
in ''De Wapenheraut'', D. G. van Epen, editor, Volume 1, The Hague, 1897, p. 53

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Versluys, Stephanus 1694 births 1736 deaths 18th-century Dutch people Dutch expatriates in Sri Lanka Governors of Dutch Ceylon People from Middelburg, Zeeland Dutch East India Company people