Dutch colonial family correspondence traveled by barge, train, and ship across continents.

Evidence

Here, Frans Carl Valck appears as just one affinal member (for it is the Lucassens who are fully present) of a family whose broad clan spent generations moving between Europe and the Indies, whose births, engagements, deaths, and dishonor they chronicle in a steady stream of missives that made their way across the Netherlands on canal barges, across Europe by train, and most often by ship to Marseille via Singapore and then Java. These are letters carefully folded, their envelopes still intact, timed to make the next barge departing for the Dutch provinces, or sometimes hurried to make the next boat leaving from Marseille. — Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ Epistemic…, 1312

Categorization

• CANDY: Letters timed to catch the next canal barge is a small evocative transport fact.
• QUESTION: The material logistics of empire-wide correspondence networks could reward closer study of timing, routes, and cost.