Stitches to Slavery

Carla de Jonge was a member of the advisory committee for the Exhibition of Historical Dress, held at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam in 1919. De Jonge later succeeded in adding many objects from that exhibition to the collection of the Centraal Museum. In 1924, she wrote to Carolina Andrea Nepveu, referring to this exhibition:

The plan succeeds, as that same year the piece is loaned to the Centraal Museum.
Of course, this dress had already had an entire life before this moment of transfer. A first step in unraveling that life lies in the answer Nepveu gives De Jonge:

The couple’s money has its origins somewhere. Their fortune largely comes from their families. The family wealth, which stems in part from slavery and (shares in) plantations, accumulates and is preserved through inheritance and marriages between influential families.

Simply by tracing their bloodlines, it becomes clear that both Anna Jacoba des Tombe and Jan Ignatius Daniel Nepveu are grandchildren of plantation owners. Their family wealth therefore stems from ‘dirty money’.

Anna Jacoba’s grandfather, Arnold Hendrik des Tombe, is a military officer working in Suriname. He owns the Des Tombesburg plantation on the Commewijne River. In 1770, he sells the plantation, including the enslaved people he owns, for 195,000 guilders. This is equivalent to around 1.7 million euros today.

Jan Ignatius Daniel’s grandfather, Laurens Johannes Nepveu, amassed even more wealth through his colonial activities. His inheritance was worth more than 600,000 guilders, equivalent to €5.5 million today. Among other assets, he inherited two of the seven plantations owned by his father, Jan Nepveu: La Singularité and Ma Retraite. For many years, he lived off the proceeds from these plantations. In 1795, he sold the Ma Retraite plantation to Francois Ewoud Becker for 180,000 guilders. But his attachment to the plantation was clearly not over, as about five years later he built a country house in Zeist bearing the same name. He retained La Singularité until at least 1810, the year Jan Ignatius Daniel was born, or until 1819 at the latest, when the plantation was registered as the property of Majorin Elisabeth Byval.

Grandfather Laurens Johannes is not interested in the well-being of the enslaved people he owns. More people die at La Singularité than are born there. And in a letter, he tells his plantation manager Martini that he should be careful with the enslaved people, but only because otherwise the plantation would not be financially viable enough. In the year his grandson Jan Ignatius Daniel is born, a Maroon village of escaped enslaved people near La Singularité is even destroyed, as described in the Historical Notes in the Surinamese Almanac for the Year 1895.

Things were not much better at Ma Retraite. In 1793, 28 guilders were paid to a blacksmith to make shackles for three enslaved people—Harlequin, Pretant and Mey—who repeatedly ran away.

The wealth on both sides of the family ultimately makes it possible to purchase the green taffeta dress. The families are affluent, with large houses and expensive clothes, and they wield power: they hold important political positions in the city. Carolina Andrea grows up in this environment. From her perspective, the green afternoon dress is a very ‘simple’ dress. But the dress and the customs associated with it are anything but simple for most of Utrecht’s residents—let alone for the people who work and die on the plantations.

The system of inheriting plantation shares continued to affect the Nepveu family for many years. In 1858, Carolina Andrea became entitled to plantation shares through inheritance. Because she was a minor, her father received the shares on her behalf. Years later, this same Carolina Andrea would lend the green taffeta dress to the Centraal Museum.

But certain ideas also persist throughout history. In the same year that the dress moves to the Centraal Museum, Carolina Andrea is a board member of the Elisabeth Association for the Education and Training of Daughters of Gospel Workers in Our Overseas Possessions. This may not seem like the most remarkable activity until you look at her family history. Her great-grandfather Jan Nepveu, governor of Suriname, had already supported missionary work in Suriname. Missionary work was part of the colonial mission. This shows how some things change only very slowly.

Why talk about indirect traces of slavery? ‘Indirect’ may be associated with being less meaningful. But these objects can show us the enduring entanglement with slavery. They belonged to people who were wealthy because of their grandparents, or because they inherited shares, and sometimes they were spoon-fed ideologies from an early age. Indirect traces reach further into history than some direct traces and span generations. Discussing these indirect traces can provide insight into how money, objects, and cultural factors can travel through time, with a changing perspective shedding new light on their charged significance.

Carolina Andrea Nepveu’s dress is now on display in Collectie Centraal (until June 2025), this time not as a neutral part of fashion history, but as an example of what collecting can mean for traces of slavery.