The raid on Dannemarksnagore took place in 1713 at the Danish colony of Dannemarksnagore in Bengal, between the Danes and a local Mughal zamindar.
After the governor of the Danish colony of Dannemarksnagore, Rasmus Hansen Attrup, refused a local Mughal zamindar's demand of 4,000 rupees in gifts, the zamindar plundered two surrounding Danish villages before laying siege to Dannemarksnagore itself. However, the siege was quickly lifted after French mediation, to which the Danes were to pay 800 rupees to the Mughals.
Background
The Danish factory of Dannemarksnagore in Bengal was built in 1699 after the end of the Dano-Mughal War. However, many of the factory's initial governors were corrupt and practiced embezzlement, causing economic difficulties in the colony. Subsequently, the governors began borrowing money from local merchants, which they could not repay on time, causing the Mughals to besiege Dannemarksnagore in 1707. Although the siege was lifted and the governor, Jacob Panck, improved the factory's conditions, economic difficulties returned when Panck's successor, Wolff Ravn, assumed office.
As a result of Ravn's actions, the Danish colony of Tranquebar's Privy Council (secrete råd) replaced him with the later governor of Tranquebar, Rasmus Hansen Attrup, in 1711, who stabilized the situation. Nonetheless, the colony received almost no money from Tranquebar, and Attrup was compelled to use his own money and take expensive loans to be able to send cargo to Tranquebar.
Prelude Concurrently, there were both commercial and political disputes with the Mughals, and rumors had spread that the Mughals would expel the Europeans in Bengal, starting with the economically and militarily weak Danes. Consequently, the Danes were ready to evacuate Dannemarksnagore in the shallop Fortuna.
Raid The Mughals subsequently took advantage of the Danish situation and assaulted the colony's commoners. In response, Attrup recruited topasses for security and invested in the factory's fortifications. However, at one point, a local Mughal zamindar demanded 4,000 rupees in gifts, which Danish colonial historian Kay Larsen described as unreasonable and sudden. When Attrup refused to pay this amount, a conflict arose with the zamindar, who plundered the two surrounding Danish villages of Tellingapore and Gondelapore, partially burning them down, and initiated a siege of Dannemarksnagore itself.
French mediation Meanwhile, the French director of Chandernagore, François de Flacourt, and a French director of a private company, Louis de Grangemont, sent mediators to the zamindar three times, finally concluding an agreement, to which Governor Attrup had to pay the zamindar 800 rupees. Followingly, the siege was lifted, sparing Dannemarksnagore from an assault.
Aftermath Right after the agreement, the zamindar made new demands to the Danes. As a result, the governor of Tranquebar, Johan Sigismund Hassius, sent a couple of ships during the following year to assist the lodge against the Mughals. Nevertheless, the colony still did not have enough resources to maintain trade, and a new Mughal attack came in 1714, resulting in a Danish evacuation of the colony altogether.
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