BONNELL, BENJAMIN [SSNE 2579]
Text source
Benjamin Bonnel was an English burgess who lived in Stockholm. He appears to have arrived in the 1620s.
He was involved in the tobacco trade in the 1640s. Benjamin Bonnel has been described as the Söderkompaniet's factor for the tobacco trade in Stockholm. He had an associate in Gothenburg with whom he imported tobacco from America, the West Indies and the Netherlands. The Swedish American colony of New Sweden sent tobacco leaves to the Netherlands and some of it made its way to Sweden. The Stockholm burgess Hans Kramer described the costs involved in tobacco spinning in his journal on 4 June 1645: Benjamin Bonnel had tested the spinning of tobacco leaves imported from New Sweden, and his outlay included salaries for the spinners, one of whom had travelled from Gothenburg and needed his roundtrip covered, and the process required cloves, "syrup" and other unspecified necessities. W. Loewe suggests that Benjamin Bonnel may have been the first person to start engaging in an industrial scale of tobacco production and that the premises for this early commercial work was in the house of Hans Kramer, which lay in Gamla Stan, between Västerlånggatan and Stora Nygatan.
In 1648 Benjamin Bonnel ordered a delivery of 1000 "skålpund" of spun tobacco from Thomas Swartwout, an Amsterdam tobacco merchant. However, by October the following year Queen Kristina had decided to call a halt to Söderkompaniet's monopoly on the tobacco trade and Bonnel faced competition from other importers.
At the end of May 1652 Benjamin Bonnel delivered nearly 10,000 "skålpund" tobacco, spun in Stockholm, along with 11,000 "skålpund" of Dutch-spun tobacco, worth a total of 16,168 daler in copper coins. In September that year he sold another 5,777 "skålpund" which had been confiscated by the customs men and had become ruined. That year Bonnel resigned from his role within Skeppskompaniet, cashing in his share in the consortium, and apparently departing on good terms with his colleagues.
During the 1650s Benjamin Bonnel served as an envoy from the court of Queen Kristina to the English Parliament, between 1650 and 1655. His mission largely concerned commercial and trade issues, particularly regarding Swedish ships that were taken as prizes by the English. He was also involved with trade and co-owned the ship Stockholm of Stockholm with th Scot, Richard Clerck. The ship was siezed by English privateers in July 1651 on her way home from Portugal.
Sources: Svenske Sandebuds till Utlandske Hof och Deras Sandebud till Sverige, Riksarkivet. 1841, p.78; TNA HCA 13/65 ff.62-65 The Claim of Benjamin Bonnell and Richard Clerck (plus depositions), 20 August 1651; Walter Loewe, Tobaksspinnarna och tobaksfabrikanterna i 1600-talets Stockholm, (Stockholm, 1993), p.26, 28, 30, 33, 38, 39, 42, 47, 261.
Service record
- SWEDEN, STOCKHOLM
- Departed 1660-12-31, as BURGESS
- Purpose TOBACCO TRADE, MERCANTILE
- SWEDEN, ENGLAND
- Departed 1655-12-31
- Capacity CONSUL, purpose DIPLOMACY