In 1808 Stamford Raffles, a young colonial secretary in Penang, took a break down the coast in Malacca. When he found that the authorities were going to shut the trading hub down in favour of Penang, destroying its public buildings and driving its people away, he was appalled at what he saw as both an injustice and a missed opportunity.

After discovering that the Company planned to shut down Malacca, Raffles wrote an outspoken report and sent it, over the heads of his superiors, to Calcutta. His picture of the potential of Malacca, and especially its rich native and colonial history, prompted a change of policy for which his colleagues in Penang were not grateful.

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