I agree Keith, there had to have been locations in Holland where there were numbers of swords assembled, and the VOC swords were one of the prime examples. It seems I was told at some point that VOC blades were effectively German and from locations in Holland, implying Solingen smiths were working there.
We know that Solingen smiths went to Sweden, Russia, France, probably Holland and of course to England. It seems to me the religious persecution card has been overplayed as far as the exodus from Birmingham. The movement of German smiths to other places to work seems to have been acceptable given the number of instances of Solingen smiths were worked in Toledo while retaining connections in Solingen.
With England, the number of blades entering both Hounslow and later Shotley were via families in Solingen with connections to the workers who had gone to England. The fact that the original 'recruiting' was from smiths in Holland suggests that they had relocated there voluntarily and without issues with the Solingen guilds.
As I have understood in reading passim, it was suggested that the Thirty Years War had impeded resources (including Swedish steel) to supply the blade making industry in Solingen. There were dramatic restrictions as to numbers of blades allowed for each smith, impairing their ability to make a living, so they moved accordingly. I was a bit surprised at this as I thought that iron deposits in Germany provided the required ore needed, but since the Swedish steel was already processed into ingots it would be more commercially viable.
With Rotterdam, while Amsterdam was of course the seat of power in Holland for the VOC and key trade port, the problems were traffic and weather as well as navigation. Some of the larger ships could not get through many smaller entering, and often these clustered around an island in the harbor. In cases where these large jams of ships remained outside the relative safety of the harbor, they were fair game for the weather, in some notable cases of over a hundred ships destroyed in one storm.
Rotterdam was far more favorable and easier access to avoid all the VOC traffic for the more specific trade commerce to England.
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