The story
The Danish East India Company was dissolved in 1729. Some of Copenhagen's leading merchants responded to its dissolution by creating two trading societies, one for the Indian trade and another one for the new and promising China trade. On 20 April 1730, the two societies were merged to form the Danish Asiatic Company. The reformed interim company opened trade with Qing China at Canton. The first expedition went badly, with Den gyldne Løve lost with its cargo of silver off Ballyheigue, Ireland, on the outbound journey. Local landowners held the silver at their estate and pursued a salvage claim, but a gang of locals overpowered the Danish guard and made off with the hoard, causing a diplomatic row between Denmark-Norway and Great Britain. The Cron Printz Christian returned from the company's first successful expedition to Canton in 1732.
With the royal licence conferred in 1732, the new company was granted a 40-year monopoly on all Danish trade east of the Cape of Good Hope. Before 1750, it sent 27 ships; 22 survived the journey to return to Copenhagen. In 1772, the company lost its monopoly and in 1779, Danish India became a crown colony.
During the Napoleonic Wars, in 1801 and again in 1807, the Royal Navy attacked Copenhagen. As a consequence of the last attack (in which most of the Danish navy was captured), Denmark (one of few Western European countries not occupied by Napoleon), ceded the island of Heligoland (part of the Duchy of Holstein-Gottorp) to Britain. In the east, when news of Anglo-Danish hostilities reached India, British colonial authorities immediately impounded seven Danish merchantmen in the Hoogli on 28 January 1808. Denmark sold its remaining colonies in mainland India to Britain in 1845, and the Danish Gold Coast to the British in 1850.
From Wikipedia’s article on Danish Asiatic Company, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.3