English 5th Rates

I spoke with the reigning expert on Van de Velde drawings, and we discussed English 5th Rates. We can't make any blanket assertions that apply to all ships, but we can make some generalizations.

Most 5th Rates, from the 1650's and 1660's, had forecastles. One prominent exception was the Garland.

Perhaps all 5th Rates had two decks. Only the lower deck was completely armed.

Generally, the upper tier had guns under the forecastle and under the quarterdeck. There may have been ships where there were guns under the ladders. A few ships had guns on the quarterdeck,. such as the Speedwell.

I will be modifying my 5th Rate drawings, accordingly.

My next project is to look more closely at the Onstelde-Zee

After recently looking at the Onstelde-Zee chapter on the Battle of Portland, I can see that I need to look more closely at what is there. I still have many questions about the battle, especially from the Dutch perspective, and this seems to be a good way to get the contemporary perspective. A challenge associated with that, though, is that it is in very archaic Dutch.

The pain might be worthwhile, though, because I saw references to three ships that I had not previously associated with the Battle of Portland. One of the names, I have had trouble taking seriously: Poort van Troijen. After finally obtaining a good number of manuscripts from 1652 and 1653, I can see that it is more plausible than I had thought. For example, Abraham van Campen's ship was the Arche Troijane. I have had some confusion about the Poort van Troijen name, as I had equated it with the ship called Hector in Vreugdenhil's list. In the manuscripts I have, that captain's ship was the Nassouw. The captain that I had believed was referenced was Lambert Pieterszoon. Now, I am not so sure.

A new drawing: The George, circa 1650

I just finished my first attempt at a drawing to represent the George (the Jacobean ship, St. George), as well as her sister ship, the Andrew. I am starting to think that both these ships may have served in this form, through the First Anglo-Dutch War. I base that on the drawings of the Andrew, at the Battle of Scheveningen, under fireship attack. The head could very well be like that in this drawing. Certainly, the Jacobean and Carolean Third Rates still had the archaic head.

I am going to continue to revise the other drawings, and will update them, as I make changes.

A larger 1650's English 5th Rate

A larger type of 5th Rate was built in the early 1650's, and was later expanded upon, after the Restoration. This is my first cut at a drawing of such a vessel.

I have kept updating my last drawing

I finally decided to try Windows XP Paint to draw the rigging. That actually worked about as well as you could hope for, given that we are working in a raster or pixel world, not a vector world. Anyway, you can judge if this was successful. What will help is that I intend to reduce the drawing to either 1/1200 or 1/3200 scale, depending on the application. For use in Iain Stanford's General-at-Sea, I will reduce this to 1/3200, so most detail will be lost. At 1/1200, you can still recognize some of the detail.

A small English 5th Rate

I just got done doing a new sort of drawing. I took a scan of a sheet of ships drawn in pencil. I converted the sheet to color, from black and white. Then, I drew or painted on the sheet, using Corel Photopaint 8 (which just happens to be what I have). I did it "freehand", using a mouse. I found that I was starting to develop a facility for drawing with a mouse. I used a Reinier Nooms painting of a scene from the Battle of Livorno as a guide to shading sails. I had thought it was not possible, but I am satisfied that it can be done, after all. This is the result:

The ship in intended for use in the First Anglo-Dutch War, and other places where a small 5th Rate, only 80 feet long, would be used. The flags could be easily changed.

The Raid on Chatham and Jan van Brakel

I was just reading Frank Fox's book, A Distant Storm, about the raid on Chatham. Frank says that Jan van Brakel's ship was the Amsterdam ship, Vrede. I had thought that, as well, but Brandt has a list of the ships on the raid, and the Amsterdam ship Vrede (46 guns) was commanded by Jan du Bois, while Jan van Brakel commanded the Admiralty of the Maas ship Vrede (40 guns). Because of this list, we even know the crews, including the numbers of sailors and soldiers. I highly recommend getting a facsimile copy of Brandt, as you don't need to know Dutch to take advantage of the ship lists. It is invaluable.

My latest thoughts on unresolved issues

I have had a number of open questions that I had not been able to resolve, in my research about the First Anglo-Dutch War:

Claes Janszoon Sanger, the West Cappelle, and the Battle of Scheveningen

Sipke Fockes, the Sint Maria and the Groot Sint Lucas

The first seems clearer, at this point. There is overwhelming evidence that Claes Janszoon Sanger became an English prisoner, after the Battle of Scheveningen and that his ship was burnt. The fact that the West Cappelle was listed in the "Staet van Oorlogh te Water voor den Jaere 1654" is simply a records keeping issue. That there was a West Cappel in service later is likely explained by a new ship having been built. We don't know that for sure, from what we have seen to date, but it seems likely.

The question of Sipke Fockes, the Sint Maria, the Groot Sint Lucas are still hard to finally resolve. There is the following pieces of evidence:

In a document dated 18 March 1652, Sipke Fockes is listed as commandiing the Amsterdam Directors' ship Sint Maria (28 guns).

In a 8 November 1652 document, Sipke Fockes still was said to command the Sint Maria

At the Battle of Portland, Sipke Fockes was killed and his ship captured.

The book, Onstelde-Zee, published in 1654, says that Sipke Fockes' ship was the Groote St. Lucas, and that the ship was captured at Portland.

The 1653 volume of the Hollandsche Mercurius for 1653 has lists of warships and merchant ships captured at Portland. The Groote St. Lucas (28 guns) was taken to Portsmouth, in early March 1653.

There is a document dated in March 1653 that lists Amsterdam Directors' ships needing repairs after the Battle of Portland. That list includes the Sint Maria, and lists the defects.

I have been resistent to concluding that there really was another ship named Groote St. Lucas that has not otherwise been noted in any published sources, or in any records found, to date. I am starting to think that it might be the case, however.

As an afterthought, I need to examine the section on the Battle of Portland, in the Onstelde-Zee, as there are at least three Dutch ships mentioned there that need further research:

Poort van Troijen

Leeuwin

Meermin

The page about Dutch ships in French intelligence documents is now available

An HTML version of my paper about Dutch ships found in French intelligence documents, primarily from the Marquis de Seignelay, is now available on KentishKnock.com. This is the direct link:

Dutch ships in French intelligence documents.

It looks like there is something copied that is left over, but that doesn't detract from the information, as it precedes the main table. As for the "unknown" ships, it is more the case that there is no known Dutch ship that matches, rather than we guess the right name. For example, Les armes de Leuarden is obviously equivalent to 't Wapen van Leeuwarden (50 guns). There are two obviously similar names: Les armes de Zelandé (60 guns) and les armes de Zélandy (30 guns), both of which refer to Noorderkwartier ships named 't Wapen van Zeeland. We just don't know of such ships from Dutch records. In another case, La Concorde (40 guns) obviously refers to an Eendracht of 121 feet long. We just don't know of such a ship. In the same way, L'Estoille du Levant would equate to a Star van Levant. I can go on, as I can see appropriate Dutch names for most, just no corresponding Dutch ships from other records.

English flags in 1652 and 1653

I would be interested to know if anyone can point to useful sources about English flags used during the First Anglo-Dutch War. So far, Willem van de Velde de Oude drawings seem to be a useful source, although it is hard to know how accurate his Dungeness drawing is. I have also looked at several Reinier Nooms paintings. I have been somewhat surprised at the ubiquity of white vanes and flags with the red St. George's cross. That is even true in Willem van de Velde de Oude drawings for Livorno, Dungeness, and even Scheveningen (Terheide).

My current thinking about my last post regarding Dutch ships at Dover in May 1652

I am increasingly skeptical about the three entries in my list from Mollema's "Honor Roll". When I originally saw the Gorcum in the list, ten years ago, I just assumed it meant at the action off Folkestone, between Tromp and Blake, in May 1652. I am much more doubtful, now, that the Gorcum was there. Instead, the three ships mentioned in the "Honor Roll" were meant to be at the Battle of the Kentish Knock, as Mollema wrote about battles.

I am less uncertain about the other captains and ships that I list, although the references in Dr. Elias' book still could be ambiguous. Much rests on ships having been at the battle, when they are mentioned either right before or right after the battle, as being with the fleet, or carrying messages for Tromp, about the recent battle.

Dutch captains mentioned in various published sources for Dover (May 1652)

There are Dutch captains and admirals mentioned in relation to the Battle off Dover (29 May 1652) in various published sources, other than Ballhausen's book. It seems relevant to list those, as they often differ from Ballhausen's list (unfortunately). Dr. Elias' book (Vol.II) gives the Dutch convoy commander as Jacob Huyrluyt. His ship was the Amsterdam ship, the Zeelandia (34 guns), built in 1643. There is some uncertainty introduced, as J. C. Mollema, in the "Honor Roll" doesn't distinguish between "Dover", the battle on 29 May or the "Dover" that we call the Kentish Knock. The latter seems to be mistaken, given the actual locations. Nonetheless, that is what he calls the Battle of the Kentish Knock. This is clear from the various entries for captains that did not appear on the scene, until the Kentish Knock.

Captain/Admiral	Admiralty	Ship	Guns	Reference
Pieter Aldertszoon	Noorderkwartier	Burcht	24	First Dutch War
Evert Anthonissen	Amsterdam	Hollandia	32	Honor Roll
Cornelis Janszoon Brouwer	Amsterdam Directors	Valck	28	First Dutch War
Abraham van Campen	Amsterdam Directors	Arke Troijane	28	First Dutch War
Cornelis Evertsen de Jonge	Vlissingen Directors	Vlissingen	26	First Dutch War
Sipke Fockes	Amsterdam Directors	Sint Maria	28	First Dutch War
Willem Ham	Noorderkwartier	Sampson	24	Schetsen
Allert Janszoon	Zeeland	Dubbele Arend	26	Schetsen
Isaak de Jongh	Rotterdam Directors	Sint Pieter	29	Schetsen
Dirck Janszoon Juynbol	Rotterdam Directors	Gelderland	30	Honor Roll
Cornelis Naeuoogh	Amsterdam Directors	Sint Matheeus	34	First Dutch War
Jan van Nes de Oude Boer Jaap	Rotterdam	Gorcum	30	Honor Roll
Jacob Corneliszoon Swart	Amsterdam Directors	Faam	28	First Dutch War
Jan Thyssen	Vlissingen Directors	Witte Lam	32	First Dutch War
Maarten Tromp	Rotterdam	Brederode	54	First Dutch War
Bastiaan Tuynemans	Vlissingen Directors	Sint Laurens	30	First Dutch War

Sources:

Elias, Johan E., Schetsen uit de geschiedenis van ons zeewezen, 6 volumes, 's-Gravenhage, 1916-1930

ed. Gardiner, Dr. S.R., First Dutch War, Vol.I, Navy Records Society, London, 1898

"Honor Roll" appendix to Vol.II, J.C.Mollema, Geschiedenis van Nederland ter Zee, 4 vols, Amsterdam 1940

The Battle off Dover (19/29 May 1652)

I just finished updating my OOB and short description for the Battle off Dover. It now reflects the Dutch fleet's organization and order of sailing, as described in Dr. Ballhausen's book. I have also corrected the ship names, in a few cases, to reflect my best information. Now, the only ship name, for the Dutch, that we know nothing about, is Johannes van Regermorter's ship. For working purposes, I am calling it Leeuwin, but there is little basis for that. I expect it is a name that we have not previously seen used.

I learned something new

I had seen Jan Glete's notes listing some ships belonging to Directors, from early 1652. I have not been able to obtain a copy of the original manuscript, but want have it. One of the names listed was a ship named Weesp. I had not realized that this is the name of a town that is Southeast of Amsterdam. It would be extremely valuable, if someone can locate the original manuscript, at the Nationaal Archief in the Hague.

Information we need to find

With respect to the First Anglo-Dutch War, there are two areas that need to be addressed:

English ship armaments and dimensions for hired ships and Dutch prizes

Names and data for "missing" Dutch ships

An important, but more secondary issue are more order-of-battle information for both sides in some battles. Typically, either the English or Dutch are well-known, and there is a lack on the other side. At Plymouth, we know the Dutch OOB pretty well, but that for the English is sorely lacking. At the Kentish Knock, we know the Dutch OOB, again, pretty well, but have a less precise view of the English fleet. At Portland, we have pretty complete information about the English, but have only a sketchy idea about the Dutch. in fact, for all of 1653, we have a very poor idea of the Dutch OOB at all the battles.

One thing that can be definitely said is that there are some severe gaps in our knowledge of Dutch ships. That is somewhat true of Admiralty and hired ships. While we have an almost complete knowledge of the Amsterdam Directors' ships, we have very little knowledge about the others.

The sad thing is that we definitely know that more information exists. There is Hendrick de Raedt's pamphlet, at Rotterdam. There is Zeeland director's ship data in the Zeeuwse Archief, but I have not been able to arrange to get reproductions of either, despite trying. There is also a manuscript in the Nationaal Archief, in the Hague, that Rick van Velden was not able to find, but that Jan Glete saw, about 20 years ago. It has some tantalizing ship names (such as Colburg and Harderwijck). I expect that it probably names captains, and this would resolve some of the remaining "holes" in our knowledge.

Wikipedia

I have started to make some contributions to Wikipedia on the subject of the Dutch in the Anglo-Dutch Wars. The Wikipedia is desperately in need of improvement, so anyone who can, should help them. That work will benefit everyone.

Their site can be found at:

Wikipedia.

Wiki editing is quite different, but is easily learned.

This site now is easily searched by Google

I found out, today, that quite obscure searches will find content from this Blog's archives. That should be of great benefit to people looking for Anglo-Dutch Wars content.

Some thoughts about the Battle of the Sound in 1658

As I am doing more research about the Battle of the Sound, I am left with the impression that the Swedish fleet had a lower level of efficiency and competence than the Dutch. Otherwise, how can we account for the Dutch beating a superior fleet?

I suspect that if Witte de With's flagship, the Brederode had not run aground, teh Dutch would not have lost a single ship. As it was, the Brederode did run aground and was mercilessly raked for several hours, until Witte de With was killed and the ship was left in a sinking condition, when she was captured by the Swedes.

When we do a comparison of the fleets, we find that the Swedes had two very large ships, the Viktoria (72 guns) and the Kronan (74 guns), and several large ships with 50-some guns. The only large Dutch ships were three flagships: the Eendracht (72 guns), the Brederode (59 guns), and the Jozua (50 guns). Many of the rest were quite small.

Dutch prizes in the English navy during the First Anglo-Dutch War

There were a considerable number of captured Dutch ships that served in the English navy during the First Anglo-Dutch War. A considerable number were captured warships, but many were merchant ships that were suitable as warships.

During July 1652, Robert Blake captured or destroyed approximately 12 Dutch warships engaged in fishery protection duties. The number is approximate, because there is evidence that at least one more ship was captured at that time (the Marcus Curtius). Only one other captured the rest of the year. That was the Maria, captured at the Battle of the Kentish Knock.

In the first month or so of the war, Dutch warships in English ports were seized, along with some ships returning from overseas. One of these, the Rotterdam Admiralty ship, the Prinses Roijaal Maria probably served in the English navy as the Princess Maria.

I think it is extremely likely that most Dutch prizes carried their Dutch armament in English service. In at least one case, the Rozeboom, the two brass 24-pounders where removed for use on board a larger english ship. As the Rosebush, she had to carry on with only the 24 smaller guns of the original 28 guns. Others, such as the Sampson (26 guns), probably carried their original Dutch armament.

In the case of the Vogelstruis, the big East Indiaman captured at Portland, the ship was so heavily damaged in two hard-fought battles, that she only served as a hulk in the English navy (although for an extended period). In any case, she was built for the East India trade (as a Retourschip), and was built to merchant ship standards, although substantial enough for round trips to the East Indies.

Maps and locations from the Anglo-Dutch Wars

I have been studying a map of the Seven United Provinces (The Netherlands). Walcheren Island and the rest of Zeeland are quite useful. I am working on a suitable map that I will be posting. I knew that this would be challenge, and it is "slow going".

One thing that I learned was the location of "The Rammekens". After the Battle of the Gabbard, Tromp had ships needing repairs beached "on the Rammekens". That is an area in the South East part of Walcheren. Vlissingen is to the West. Tromp reported that since the shore off Vlissingen (Flushing) was so rocky, that they would use the beach at the Rammekens for making repairs.

Looking at the map, you can see that the area off Vlissingen appears to be an ideal fleet anchorage, as there is very large, protected area of water. To the North, where the "Goeree Gatt" is located, near the island of Goeree, there is a much smaller-looking anchorage. Some ships sheltered there, after the Gabbard, as well. As usual, there was a contingent, including Witte de With's squadron, which retreated to the Texel roads (often referred to as "The Texel".

A French intelligence report on the Dutch Navy

I hope that my webmaster will be able to put some of my research results where I analyzed some French intelligence reports that Prof. Jan Glete passed on to me. They were referenced in Prof. Glete's book, Navies and Nations: Warships, Navies and State Building in Europe and America, 1500-1860 (1993).

The reports, not that surprisingly, use French names for Dutch ships. In some cases, the Dutch name is fairly obvious. In other cases, by translating the French name to English (and then to Dutch), I could associate the correct ship. In other cases, I have not been able to tell what ship was meant.

French name	Admiralty	Guns	Length	Beam
Les armes de Cergant	?	40	130	32
Les armes de dergau	?	?	?	?
Les armes de Leuarden	?	50	148	38
Les armes de Zelandé	NQ	60	?	?
les armes de Zélandy	NQ	30	?	?
Le Chesne	?	55	140	37
L'oiseau de mer	?	40	120	29
La Sigongne	A	72	?	?
La Soy	?	50	150	40
La ville de groenwijk	?	40	120	30.5

If anyone ever reads this, and has an idea what some of these ships were, I would welcome the input.

What is great about these documents, is that they supply information about Dutch ships, which researchers have not been able to find in the Netherlands.

Dutch vessels: Advijs jacht and a Galjoot

There is information, from Nicolaes Witsen, that gives dimensions for an advijs jacht (advice yacht) and a galjoot (galliot). They are later than what was used in the First Anglo-Dutch War, so they are not comparable, but they are both of interest. We also know the dimensions for an older, three-masted yacht of war, as well.

The advis jacht, from Witsen, has the following dimensions:

Length: 115ft
Beam: 27ft-5-1/2in
Hold: 11ft-5-1/2in

The galjoot, from Witsen, has the following dimensions:

Length: 85ft
Beam: 21ft
Hold: 11ft

The older three-masted jacht, built in 1638, was smaller than the later jacht. This type of jacht could have been employed during the First Anglo-Dutch War. Such a vessel could have carried 14 guns. One example of such a ship was the Zeeland jacht, the Gloeyenden Oven. At the beginning of the First Anglo-Dutch War, she had 14 guns and a crew of 56 men. She was commanded by Adriaan Janszoon den Oven.

Length: 106ft
Beam: 24ft
Hold: 9ft

Some items from the August 1658 Swedish list

To be specific, the list that Jan Glete sent me is dated 28 August 1658. The list is divided into three sections:

Swedish navy ships

Stockholm company ships

Captured Danish ships
The list is also divided vertically: on the left are brass guns and on the right are iron guns.

Here is a taste of what is there:

Ship	Brass Guns	Iron Guns
Victoria	24-24pdr, 14-14pdr,10-12pdr, 16-6pdr, 6-3pdr
Draken	4-30pdr, 20-24pdr, 2-18pdr, 22-12pdr, 8-6pdr, 4-3pdr
Hercules	24-24pdr, 20-12pdr, 8-6pdr, 2-3pdr
Maria	4-24pdr, 10-6pdr, 3-3pdr	8-14pdr, 2-6pdr

Wargame pieces

Brederode

Stad en Lande

The Battle of the Gabbard

I have made some more progress on developing the orders of battle for the Gabbard. The English side is quite straight-forward, as the widely published list seems to be accurate.

The Dutch order of battle is quite difficult, as there are probably more than a dozen ships that we don't know their names. There are a few ships that we know the name and captain, but don't know anything else. I have previously mentioned Jan Glete's notes that show a list, from early 1652, that indicates that there were some Directors' ships with names like "Colburg" and "Harderwijk". I have not been able to find that document (in the Nationaal Archief, in the Hague), and really need to find it. I also desperately need a copy of Hendrick de Raedt's pamphlet that lists Tromp's fleet during his disastrous voyage to the Shetlands, in July-August 1652.

The Dutch fleet closing the English fleet at the Battle of the Kentish Knock

This another of the semi-acceptable photographs of Privateers Bounty. The picture was taken on January 27, 2004. This shows the Dutch fleet, at the opening of the battle scenario, closing with the English fleet. They would turn to starboard, into the general shape of a line. They broke the English line, although with heavy casualties.

Picture from Battle of the Kentish Knock scenario

I have struggled getting good digital photographs of the Privateers Bounty simulation, running one of my scenarios. This is a picture from January 27, 2004, from the Battle of the Kentish Knock scenario. One of the drawbacks of this simulation is that there are no 17th Century 3D ship models (except one merchant ship).

Dr. Carl Ballhausen's book

Despite my criticisms, I would highly recommend Dr. Ballhausen's book about the First Anglo-Dutch War and the war between the Dutch and Swedes in 1658-1659. The reference for the book is:

Carl Ballhausen, PhD, Der Erste Englisch-Höllandische Seekrieg 1652-1654 Sowie der Schwedisch-Holländische Seekrieg 1658-1659, Martinus Nijhoff, Haag, 1923.

Despite Dr. Ballhausen's frequent leaps of imagination in listing ships at various battles, there are enough positive features to make the book valuable:

The charts of the battles, showing wind direction and the position of squadrons

Some unique information that is very likely to be correct, such as the Swedish armaments listed in footnotes in the section about the Battle of the Sound

A valuable bibliography that lists many obscure, published sources

Extensive footnotes (however, you need to check the sources, as I have found that I often disagree with Dr. Ballhausen's conclusions

Information about the fleet organizations

The Library of Congress holds a copy of this book (as does the Wilson Library at the University of Minnesota). The Library of Congress will make a photocopy of the book, at a fairly high price. I was persistent, and finally was able to buy the book, after persistent searching using Addall.com.

I am making progress on updating formating

I hope to be done updating formatting on this blog by this weekend. I need to transfer this to AngloDutchWarsBlog.com, quite soon. It will accelerate the process of building a content index for this material.

Off topic, I often can search and find material from this blog in Google. For whatever reason, it seems to "come and go", but I was able to find "Maarten Schaeff", this morning. It will be a big help to users of this site, if it will be constantly searchable. I am doing things to facilitate that, with some changes, including the new formatting.

Formatting

I'm afraid that temporarily, the formatted will be bolixed up, until I can do a total conversion of content to match the new posting format. The advantages for the new format are that having the title with an anchor tag should help Google, plus tables now can be used, as the hard breaks have been removed (which temporarily is a bother). I am working from the oldest posts, in the conversion process, although maybe I can convert the from page, sometime later today.

Google and this blog

During the day, yesterday, content from this, and the related blogs and website, were searchable in Google. By late afternoon, that had all disappeared. On AngloDutchWarsBlog.com, I have added a index to content, so that individual items can be accessed. For now, the scheme used is to use the first, non-pronoun-word of the title. This is a time-consuming process, so this will be an on-going project for some time. There will be great benefit, that will provide a way to access content originally published here (since Google is so generally non-cooperative, which is hard to understand).

Swedish ships from August 1658

I received a package, today, that has some information from Prof. Jan Glete about Swedish ships, circa 1658. The most interesting document is a list of ships and the guns planned for them, from August 1658.

One striking feature about the list is the gun calibers listed. I have not seen, on the Internet, any indication that the Swedes used 14pdr and 10pdr guns. I had seen that noted in Carl Ballhausen's book, where he quoted a book from Johan Levin Carlbom, from almost a 100 years ago. I was skeptical that those guns were correct, but after seeing this document, the credibility of what I saw has soared.

I will be interested to compare this list with what I saw in Dr. Ballhausen's book, to see what differences there are. He lists ships that are not in this list, but others are in both.

Here is what is listed in this August 1658 document for a well-known ship, the Amarant:

4-24pdr, 18-14pdr, 14-6pdr, and 2-3pdr = total of 38 guns

I can see that I will need to compare a list that I can easily read, with this list, as I cannot easily decipher some of the names. Victoria, Samson, and Jacob are easy. I won't even attempt to guess at several of the other ship names.

The document that I am looking at is "List of the armament of ships in the main fleet 28/8/1658, Swedish Riksakivet, volume M 1850.

The entry from the July 1653 list from Vlissingen

My latest attempt to transcribe the handwritten entry, show below is:

absant - 81) een advijs barck. is crucende en niet onder het getal van schepen van oorloge.

The "crucende" is the most suspect word. I will need to browse my copy of Van Dale to see if I can figure out what the word should be. I would welcome suggestions. The other possible problem would be "absant". After further study, I realized that the word before "oorloge" was "van". This is somewhat more sloppy writting than usual, but is not untypical. It has a mix of modern and old ways of forming letters.

This is the entire text for what looks like an "Advijs berck"

I had to squeaze the image, so I removed the "absant" from the left side.

The July 1653 list from Vlissingen

In this list, there is an entry that is difficult to understand, under the Rotterdam Chamber of the VOC. The handwriting strongly resembles "An Advijs berck", which doesn't make sense.