Anglo-Dutch Wars

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.

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.

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 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 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.

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.

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.

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:

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.

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).

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.