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Saturday, October 15, 2005

The undated list of ships "under the control of the Admiralty of Amsterdam"

There is an undated list in Vol.IV of The First Dutch War, on pages 308 to 310. This list has been very helpful, in that it matches ships with captains and gives guns and crew numbers. With my new system of wanting exact dates to go with information, this list is less useful. All we can do is to try and date the list, given its internals. There is the additional issue that the comments in the list may have been added at different dates. Given that Johan van Galen is listed as commanding the Vereenigde Provinciën, the list dates from prior to March 14, 1653. Given the comments about the Vrede, I have thought that the list dates from after the Battle of Portland. that would narrow the range to early March 1653. Given that Isaac Sweers' ship was sunk at Portland, that would seem to be valid. The note about Joris van der Zaan seems to only apply to his ship. He was killed at Portland. This list seems pretty clearly to be from March, after the 2nd (the end of the Battle of Portland) and before they had received word about the Battle of Livorno (fought on March 14).

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