First Anglo-Dutch War

The First Anglo-Dutch War (1652 - 1654) (called First War Dutchwoman in England, and First English War with the Netherlands) of the four Anglo-Dutch Guerres was the first. It was entirely held on sea between the ships of the the Commonwealth and those of the United Provinces.

Finding its origin in commercial disagreements, the war begin with attacks from trading vessels, to turn quickly to the great naval battles. The English navy gained there the supremacy of the seas around England, and obliged the Netherlanders to accept the Monopole English on the trade of the British Colonies.

Be a prelude to

With the 16th century, England and the Netherlands were closely associated against the ambitions of the Habsbourg. They cooperated with the defeat of the Spanish Invincible Armada. England supported the Netherlanders in the Guerre the eighty year old by sending money and troops. There was a permanent English representative in the Dutch government to ensure the coordination of the effort of war.

The collapse of the Spanish power at the end of the Thirty Year old Guerre in 1648 meant that the colonial possessions of the empires Spanish and Portuguese were given concerned. The race with the empire which followed brought the old allies to a conflict. Moreover the Netherlands, being in peace with Spain, maintained quickly the commercial relations with the Iberian peninsula with the detriment of England.

In the middle of the 17th century, the Netherlands had the merchant fleet by far most powerful of Europe, having more boats than the unit of the other joined together nations. Their economy, mainly based on the maritime trade, ensured a dominant position in the European trade to them, particularly in the Baltic. Moreover, the annexation of the major part of the Portuguese possessions in the the Indies ensured to them the control of the exchanges, very lucrative, of the spice S. They gained even a significant influence on the maritime trade of England with the colonies of North America, benefitting from the disorders which resulted from the English civil war.

However, after the decisive Dutch victory over the Spanish fleet of invasion, with the of the Dunes in 1639 battles, the war with Spain was limited to the terrestrial operations, and the Dutch navy remained safe from any attack. For economic reasons, in 1648 the Dutchmen liquidated most of their fleet. In 1652, less than fifty vessels were still in a position to sail, and it was thus necessary to arm with the trading vessels to avoid the deficit. All these vessels had a firepower much lower than the English ships.

The British Marine was in better condition. It was arisen victorious from the English Civil war. It supported and provided the army of Oliver Cromwell in the wars with the Scotland and the Ireland, had carried out a blockade of the royalist fleet of prince Rupert to Lisbon; it had organized a system of convoys to protect the trade from the Commonwealth against the swarms of ships Corsaire S with the mounting in each European port.

September 24th, 1650, the admiral Robert Blake demolished the fleet of the Portugal, at the time of a violent storm, which ran the Portuguese vice-admiral, and rafla several catches, obliging Portugal to cease protecting Rupert. In 1651, the royalist fortresses of the Scilly Isles, island of Man and Channel Islands were taken, and in 1652, the general George Ayscue had reconquered the English possessions of the the Caribbean and North America. The financing of the English navy was ensured by a law of the November 10th 1650 imposing 15% of tax on the trading vessels. Money thus collected in front of being employed to ensure the protection of the naval convoys.

The origin and the beginning of the conflict

The French support for the English royalists led the the Commonwealth to draw up letters of reprisals against the French ships and against the French goods aboard neutral ships. These letters authorized to control neutral ships, which were for the Dutch majority. The English Parliament adopted the first of the decrees of navigation ( Navigation Acts ) in October 1651. It ordered that only English ships as well as the ships of the country of origin can import goods into England. This measurement particularly aimed at blocking the Dutch ships very dependant on the trade, and it was often used as pretext for, simply, seizing their ships.

The agitation of the Dutch merchants was still increased by the capture by George Ayscue in the beginning of 1652 of 27 Dutch ships which made trade with the royalist island of Barbados, in infringment with an embargo imposed by the the Commonwealth. Moreover, the death of the stadhouder (governor) of Holland Guillaume II placed the foreign policy of the Provinces Linked under the needs for the commercial interests of Amsterdam and Rotterdam. Consequently, the State-generals (Parliament) decided on March 3rd, 1652 to increase the fleet of war by requisitioning and equipping 150 trading vessels.

The news of this decision reached London on March 12th, 1652 and the Commonwealth also started to prepare with a war, but as the two nations were not ready, the war could have been delayed without the unexpected meeting of the fleets of the Dutch admiral Maarten Tromp and of the general Robert Blake in the English Channel, not far from Dover, on May 29th, 1652. An ordinance of Cromwell decided that all the foreign fleets in the North Sea or the English Channel owed safety with the English Pavillon; but when Tromp refused, Blake opened fire, beginning short the Bataille of Sands of Goodwin. Tromp lost two boats, but he escorted his convoy in safety.

The war

The war is declared the July 10th 1652. The Netherlanders realize what is concerned; one of the ambassadors in departure declared: " The English prepare to attack a gold mountain, we prepare to attack a mountain of fer."

During the first months, the English attacked the Dutch convoys. Blake is sent with 60 ships to disturb the activities of fishing in the North Sea and the exchanges Dutch in the Baltic , leaving Ayscue with a small fleet to keep the Manche. The July 12th 1652, Ayscue intercepted a Dutch convoy ghost of the Portugal, it captured seven tradind ships and destroyed three of them. Tromp joins together a fleet of 96 ships to attack Ayscue but winds of south maintained it in the North Sea. Being turned over towards north to continue Blake, Tromp met the English fleet in front of the the Shetland but a storm dispersed its ships and the confrontation did not take place. The August 26th 1652 Ayscue attacked a Dutch convoy ordered by the admiral Michiel de Ruyter but it was beaten in the Bataille of Plymouth and was raised of its command.

Tromp was also suspended after the failure of the the Shetland, and the admiral Witte de With took the command. The Dutch convoy left healthy and except English attack, of With an opportunity lives then of concentrating its forces and of gaining the control of the seas. With the Battle of Kentish Knock the October 8th 1652, the Dutchmen attacked the English fleet in front of the mouth of the the Thames, but they had to beat a retreat after severe losses. The English Parliament, thinking the Netherlanders close to the defeat, sent twenty vessels to reinforce its positions in the the Mediterranean. This division of the forces left in Blake only 42 vessels in November, while the Netherlanders endeavor to reinforce their fleet. This led to the English defeats of the Bataille of Dungeness in December and of the Bataille of Leghorn at the beginning of 1653. The Dutchmen have the control of the English Channel then, of the Mediterranean and North Sea, while the English vessels are blocked in the ports.

In spite of its successes, the Batavian Republic was badly prepared for a naval war. Enrôlement was prohibited, of the enormous sums were to be spent to attract sailors enough. To make the things more difficult, a political controversy burst on the procedure to follow: was the Dutch fleet to be reinforced or of defensive measurements against a terrestrial invasion were to be taken? Incompetents to come to assistance of all their colonies, they let the Portuguese take again control of the Brésil.

During the winter 1652 - 1653 England repaired its ships and reinforced its positions. Blake wrote its Sailing and Fighting Instructions ( Instructions for navigation and the combat ), an important revision of the naval tactics containing the first descritpion line of battle. In February 1653 the English are ready to face the Dutchmen, and after the three days of the Bataille of Portland cement in March, and the two days of the Bataille of Gabbard in June, took back the Dutchmen in their ports.

The Battle of Scheveningen in August, was the last of the war. The Netherlanders tried to break the English blockade, but after combat which caused heavy losses in the two camps, they took refuge on the island of Texel, leaving to the English control seas. The news of died of Tromp, at the beginning of the battle, carried a fatal blow to moral of the Dutchmen, who reflect fine with the war. Similar feelings emerged to England after Oliver Cromwell had dissolves the Parliament hitherto favorable to the war.

Dutch catches during the war (surroundings 1 200 tradind ships) equivalent to the double of the whole of merchant fleet of sea of England.

Consequences

The peace negotiations succeeded the April 5th 1654 with the signature of the treated of Westinster in 1654, by which the Dutchmen recognized the Commonwealth and accepted the Navigation Acts . The treaty had an appendix secret, the Act d' Exclusion , prohibiting the Dutchmen from naming the son of the Stathouder, the future Guillaume III, with the succession of his/her father Guillaume II. In fact this clause had been suggested by the principal Dutch politician, the republican Jean de Witt.

However, the commercial competitions between the two nations were not solved. Particularly in the vast empires of overseas, the hostilities continued between the Dutch and English companies of trade, which armed their own men-of-war.

The Netherlanders started an important program of naval constructions to cure the lack of ship of the lines. The Second war anglo-Dutchwoman was close.

Category: New-country-Low

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