Battle of Dungeness
10 December 1652
In October 1652 the English government, mistakenly believing that the United Provinces had been defeated at the Battle of the Kentish Knock, sent away ships to the Mediterranean. This left the English badly outnumbered in home waters. Meanwhile the Dutch were making every effort to reinforce their fleet.
On 1 December 1652 Admiral Maarten Tromp set sail from Helvoetsluys with 88 men of war and 5 fire ships, escorting a vast convoy bound for the Indies. With the convoy safely delivered through the straits of Dover, Tromp turned in search of the English, and on 9 December 1652 he encountered the English fleet of 42 ships commanded by General at Sea Robert Blake. Bad weather prevented an action that day, but the next day Blake came out to fight and the two fleets met at about 15:00 near the cape of Dungeness in a "bounteous rhetoric of powder and bullet" (according to a contemporary account).
A strong North-East wind prevented a large part of the Dutch fleet from engaging Blake whose fleet by nightfall had lost two ships captured, Anthony Bonaventure and Garland and had many more damaged. The Dutch lost one ship, DNS Schiedam, through fire. Blake retreated under cover of darkness to his anchorage in the Downs. Tromp could not be satisfied with the result however as the Dutch had missed an opportunity to damage the English fleet.
Desription of the Action taken from Clowes Vol II
A huge Dutch fleet of three hundred merchantmen was lying ready to sail. Great efforts were made to ensure its safety, and a fleet was equipped and sent to sea under Tromp and Jan Evertsen, with De Ruijter as vice-admiral, and Pieter Floriszoon as rear-admiral. De With was to have held a vice-admiral's command, but had to be left sick ashore. The fleet, by Dutch accounts, consisted of seventy-three men-of-war and a few fireships and small craft, while with Blake at the time in the Downs there were, from causes already explained, no more than thirty-seven, with two or three small tenders.
Tromp left his merchantmen on the Flamand coast, and appeared with all his fighting ships at the back of the Goodwin on November 29th. Blake, after holding a hasty council of war, weighed and stood with him to the southward.
It is impossible now to say exactly why Blake took this step, so contrary to his usually well-considered methods. Many reasons have been suggested, and of these the oldest, that Blake had to defend the river at any cost, is obviously the most fallacious, for Blake's course took him to leeward of the river's mouth. It is possible that Blake recalled how this same Tromp had, in the case of Oquendo, turned the Downs into a rat-trap, and that, in view of the demolition of the batteries that had protected Ayscue, the anchorage was held to be unsafe. It is also possible that the thickness of a November day led him to misjudge the quantity or quality of the enemy's fleet. The action certainly was not due to a mere chivalrous spirit that held itself in honour bound to accept every preferred challenge.
Not until he was under way does Blake seem to have realised what force he had to meet. The wind, too, which, at the time of weighing had been at S.W., veered and made return to the Downs impossible. For awhile it was variable, but soon it settled in the north-west and blew too strongly to admit of fighting, so that with evening Blake anchored in Dover Roads, Tromp lying some two leagues to leeward, i.e., close off the South Sand Head. With the morning of the 30th both weighed, and, as Blake still kept the wind, both steered parallel courses along the shore. There was no engagement till the fleets came off Dungeness, when the trend of the coast brought the English van down upon the Dutch.
There resulted a partial engagement, in which the leading English ships were terribly outnumbered. It is probable that many Dutch vessels were too far to leeward to help, while it is but too certain that English captains in the rear availed themselves of the wind to keep out of action. The reason for their doing so is hard to discover. Had they been mere merchant captains the case would be easily understood; but the evil system of employing merchant captains to fight battles had been remedied somewhat, and the offenders in this case commanded ships of the regular Navy and were, in some cases at least, men of known courage. The only reason that can be suggested is that they had received Royalist bribes; but as the evidence taken on their examinations is not forthcoming, this must remain a theme for speculation.
Such ships as were engaged fought desperately, foremost among them being the Triumph, with Blake on deck. She was resolutely seconded by Lionel Lane in the Victory and John Mildmay in the Vanguard, and against Evertsen and De Ruijter these ships fought from about one o'clock till dark. As Tromp came into action a most gallant attack was made on him by Captains Robert Batten in the Garland, a third rate, and Hoxton, in the hired merchantman Bonaventure. The Brederode was laid aboard on both sides and was extremely hard pressed, but Evertsen, drawing up, took the pressure off her and captured the Bonaventure, with the loss in killed and wounded of the major part of her crew, among whom fell the captain. Tromp himself proved far more than a match for the Garland, which before being taken had lost her captain and sixty men killed, out of a company of one hundred and fifty.
Blake did his best to relieve these two ships, but, owing to the loss of his foretopmast and mainstay, found himself unable to get near them till too late. In the attempt the Triumph was herself placed in danger, being boarded on both sides at once; but she managed to shake off her assailants and to rejoin the rest of the fleet. Besides the Garland and Bonaventure, the English loss amounted to three ships sunk, while the Dutch lost only one, which was accidentally blown up.
Blake went to Dover Roads and thence into the Downs. Tromp, for his part, lay for two or three days off Dungeness refitting, and was thus in a position to intercept vessels coming round from the western ports. On the night of December 1st, one of these, the Hercules, hired merchantman, fell into the Dutch fleet and was at once taken. Tromp next picked up his convoy and took it as far as Rhe, where he lay to wait until the homeward-bound trade was ready for his escort back.
Blake was extremely dejected by his defeat. In reporting the result of the battle to the Council of State, he wrote:
" I am bound to let your Honours know that there was much baseness of spirit, not among the merchantmen only, but many of the State's ships; and, therefore, I make it my earnest request, that your Honours would be pleased to send down some gentlemen to take an impartial and strict examination of the deportment of several commanders. . . . And I hope it will not be unreasonable for me, in behalf of myself, to desire your Honours, that you would think of giving me, your unworthy servant, a discharge from this employment, so far too great for me . . . that so I may be freed from that trouble of spirit which lies upon me, arising from the sense of my own insufficiency."
But Blake was far too valuable a servant to lose, and the Council refused to receive his commission back again. It thanked him for his efforts, and it at once acceded to his demand for a commission of inquiry. The results of this inquiry were threefold: a considerable increase in the material force of the fleet, including the building of thirty new frigates; the removal from their commands, and the committal to the Tower, of various captains, including Saltonstall, Taylor, Young, Brown, and Chapman; and the giving of orders that, to avoid desertion and delay, seamen should be kept in their ships while the ships lay in port, and that merchant skippers should no longer be allowed in action to command their own vessels.
Notes:
Bold indicates a ship sunk, scuttled or blown up, or a captain killed
Italics indicates a ship or captain captured
After the battle several English captains were disciplined for not fighting hard enough. These included :
Sources
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