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Michiel de Ruyter

Michiel Adriaenszoon de Ruyter (24 March 1607-29 April 1676) was a Dutch admiral who service in the Dutch Navy during the Anglo-Dutch Wars, including his daring Raid on the Medway in 1667, made him a national hero. He was killed in battle at the Battle of Augusta during the Franco-Dutch War.

Biography[]

Michiel de Ruyter came to warfare late in life. The son of a laborer in the port of Vlissingen,, he went to sea as a boy and worked his way up to solid prosperity. By the age of 30, he was captain of his own ship and, by 40, a successful merchant in the colonial trade. During this time, he was occasionally involved in naval action, because armed merchant vessels were pressed into service as fighting ships when required. The experience did not impress him. Taking part in an action off Cape St. Vincent in 1641, he was so infuriated by the lack of discipline among fellow Dutch captains that he vowed never to serve in battle again.

A Change of Heart[]

The outbreak of the First Anglo-Dutch War in 1652 transformed his life. An experienced and respected sailor, he was persuaded to enter naval service as a vice-commodore. His first tour of duty made his reputation. Escorting a merchant convoy into the Atlantic, he was intercepted by an English naval force under George Ayscue that outnumbered his ships two to one. De Ruyter rounded on the Englishand attacked them with such spirit that they were driven back into Plymouth. On the way home, he was involved in a Dutch defeat at the Kentish Knock, but emerged with credit by managing a prudent withdrawal when the battle was lost.

Following the death of Admiral Maarten Tromp in the last encounter of the war in August 1653, the Dutch leader, Johan de Witt, invited de Ruyter to take overall commandof the navy. The offer was firmly declined, however, as de Ruyter rightly feared the personal jealousies and political intrigues that such a meteoric rise would cause. Instead, he continued to perform more modest but distinguished service from the Mediterranean to the Baltic.

The crisis of the Second Anglo-Dutch War in 1665 finally overcame de Ruyter's reluctance to assume supreme command. He was engaged in colonial warfare with the English on the coast of Africa in the last year of peace and moved seamlessly into attacks on English colonies in the Caribbean and North America once war was declared. Returning home from this successful marauding at a low point in Dutch fofrtunes, he was hailed as a potential savior. But his appointment as navy commander was not welcomed by the de Witts' political enemies, the Orange faction, or by their favored admiral, Cornelis Tromp, who had assumed he would get the job. In the series of epic battles of the summer of 1666, the failure of Tromp, commanding a squadron, to follow orders and coordinate his movements with the rest of the Dutch fleet was almost disastrous for de Ruyter, whose tactics depended on disciplined maneuver. After the St. James's Day Battle in August - the closest to a total defeat de Ruyter ever suffered - Tromp was dismissed for negligence. It is a measure of the bitterness at the heart of these disputes that one of Tromp's supporters tried to assassinate de Ruyter at his home three years later.

The Second Anglo-Dutch War ended in triumph for de Ruyter after his bold and successful raid on the English naval dockyard at Chatham on the River Medway. The resulting Treaty of Breda brought a spell of peace, and the aging de Ruyter, still precious to the Dutch state and people, was ordered to stay ashore.

Renewed aggression[]

De Ruyter was therefore safeguarded for the climactic challenge of his career in 1672. England allied itslef with Louis XIV's France against the Dutch and they looked certain of victory. De Ruyter's impulse was to attack the two enemy fleets separately before they could join up, but he was frustrated by administrative delays. He took the offensive regardless, surprising the allied fleets in Solebay, eastern England. He inflicted heavy losses on the numerically superior enemy, and extricated his fleet in a skullful withdrawal. The downfall of his political allies, the de Witts, brought the Orange party to power, and could have ended de Ruyter's career. But he was too valuable to fire and continued in command, at the price of accepting Tromp's return as his subordinate. He fought defensive battles at Schooneveld and Texel in 1673, masterpieces of deft maneuver and brilliant exercises in strategic calculation, denying the allies the chance of mounting a seaborne invasion or sustaining a blockade without risking the loss of his fleet.

The English made peace in 1674 and de Ruyter out to have retired. Instead in 1676, he led an inadequate fleet to the Mediterranean to join the Spanish who were fighting the French around the coast of Sicily. At the battle of Augusta on 22 April, in the thick of the action, de Ruyter's leg was severed by a cannonball. He died of gangrene a week later.

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