Maarten Tromp

Maarten Tromp (born April 23, 1598, Breille, Holland—died Aug. 9, 1653, at sea off Terheijde, near Scheveningen) was a Dutch admiral, the highest ranking sea commander (from 1636) under the stadholder during the Dutch wars with Spain and England during the first half of the 17th century. His victory over the Spanish in the Battle of the Downs (1639) signalled the passing of Spain’s power at sea.

At the age of nine, he sailed with his father, Harpert Maartenszoon, the captain of a small man-of-war. When his father changed to the merchant fleet, Maarten accompanied him, but in 1609 the ship was taken by an English pirate, his father was killed, and Maarten was forced to serve the pirate captain for two years.

After his return to Holland, he rejoined the navy in 1617 and took part in a successful expedition against Algerian pirates. In 1619 he left the navy to sail with a merchant fleet to the Mediterranean, but in 1621 he fell once more into the hands of pirates. Set free after a year, he became a lieutenant in the Dutch navy. In 1621 the Twelve Years’ Truce between the Netherlands and Spain expired, and it became necessary to prepare the fleet for war. In 1624 Tromp received his first commission as a captain, and five years later he commanded the flagship against pirates from Ostend. In 1634 he again left the navy, but in 1636 he returned and was soon appointed lieutenant admiral of Holland, at that time the highest post in the navy under the stadholder, who was also the admiral general of the republic. In February 1639, he defeated a fleet of Dunkirk privateers; he then met a large Spanish armada that was transporting some 13,000 Spanish recruits to Flanders. Commanded by Adm. Antonio de Oquendo and several other experienced captains, the fleet consisted of 45 warships and 30 merchantmen hired as troopships. When Tromp spotted the armada off Beachy Head on Sept. 15, 1639, he had only 13 vessels at his command; his other detachments were cruising in the Strait of Dover and off Dunkirk. Five more Dutch ships arrived the next day, and the Dutch captains decided to give battle. After six hours of fighting, the armada—overcrowded with recruits who accounted for an extremely high number of casualties—withdrew to repair damages. The next day no action could take place for lack of wind, but the Dutch were reinforced by a Zeeland squadron, and, in the early morning of September 18, Tromp attacked the Spaniards in the Strait of Dover. In the afternoon Oquendo withdrew into the neutral roadstead of the Downs. Tromp, after taking in fresh supplies of gunpowder at Calais, soon followed him there, only to be separated from him by an English squadron under the command of Sir John Penington. By October 10 the Dutch fleet was strong enough to challenge the Spaniards, and on October 21 Tromp attacked Oquendo, and Penington’s efforts at protection were of little avail. In the Battle of the Downs, the armada was completely defeated, suffering severe losses in both ships and manpower. Tromp was knighted by Louis XIII in 1640 and by Charles I in 1642 when he visited Dover to escort Queen Henrietta Maria and Princess Mary to Holland. By 1640, thanks to his share of prize money, Tromp valued his assets at 90,000 guilders (at a time when ordinary seamen under his command made 10 guilders a month).

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Tromp’s main task during the next years was action against the Dunkirk pirates who continued to attack the Dutch merchant fleet. In 1646 Tromp helped the French capture Dunkirk, after which the Order of St. Michael was conferred upon him. After the Peace of Munster in 1648, which concluded the Eighty Years’ War, the activities of the Dutch navy diminished until, in 1651, growing privateering between Scandinavia and Gibraltar made it necessary to reinforce the neglected fleet and to protect maritime trade. Relations with England became increasingly strained after the Navigation Act (1651), which was passed to restrict Dutch trade with British possessions, while much resentment was also caused by the English claim to sovereignty over the seas.

A skirmish with Adm. Robert Blake off Dover in May 1652 resulted in the First Anglo-Dutch War, which marked a crisis in the rivalry between England and the Netherlands as carriers of world trade. Although Tromp was unable to stir the English admirals to action later in the year—for which he was censured by the Dutch authorities, who even kept him from his command for some months—he defeated Blake off Dungeness in December. But the English fleet was superior to the Dutch; Tromp was unable to continue his successes and lost the three-day battle between Portland and Calais (March 1653), as well as the Battle of Gabbard in June. Tromp was killed in the battle off Terheijde near Scheveningen.