DUTCH BUCCANEER

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aukepalmhof
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DUTCH BUCCANEER

Post by aukepalmhof » Tue Jul 21, 2009 1:17 am

The vessel depict on this stamp of the British Virgin Islands is given as a Dutch buccaneer around 1660, not a specific ships name is given. According the Crown Agent Stamp Bureau the stamp depict a ship of the Dutch buccaneer Edward Mansvelt. He was active in the Caribbean from 1663 till 1666.

Dutch pirates and smugglers roamed in force the Caribbean waters after the Dutch were expelled from the trade with the Iberian Peninsula in 1598.

From 1599 large fleets of Dutch vessels sailed to the Caribbean waters for salt, mostly collected at the Araya Peninsula in Venezuela and Sint Maarten. Much salt was needed in the Zeven Provincien for the preserving of pickled herring.
Some of these vessels were used as privateer, and they used the British Virgin Islands sometimes as a base or hideaway place, one of the islands of the group is named after Jost van Dyke a Dutch pirate? (till so far noting is found in the Dutch archives about this man.) Around 1625 some Dutch settlers were found at St Croix, Virgin Islands.

When the truce between Spain, Portugal and the Zeven Provincien expired in 1621, the West Indische Compagnie (WIC.) was founded on 3 June 1621, and this company sends large fleets of warships to Brazil and the Caribbean to destroy the Portuguese and Spanish sea power. The company also licensed vessels as privateer.

When Henry Morgan attacked Porto Bello in 1668 with 500 men, 40 were Dutchmen.

Dutch privateers sailed in these waters into the early 1700, thereafter the influence of Dutch pirates declined in the waters of the Caribbean.

British Virgin Islands 3c sg243, scott?

Source: Hollandsche Kapers op Amerikaansche Kusten (Dutch Pirates on the American Coasts) by W..J. van Balen. Life among the pirates by David Cordingly.
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