The Anglo-Dutch Wars of the Seventeenth Century

This Anglo--Dutch naval wars of 1652-54, 1665-67, and 1672-74 were fought between two states who had more in common with each other than with the other states of continental Europe. Both were distinguished from other major European countries by their economies, in which trade and shipping had a vitally important, and vigorously expanding, role; both had governments that were crucially influenced by mercantile interests; and both governments, uniquely in Europe, depended on the co-operation of representative bodies - the States General in the Dutch Republic, and Parliament in England.

This account of their long-running conflict sets the wars in their full political, economic and naval contexts. It offers not only a compelling study of the logistics and strategy of naval warfare at a crucial phase in the emergency of a modern navy and a professional officer corps; it also throws a searching light on the government, economies and societies of the two belligerents, bringing out their obvious similarities but also exposing the many deep difficulties between their systems, attitudes and aims.

The Anglo-Dutch wars are conventionally seen as a struggle over trade, and for the control of the narrow seas on which both states depended; but Professor Jones examines the other factors that contributed to their outbreak. He analyses the impact on them of the political changes in England, as the Commonwealth gave way to the restored monarchy of Charles II. He investigates how far the respective forms of government in England and the Dutch Republic influenced the conduct, and the outcome, of the three wars. He compares the effectiveness of the different governments under pressure — not just the English with Dutch, but Commonwealth with restored monarchy in England, and Republican with Orangist in the Netherlands. And he reviews the impact of the wars on both economies, and considers whether the more highly developed Dutch trading economy proved an asset or a liability in wartime.

But his book is more than just a study of two mercantile nations at each other's throats. It gives a vivid picture of the ships, the sailors, and the lives they led at sea and on shore at a time when the modern concept of a professional navy, with a professional officer class, was beginning to take shape. And it shows how these wars established new battle tactics for conflict at sea that would endure for the rest of the age of sail.