1.
Second Anglo-Dutch War
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After initial English successes, the war ended in a Dutch victory. It was part of a series of four Anglo-Dutch Wars fought between the English and the Dutch in the 17th and 18th centuries. The First Anglo-Dutch War was concluded with an English victory in the Battle of Scheveningen in August 1653, the Commonwealth government of Oliver Cromwell tried to avoid further conflict with the Dutch Republic. It did not come to the aid of its ally, Sweden, the Commonwealth was at war with Spain in the Anglo-Spanish War. The English feared Dutch intervention in this war on the side of the Spanish, in part, the leading personage of the Royal House of Orange was young Prince William who was the grandson of Charles I the lately beheaded king of England. Thus, the Commonwealth of England feared that the Orange party was under the influence of exiled English royalists, in reality, however, the Dutch Republic had only recently had its independence from Spain recognised, so had no desire to aid their hated former master. The Dutch were also building up their shipping and trading fleet again following the devastation of the First Anglo-Dutch War. While the English had won a great naval battles and destroyed a great many Dutch ships during the First Anglo-Dutch War. The real problem with the English trading system was that it was based on tariffs, Dutch goods were much more attractive around the world because they lacked the additional taxing on imports and exports that came with English goods. The end of the First Anglo-Dutch War had not changed this dynamic, indeed, the end of the war had set the United Provinces free to expand their trade while the English were still hindered by the same tariff system. Thus, another war seemed inevitable to many people of the time, as the Commonwealth was unlikely to give up its naval, the Treaty of Westminster itself planted the seeds of future conflict because of its secret annexe which contained the Act of Seclusion. The Act of Seclusion forbade the Province of Holland from installing any member of the House of Orange as their stadtholder, of course the most important province was Holland. Thanks to the influence that Johan de Witt could exert over the States-General, on May 4,1654, the Province of Holland passed its own Act of Exclusion. The Restoration of Charles II, in 1660, produced a surge of optimism in England. Many hoped to reverse the Dutch dominance in world trade, the Dutch, in this coordinated by Cornelis and Andries de Graeff, tried to placate the king with prodigious gifts, such as the Dutch Gift of 1660. Negotiations were started in 1661 to solve issues, which ended in the treaty of 1662. In 1663, Louis XIV of France stated his claim to portions of the Habsburg Southern Netherlands, during this time, Lord Clarendon, serving as chief minister to King Charles II of England, felt that France had become the greatest danger to England. In 1664, however, the situation quickly changed, clarendons enemy, Lord Arlington, became the favourite of the king and began to cooperate with the kings brother James, Duke of York, the Lord High Admiral
2.
North Foreland
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North Foreland is a chalk headland on the Kent coast of southeast England. North Foreland forms the end of the Isle of Thanet. It presents a bold cliff to the sea, and commands views over the southern North Sea and this house was burnt down by accident in the year 1683 after which for some years use was made of a sort of beacon on which a light was hoisted. About the year 1732 the top of this lighthouse was covered with a sort of lantern with large sash windows and the fire was kept bright by bellows with which the attendants blew throughout the night. This contrivance is said to have been for the purpose of saving coals but it would seem more probable that it was in order to preserve the fire from being extinguished by rain. They added that before the lantern was placed there and when the fire was kept in the air the wind kept the fire in a constant blaze which was seen in the air far above the lighthouse. Complaints of this sort were so loud and frequent that the governors of Greenwich Hospital to whom the lighthouse belonged sent Sir John Thomson to examine and make arrangements on the subject. He ordered the lantern to be away and things to be restored to nearly their former state the light to continue burning all the night until daylight. Towards the end of the 18th century the North Foreland Lighthouse underwent some considerable alterations, two stories of brick were built on the original structure which raised it to the height of 100 feet including the room at the top in which the lights were kept. To prevent accidents from fire it was coated with copper as was also the gallery around it and this gallery used to be much frequented by the visitors to Margate on account of the extensive views. This preceded by a decade the construction of the worlds first lighthouse designed for such a light, an array of transmitters was set out around the gallery of the lighthouse controlled by equipment in the lower lantern as part of this chain. The North Foreland lighthouse was the last manned lighthouse in the UK but was automated in a ceremony presided over by the Duke of Edinburgh in 1998, dermot Cronin was one of last Principal Lighthouse Keepers that manned North Foreland lighthouse. A painting of the lighthouse by Elwin Hawthorne is in the Russell-Cotes Art Gallery & Museum, currently, the cottages around the lighthouse can be rented as holiday accommodation. Two naval battles of the Anglo-Dutch Wars are called the Battle of the North Foreland after the cape, The Battle of the Gabbard, 2–3 June 1653, the St. Jamess Day Battle, 25–26 July 1666, in the Second Anglo-Dutch War. List of lighthouses in England Trinity House MapServer chart, North Foreland location Satellite photograph showing the Thames Estuary Photographs of the North and South Foreland
3.
England
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England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west, the Irish Sea lies northwest of England and the Celtic Sea lies to the southwest. England is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east, the country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain in its centre and south, and includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly, and the Isle of Wight. England became a state in the 10th century, and since the Age of Discovery. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the worlds first industrialised nation, Englands terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north and in the southwest, the capital is London, which is the largest metropolitan area in both the United Kingdom and the European Union. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922 the Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom, leading to the latter being renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain, the name England is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means land of the Angles. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages, the Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. The earliest recorded use of the term, as Engla londe, is in the ninth century translation into Old English of Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its spelling was first used in 1538. The earliest attested reference to the Angles occurs in the 1st-century work by Tacitus, Germania, the etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars, it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an angular shape. An alternative name for England is Albion, the name Albion originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The nominally earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC De Mundo, in it are two very large islands called Britannia, these are Albion and Ierne. But modern scholarly consensus ascribes De Mundo not to Aristotle but to Pseudo-Aristotle, the word Albion or insula Albionum has two possible origins. Albion is now applied to England in a poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, Lloegr, the earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of Homo antecessor, dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago, Modern humans are known to have inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years
4.
Kingdom of England
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In the early 11th century the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, united by Æthelstan, became part of the North Sea Empire of Cnut the Great, a personal union between England, Denmark and Norway. The completion of the conquest of Wales by Edward I in 1284 put Wales under the control of the English crown, from the accession of James I in 1603, the Stuart dynasty ruled England in personal union with Scotland and Ireland. Under the Stuarts, the kingdom plunged into war, which culminated in the execution of Charles I in 1649. The monarchy returned in 1660, but the Civil War had established the precedent that an English monarch cannot govern without the consent of Parliament and this concept became legally established as part of the Glorious Revolution of 1688. From this time the kingdom of England, as well as its state the United Kingdom. On 1 May 1707, under the terms of the Acts of Union 1707, the Anglo-Saxons referred to themselves as the Engle or the Angelcynn, originally names of the Angles. They called their land Engla land, meaning land of the English, by Æthelweard Latinized Anglia, from an original Anglia vetus, the name Engla land became England by haplology during the Middle English period. The Latin name was Anglia or Anglorum terra, the Old French, by the 14th century, England was also used in reference to the entire island of Great Britain. The standard title for all monarchs from Æthelstan until the time of King John was Rex Anglorum, Canute the Great, a Dane, was the first king to call himself King of England. In the Norman period Rex Anglorum remained standard, with use of Rex Anglie. The Empress Matilda styled herself Domina Anglorum, from the time of King John onwards all other titles were eschewed in favour of Rex or Regina Anglie. In 1604 James VI and I, who had inherited the English throne the previous year, the English and Scottish parliaments, however, did not recognise this title until the Acts of Union of 1707. The kingdom of England emerged from the unification of the early medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdoms known as the Heptarchy, East Anglia, Mercia, Northumbria, Kent, Essex, Sussex. The Viking invasions of the 9th century upset the balance of power between the English kingdoms, and native Anglo-Saxon life in general, the English lands were unified in the 10th century in a reconquest completed by King Æthelstan in 927 CE. During the Heptarchy, the most powerful king among the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms might become acknowledged as Bretwalda, the decline of Mercia allowed Wessex to become more powerful. It absorbed the kingdoms of Kent and Sussex in 825, the kings of Wessex became increasingly dominant over the other kingdoms of England during the 9th century. In 827, Northumbria submitted to Egbert of Wessex at Dore, in 886, Alfred the Great retook London, which he apparently regarded as a turning point in his reign. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle says that all of the English people not subject to the Danes submitted themselves to King Alfred, asser added that Alfred, king of the Anglo-Saxons, restored the city of London splendidly
5.
Dutch Republic
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It preceded the Batavian Republic, the Kingdom of Holland, the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, and ultimately the modern Kingdom of the Netherlands. Alternative names include the United Provinces, Seven Provinces, Federated Dutch Provinces, most of the Low Countries had come under the rule of the House of Burgundy and subsequently the House of Habsburg. In 1549 Holy Roman Emperor Charles V issued the Pragmatic Sanction, Charles was succeeded by his son, King Philip II of Spain. This was the start of the Eighty Years War, in 1579 a number of the northern provinces of the Low Countries signed the Union of Utrecht, in which they promised to support each other in their defence against the Spanish army. This was followed in 1581 by the Act of Abjuration, the declaration of independence of the provinces from Philip II. In 1582 the United Provinces invited Francis, Duke of Anjou to lead them, but after an attempt to take Antwerp in 1583. After the assassination of William of Orange, both Henry III of France and Elizabeth I of England declined the offer of sovereignty, however, the latter agreed to turn the United Provinces into a protectorate of England, and sent the Earl of Leicester as governor-general. This was unsuccessful and in 1588 the provinces became a confederacy, the Union of Utrecht is regarded as the foundation of the Republic of the Seven United Provinces, which was not recognized by the Spanish Empire until the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. During the Anglo-French war, the territory was divided into groups, the Patriots, who were pro-French and pro-American and the Orangists. The Republic of the United Provinces faced a series of revolutions in 1783–1787. During this period, republican forces occupied several major Dutch cities, initially on the defence, the Orangist forces received aid from Prussian troops and retook the Netherlands in 1787. After the French Republic became the French Empire under Napoleon, the Batavian Republic was replaced by the Napoleonic Kingdom of Holland, the Netherlands regained independence from France in 1813. In the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 the names United Provinces of the Netherlands, on 16 March 1815, the son of stadtholder William V crowned himself King William I of the Netherlands. Between 1815 and 1890 the King of the Netherlands was also in a union the Grand Duke of the sovereign Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. After Belgium gained its independence in 1830, the state became known as the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The County of Holland was the wealthiest and most urbanized region in the world, the free trade spirit of the time received a strong augmentation through the development of a modern, effective stock market in the Low Countries. The Netherlands has the oldest stock exchange in the world, founded in 1602 by the Dutch East India Company, while Rotterdam has the oldest bourse in the Netherlands, the worlds first stock exchange, that of the Dutch East-India Company, went public in six different cities. Later, a court ruled that the company had to reside legally in a city so Amsterdam is recognized as the oldest such institution based on modern trading principles
6.
George Monck, 1st Duke of Albemarle
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George Monck, 1st Duke of Albemarle, KG was an English soldier, politician and a key figure in effecting the Restoration of the Monarchy to King Charles II in 1660. Having assaulted the Under Sheriff of the county in revenge for a wrong done to his father, becoming a soldier, he served as a volunteer in the 1626 expedition to Cadiz, and the next year fought well at the siege of the Île de Ré. In 1629 Monck went to the Netherlands, then a theatre of warfare and he fought bravely at the 1637 Siege of Breda, always first in the breach of his men. In 1638 he surrendered his commission in consequence of a quarrel with the authorities of Dordrecht. He was appointed to the lieutenant-colonelcy of the Earl of Newports regiment, during the operations on the Scottish border in the Bishops Wars he showed his skill and coolness in the dispositions by which he saved the English artillery at the Battle of Newburn. At the outbreak of the Irish rebellion Monck was appointed as colonel of Sidneys Regiment under the command of James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormonde. All the qualities for which he was noted through life — his talent for making himself indispensable, his imperturbable temper, the governorship of Dublin stood vacant, and Lord Leicester recommended Monck. Charles I overruled the appointment in favour of Lord Cavan, the Duke of Ormonde viewed him with suspicion as one of two officers who refused to take the oath to support the Royalist cause in England and sent him under guard to Bristol. Taken prisoner by the Parliamentary Northern Association Army under Lord Fairfax at the Battle of Nantwich in January 1644, during his imprisonment he wrote Observations on Military and Political Affairs. Moncks experience in Ireland led to his release and he was made major general in the army sent by Parliament against Irish rebels. Making a distinction between fighting the Irish and taking arms against the king, he accepted the offer and swore loyalty to the Parliamentary cause. He made little headway against the Irish led by Owen Roe ONeill, the convention was a military expedient to deal with a military necessity. Most of Moncks army went over to the Royalist cause, placing themselves under the command of Hugh Montgomery, although Parliament disavowed the terms of the truce, no blame was attached to Moncks recognition of military necessity. He next fought at Oliver Cromwells side in Scotland at the 1650 Battle of Dunbar, made commander-in-chief in Scotland by Cromwell, Monck completed the subjugation of the country. During this subjugation he lost control of his men with the resulting manslaughter, the streets of the town were reputed to run red with blood for days and Monck eventually was sickened by the barbarity when he saw the corpse of a suckling mother with her baby still feeding. In February 1652 Monck left Scotland to recover his health at Bath. On his return to shore Monck married Anne Radford, in 1653 he was nominated one of the representatives for Devon in Barebones Parliament. He returned to Scotland, methodically beating down a Royalist insurrection in the Highlands, at Cromwells request, Monck remained in Scotland as governor
7.
Michiel de Ruyter
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Michiel Adriaenszoon de Ruyter was a Dutch admiral. He is the most famous and one of the most skilled admirals in Dutch history and he fought the English and French and scored several major victories against them, the best known probably being the Raid on the Medway. It is said once, when he was a child. Not knowing that De Ruyter was there, some workers then removed the ladders, De Ruyter had to smash the tiles on the church roof to get into the church and out the door. In 1622, he fought as a musketeer in the Dutch army under Maurice of Nassau against the Spaniards during the relief of Bergen-op-Zoom and that same year he rejoined the Dutch merchant fleet and steadily worked his way up. According to English sources, he was active in Dublin between 1623 and 1631 as an agent for the Vlissingen-based merchant house of the Lampsins brothers, although Dutch sources have no data about his whereabouts in those years, it is known that De Ruyter spoke Irish fluently. He occasionally travelled as supercargo to the Mediterranean or the Barbary Coast, in those years, he usually referred to himself as Machgyel Adriensoon, his name in the Zealandic dialect he spoke, not having yet adopted the name De Ruyter. De Ruyter most probably was a given to him. In 1631, he married a daughter named Maayke Velders. The marriage lasted until the end of 1631, when Maayke died after giving birth to a daughter who died three weeks later, in 1633 and 1635, De Ruyter sailed as a navigating officer aboard the ship Groene Leeuw on whaling expeditions to Jan Mayen. At this point he did not yet have a command of his own, in the summer of 1636 he remarried, this time to a daughter of a wealthy burgher named Neeltje Engels, who gave him four children. One of these died shortly after birth, the others were named Adriaen, Neeltje, in the midst of this, in 1637, De Ruyter became captain of a private ship meant to hunt for raiders operating from Dunkirk who were preying on Dutch merchant shipping. He fulfilled this task until 1640, a Dutch fleet, with De Ruyter as third in command, beat back a Spanish-Dunkirker fleet in an action off Cape St Vincent on 4 November 1641. After returning, he bought his own ship, the Salamander, during this time, his esteem grew among other Dutch captains as he regularly freed Christian slaves by redeeming them at his own expense. In 1650, De Ruyters wife, who in 1649 had given him a son named Engel. On 8 January 1652, he married the widow Anna van Gelder and he bought a house in Flushing, but his blissful family life did not last long. During the First Anglo-Dutch War, De Ruyter was asked to join the fleet as a subcommander of a Zealandic squadron of directors ships. After initially refusing, De Ruyter proved his worth under supreme commander Lieutenant-Admiral Maarten Tromp and he also fought at the Battle of Kentish Knock and the Battle of the Gabbard
8.
Holmes's Bonfire
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Holmess Bonfire was a raid on the Vlie estuary in the Netherlands, executed by the English Fleet during the Second Anglo-Dutch War on 19 and 20 August 1666. The attack, named after the commander of the landing force, during the same action the town of West-Terschelling was burnt down, causing an outrage in the Dutch Republic. After its victory in the St Jamess Day Fight on 4 and 5 August 1666, the Dutch fleet, though having lost only two ships, was severely damaged and would for some weeks be unable to challenge the English fleet. The joint fleet commanders, George Monck, 1st Duke of Albemarle and Prince Rupert of the Rhine and it was to be expected that the English fleet would be forced to return to the home ports, even before the Dutch fleet was repaired. To accomplish anything of import during the time period available. The most attractive Dutch targets were also the most dangerous. In the south, the port of Rotterdam was too far inland, because of these dangers, there would be no English attempts on these ports until Napoleonic times. But one lesser target was more exposed, the naval port of the Admiralty of Friesland, Harlingen, lies at the southern edge of the Waddenzee, the vast stretch of mudflats between the Frisian Isles and the continental coast. Harlingens exit to the North Sea, located 20 miles to the northwest, is the Vlie, the shoals, at this point even more dangerous than usual at the Dutch coast, were generally considered sufficient protection against any enemy attack. Trying to ingratiate himself with his new masters, he had for some time been promoting a possible raid on this location, a sweep along the coast by a frigate squadron during the following week brought only few prizes. Eight frigates were dedicated, the Advice, Hampshire, Tyger, Dragon, Assurance, Sweepstake, Garland, to this force were added five fireships and seven ketches. Holmes kept some men apart for personal protection and thus speaks of eleven companies, holmess orders were to put the main emphasis on plundering the islands. The common people among the population should be spared, that no violence be done to women or children, nor the inferior sort of people. Today the situation has changed considerably, the channel has shifted four miles to the southwest, eroding the north coast of Vlieland, normally the shifting shoals would have made an approach very difficult but Holmes had a stroke of luck. As a result, Holmes found a fleet of about 140 merchantmen or smaller vessels at anchor — by himself estimated at about 150 to 160 —, guarded by two light frigates, the Adelaar and Tol. The Adelaar of the Amsterdam admiralty had been used as a permanent escort ship for the Vlie since 1652 and was armed with twelve cannon, indeed, Holmes had been ordered to give priority to the shore installations on Vlieland. He therefore decided to attack this fleet first, according to some, Holmes was also specially inspired by the opportunity to damage the Dutch economy. He would later justify his initiative by claiming that he lacked the capacity to attack Vlieland because all ketches had grounded
9.
Naval warfare
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Naval warfare is combat in and on the sea, the ocean, or any other major body of water such as a large lake or wide river. Mankind has fought battles on the sea for more than 3,000 years, even in the interior of large landmasses, transportation before the advent of extensive railroads was largely dependent upon rivers, canals, and other navigable waterways. Prior to 1750, materials largely moved by barge or sea vessels. Thus armies, with their exorbitant needs for food, ammunition, the oceanic influences throughout pre-recorded history, and classical works such as The Odyssey underscore the past influences. The Persian Empire – united and strong – could not prevail against the might of the Athenian fleet combined with that of city states in several attempts to conquer the Greek city states. Phoenicias and Egypts power, Carthages and even Romes largely depended upon control of the seas, so too did the Venetian Republic dominate Italys city states, thwart the Ottoman Empire, and dominate commerce on the Silk Road and the Mediterranean in general for centuries. For three centuries, the Northmen raided and pillaged and went where they willed, far into central Russia and the Ukraine, many sea battles through history also provide a reliable source of shipwrecks for underwater archaeology. A major example is the exploration of the wrecks of various warships in the Pacific Ocean, the first dateable recorded sea battle occurred about 1210 BC, Suppiluliuma II, king of the Hittites, defeated a fleet from Cyprus, and burned their ships at sea. In the Battle of the Delta, the Ancient Egyptians defeated the Sea Peoples in a sea battle circa 1175 BC, no written mention of strategy or tactics seems to have survived. Josephus Flavius reports a battle between Tyre and the king of Assyria who was aided by the other cities in Phoenicia. The battle took place off the shores of Tyre, although the Tyrian fleet was much smaller in size, the Tyrians defeated their enemies. The Greeks of Homer just used their ships as transport for land armies and it seems unlikely that all this was the product of a single mind or even of a generation, most likely the period of evolution and experimentation was simply not recorded by history. After some initial battles while subjugating the Greeks of the Ionian coast, the Persians determined to invade Greece proper. The first Persian campaign, in 492 BC, was aborted because the fleet was lost in a storm, attacks by the Greek armies repulsed these. The third Persian campaign in 480 BC, under Xerxes I of Persia, but the defeat on land at Thermopylae forced a Greek withdrawal, and Athens evacuated its population to nearby Salamis Island. The ensuing Battle of Salamis was one of the engagements of history. Themistocles trapped the Persians in a too narrow for them to bring their greater numbers to bear. Aeschylus wrote a play about the defeat, The Persians, which was performed in a Greek theatre competition a few years after the battle and it is the oldest known surviving play
10.
Dunkirk
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Dunkirk is a commune in the Nord department in northern France. It lies 10 kilometres from the Belgian border, the population of the city at the 2012 census was 90,995 inhabitants. The name of Dunkirk derives from West Flemish dun and kerke, nowadays, Dunkirk is the worlds northernmost Francophone city. About 960AD Count Baldwin III had a wall erected, in order to protect the settlement against Viking raids. The surrounding wetlands were drained and cultivated by the monks of nearby Bergues Abbey, the name Dunkirk was first mentioned in a tithe privilege of 27 May 1067, issued by Count Baldwin V of Flanders. Count Philip I brought further large tracts of marshland under cultivation, laid out first plans to build a Canal from Dunkirk to Bergues and vested the Dunkirkers with market rights. However, in the course of the Western Schism from 1378, English supporters of Pope Urban VI disembarked at Dunkirk, captured the city and they were ejected by King Charles VI of France, but left great devastations in and around the town. Upon the extinction of the Counts of Flanders with the death of Louis II in 1384, Flanders was acquired by the Burgundian, the fortifications were again enlarged, including the construction of a belfry daymark. As Maximilian was the son of Emperor Frederick III, all Flanders was immediately seized by King Louis XI of France. However, the defeated the French troops at the 1479 Battle of Guinegate. The area remained disputed between Spain, the United Netherlands, England and France. At the beginning of the Eighty Years War, Dunkirk was briefly in the hands of the Dutch rebels, Spanish forces under Duke Alexander Farnese of Parma re-established Spanish rule in 1583 and it became a base for the notorious Dunkirkers. The Dunkirkers briefly lost their home port when the city was conquered by the French in 1646, in 1658, as a result of the long war between France and Spain, it was captured after a siege by Franco-English forces following the battle of the Dunes. The city along with Fort-Mardyck was awarded to England in the peace the following year as agreed in the Franco-English alliance against Spain and it came under French rule when Charles II of England sold it to France for £320,000 on 17 October 1662. The French government developed the town as a fortified port, the towns existing defences were adapted to create ten bastions. The port was expanded in the 1670s by the construction of a basin that could hold up to thirty warships with a lock system to maintain water levels at low tide. The basin was linked to the sea by a channel dug through coastal sandbanks secured by two jetties and this work was completed by 1678. The jetties were defended a few years later by the construction of five forts, Château dEspérance, Château Vert, Grand Risban, Château Gaillard, an additional fort was built in 1701 called Fort Blanc
11.
Prince Rupert of the Rhine
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Rupert was a younger son of the German prince Frederick V, Elector Palatine and his wife Elizabeth, the eldest daughter of James I of England. Thus Rupert was the nephew of King Charles I of England, who made him Duke of Cumberland and Earl of Holderness, and his sister Electress Sophia was the mother of George I of Great Britain. Prince Rupert had a varied career and he was a soldier from a young age, fighting against Spain in the Netherlands during the Eighty Years War, and against the Holy Roman Emperor in Germany during the Thirty Years War. Aged 23, he was appointed commander of the Royalist cavalry during the English Civil War, becoming the archetypal Cavalier of the war and he surrendered after the fall of Bristol and was banished from England. He served under Louis XIV of France against Spain, and then as a Royalist privateer in the Caribbean, Rupert died in England in 1682, aged 62. Rupert is considered to have been a quick-thinking and energetic cavalry general, in the Interregnum, Rupert continued the conflict against Parliament by sea from the Mediterranean to the Caribbean, showing considerable persistence in the face of adversity. As the head of the Royal Navy in his years, he showed greater maturity and made impressive and long-lasting contributions to the Royal Navys doctrine. As a colonial governor, Rupert shaped the geography of modern Canada—Ruperts Land was named in his honour. He also played a role in the early African slave trade, Ruperts varied and numerous scientific and administrative interests combined with his considerable artistic skills made him one of the more colourful individuals of the Restoration period. Rupert was born in Prague in 1619, at the start of the Thirty Years War, to Frederick V, Elector Palatine, and Elizabeth Stuart and he was given his name in honour of King Rupert of Germany, a famous Wittelsbach ancestor. Ruperts father was a member of the Holy Roman Empire. This support was not forthcoming, resulting in a defeat at the hands of his Catholic enemies at the Battle of White Mountain in 1620. Ruperts parents were mockingly termed the Winter King and Queen as a consequence of their reigns in Bohemia having lasted only a single season. Rupert was almost left behind in the rush to escape Ferdinands advance on Prague, until Kryštof z Donína. Rupert accompanied his parents to The Hague, where he spent his years at the Hof te Wassenaer. Ruperts mother paid her children little attention even by the standards of the day, apparently preferring her pet monkeys, the result was a strict school routine including logic, mathematics, writing, drawing, singing and playing instruments. As a child, Rupert was at times badly behaved, fiery, mischievous, nonetheless, Rupert proved to be an able student. By the age of three he could speak some English, Czech and French, and mastered German while still young and he excelled in art, being taught by Gerard van Honthorst, and found the maths and sciences easy
12.
Strait of Dover
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Between these points lies the most popular route for cross-channel swimmers. The entire strait is within the waters of France and the United Kingdom. The strait is the busiest international seaway in the world, used by over 400 commercial vessels daily and this has made traffic safety a critical issue, with HM Coastguard and the Maritime Gendarmerie maintaining a 24-hour watch over the strait and enforcing a strict regime of shipping lanes. In addition to the intensive east–west traffic, the strait is crossed north to south by ferries linking Dover to Calais. Until 1994 these provided the route across it for land transport. The Channel Tunnel now provides a route, crossing beneath the strait at an average depth of 45 m below the seabed. The town of Dover gives its name to one of the sea areas of the British Shipping Forecast, the strait is believed to have been created by the erosion of a land bridge that linked the Weald in Great Britain to the Boulonnais in the Pas de Calais. The predominant geology on both the British and French sides and on the seafloor is chalk, although somewhat resistant to erosion, erosion of both coasts has created the famous white cliffs of Dover in the UK and the Cap Blanc Nez in France. The Channel Tunnel was bored through solid chalk, the Rhine flowed northwards into the North Sea as the sea level fell during the start of the first of the Pleistocene Ice Ages. This overflow channel became the Strait of Dover about 425,000 years ago, a narrow deep channel along the middle of the strait was the bed of the Rhine in the last Ice Age. A geological deposit in East Anglia marks the old preglacial northward course of the Rhine, a 2007 study concluded the English Channel was formed by erosion caused by two major floods. The first was about 425,000 years ago, when a lake in the southern North Sea overflowed and broke the Weald-Artois chalk range in a catastrophic erosion. Afterwards, the Thames and Scheldt flowed through the gap into the English Channel, in a second flood about 225,000 years ago the Meuse and Rhine were ice-dammed into a lake that broke catastrophically through a high weak barrier. Both floods cut massive flood channels in the dry bed of the English Channel, the Lobourg strait, a major feature of the straits seafloor, runs its 6 km wide slash on a NNE–SSW axis. The submarine depth of the varies between 68 m at the Lobourg strait and 20 m at the highest banks. It presents a succession of rocky areas relatively deserted by ships wanting to spare their nets, the strong currents of the Channel are slowed down around the rocky areas of the strait, with formation of countercurrents and calmer zones where many species can find shelter. Moreover, this is a zone for the species of the Atlantic Ocean. This mix of various environments promotes a variety of wildlife
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