THE MEDWAY RAID

 THE MEDWAY RAID ~ History they don't teach in England 

This is the chapter of naval history they don't teach or celebrate in England. In June 1667, just two years after the country was ravaged by plague, a year after the capital city had been decimated in a Great Fire, the Dutch sailed into the HQ of the Royal Navy and sank, burned or stole the larger part of King Charles II's fleet while it sat helpless at its moorings.

By the summer of 1667 King Charles was broke and there was no money to pay for the fleet. Charles was in Breda, suing for peace with the Dutch, trying to end the Second Anglo-Dutch War. The biggest, most powerful ships were laid up, stripped of their crews and many of their more perishable fittings, and kept at anchor in the River Medway in Kent. Complacent about the possibility of attack, they were largely unmanned and unprotected. The naval base at Chatham was the kingdom's primary installation, the best place to deploy from to meet England's most potent adversary at the time, the Dutch. But the sea is a two-way street.

In early June the Dutch sailed into the Thames Estuary. They bombarded, captured and demolished Sheerness Castle and sailed up the Medway towards Chatham. The English desperately tried to block the river. They sank ships, ran a chain from one side to the other and reinforced Upnor Castle. None of that stopped the Dutch, who brushed aside the chain, and blasted any ships or land-based artillery that attempted to engage them. They set fire to ships and captured a few of the biggest and best. The pinnacle of humiliation was the capture of the Royal Charles, the pride of Charles's fleet, bearing his owa name. It was deemed so important that the Dutch towed it back to Holland.

English losses were over a dozen, including three of the four biggest battleships in the navy. On top of this the English sank 30 of their own ships to avoid their capture. The only glimmer of good news was that the Dutch did not press their advantage and attack the defenceless capital city, instead choosing to head home with their loot. The Royal Charles became a tourist attraction in Holland, and its stern still sits in Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum.

Source ~ ‘History Hit Miscellany of Facts, Figures and Fascinating Finds’ by Dan Snow