First day In the early morning of 25 July, the Dutch fleet of 88 ships discovered the English fleet of 89 ships near North Foreland, sailing to the north. De Ruyter gave orders for a chase and the Dutch fleet pursued the English from the southeast in a leeward position, as the wind blew from the northwest. Suddenly, the wind turned to the northeast. The English commander,
Prince Rupert of the Rhine, then turned sharply east to regain the
weather gauge. De Ruyter followed, but the wind fell and the fleet fell behind. The Dutch van, commanded by Lieutenant-Admiral
Johan Evertsen, was becalmed and drifted away from the
line of battle, splitting De Ruyter's fleet in two. This awkward situation lasted for hours; then, again, a soft breeze began to blow from the northeast. Immediately, the English van, commanded by
Thomas Allin, and part of the centre formed a line of battle and engaged the Dutch van, still in disarray. The Dutch failed to form a coherent line of battle in response, and ship after ship was mauled by the combined firepower of the English line. Vice-Admiral
Rudolf Coenders was killed, and Lieutenant-Admiral
Tjerk Hiddes de Vries had an arm and a leg shot off, yet still tried to bring cohesion to his force — but to no avail. Unable to reach them with his centre, the horrified De Ruyter saw the Frisian ships drifting to the south, now no more than floating wrecks full of dead, the moans of the dying clearly audible above the other sounds of battle. With the Dutch van defeated, the English converged to deliver the coup-de-grâce to De Ruyter's centre.
George Monck, accompanying Rupert, predicted that De Ruyter would give two broadsides and run, but the latter put up a furious fight on the Dutch flagship
De Zeven Provinciën. He withstood a combined attack by and
Royal Charles and forced Rupert to leave the damaged
Royal Charles for
Royal James. The Dutch centre's resistance enabled the seaworthy remnants of the van to make an escape to the south. Lieutenant-Admiral
Cornelis Tromp, commanding the Dutch rear, had from a great distance seen the disaster for the Dutch fleet evolve. Annoyed by what he saw as a lack of competence, he decided to give the correct example. He turned sharply to the west, crossed the line of the English rear, under the command of
Jeremiah Smith, separating it from the rest of the English fleet and then, having the weather gauge, kept on attacking it rabidly until at last the English were routed and fled to the west. He pursued well into the night, destroying with a fireship. After Tromp three times shot the entire crew from its rigging, Smith's flagship caught fire and had to be towed home. The vice commander of the English rear was
Edward Spragge, who felt so humiliated by the course of events that he became a personal enemy of Tromp. He would later be killed pursuing Tromp in the
Battle of the Texel.
Second day On the morning of 26 July, Tromp broke off pursuit, well-pleased with his first real victory as a squadron commander. During the night, a ship had brought him the message that De Ruyter had likewise been victorious, so Tromp was in a euphoric mood. That abruptly changed upon the discovery of the drifting flagship of the dying
Tjerk Hiddes de Vries. Suddenly he feared that his ship was now the only remnant of the
Dutch fleet and that he was in mortal peril. Behind him, those ships of the English rear still operational had again turned to the east. In front, the other enemy squadrons surely awaited him. On the horizon, only
English flags were to be seen. Manoeuvring wildly, Tromp, drinking a lot of gin to restore his nerve, dodged any attempt to trap him and brought his squadron safely home in the port of
Flushing on the morning of 26 July. There, to great mutual relief, he discovered the rest of the Dutch fleet. It took Tromp six hours to gather enough courage to face De Ruyter. It was obvious to him that he should never have allowed himself to get completely separated from the main force. Indeed, De Ruyter, not being his usual charitable self, immediately blamed him for the defeat and ordered Tromp and his subcommanders
Isaac Sweers and
Willem van der Zaan from his sight, and told them to never again set foot on
De Zeven Provinciën. The commander of the Dutch fleet still had not mentally recovered from the events of the previous day. On the morning of 5 August, after a short summer's night, De Ruyter discovered that his position had become hopeless. Lieutenant-Admiral Johan Evertsen had died after losing a leg, De Ruyter's force was now reduced to about forty ships, crowding together and most of these were inoperational, being survivors of the van. Some fifteen good ships had apparently deserted during the night. A strong gale from the east prevented an easy retreat to the continental coast, and to the west the British van and centre (about fifty ships) surrounded him in a half-circle, safely bombarding him from a leeward position. De Ruyter was desperate. When his second-in-command of the centre, Lieutenant-Admiral
Aert Jansse van Nes visited him for a council of war, he exclaimed: "With seven or eight against the mass!" He then sagged, mumbling: "What's wrong with us? I wish I were dead." His close personal friend Van Nes tried to cheer him up, joking: "Me too. But you never die when you want to!" No sooner had both men left the cabin than the table they had been sitting at was smashed by a cannonball. The English, however, had their own problems. The strong gale prevented them from closing with the Dutch. They tried to use fire ships, but these, too, had trouble reaching the enemy. Only the sloop
Fan-Fan, Rupert's personal pleasure yacht, rowed to the Dutch flagship
De Zeven Provinciën to harass it with its two little guns, much to the hilarious laughter of the English crews. When his ship had again warded off an attack by a fireship (the
Land of Promise) and Tromp still did not show up, for
De Ruyter tension became unbearable. He sought death, exposing himself deliberately on the deck. When he failed to be hit, he exclaimed: "Oh, God, how unfortunate I am! Amongst so many thousands of cannonballs, is there not one that would take me?" His son-in-law, Captain of the Marines Johann de Witte, heard him and said: "Father, what desperate words! If you merely want to die, let us then turn, sail in the midst of our enemies and fight ourselves to death!". This brave but foolish proposal brought the Admiral back to his senses, for he discovered that he was not so desperate and answered: "You don't know what you are talking about! If I did that, all would be lost. But if I can bring myself and these ships safely home, we'll finish the job later." Then the wind, that had brought so much misfortune to the Dutch, saved them by turning to the west. They formed a line of battle and brought their fleet to safety through the Flemish shoals, Vice-Admiral
Adriaen Banckert of the Zealandic fleet covering the retreat of all damaged ships with the operational vessels, the number of the latter slowly growing as it turned out that only very few ships had actually deserted in the night; most had merely drifted away, and now, one after the other, they rejoined the battle. ==Aftermath==