In November 1654, Godske was holding the rank of merchant in the
VOC and a member of a mission to the king of
Kandy, in
Ceylon. From 1656 to 1661 he commanded the important VOC office at
Galle, Ceylon. Godske left the Company's service in 1661, but then decided to take part in the conquest of
Cochin under
Rijckloff van Goens and only returned to the Netherlands in September 1662. In March 1664 Godske again left for the East Indies and while at the Cape, in 1665, recommended a suitable site for the new fort or castle which was to replace the existing
Fort de Goede Hoop. On 11 November 1665, two days after his arrival at
Batavia, he became commander of
Dutch Malabar and on 1 September 1668 director of the VOC factory at
Gamron in Persia, a position he held until 1670. As commander of the return fleet he arrived again at the Cape in 1671. During his three and a half weeks stay at the Cape, he made several decisions concerning the fortification of the settlement and made many recommendations about administration in the instructions which he left for Commander
Pieter Hackius. Godske was sent to preserve the peace at the time of
Third Anglo-Dutch War. Needed in the
Netherlands after the war's end, he returned there in 1676. ==See also==