To gain experience, and achieve promotion, Psilander joined the Dutch Navy during the Nine Years' War, serving as rating and petty officer, fighting in the Battle of Beachy Head (1690).

The ensuing battle left his ship of the line captured with fifty-three casualties, but they were eventually released and allowed to return home.

[1][2] Psilander commanded a ship-of-the-line in the Battle of Køge Bay, becoming Deputy Superintendent of the Royal Navy shipyard in Karlskrona the same year.

The Swedish island in the Baltic was under increasing threats from the ascending Russian Navy, which was repeatedly launching raids upon it.

Psilander's mission was to organize the local population in a homeland defence, but this proved unfeasible when the Russian galley fleet under Admiral Fyodor Apraksin[3] in July 1717 carried out a week-long looting of parts of the island.