Joost Banckert

Joost van Trappen Banckert (c.1597 – 12 September 1647) was a Dutch vice admiral who spent most of his career in the service of the admiralty of Zeeland.

That year he took service with the Zeeland Chamber of the Dutch West India Company (WIC), remaining there until 1636.

He defeated four Spanish galleons in 1626 when commander of a squadron of three ships taking or sinking three of them, he also repeatedly defeated the Dunkirk corsairs Banckert often fought together with Piet Hein, with whom he attacked and captured the Portuguese settlement Salvador on the coast of Brazil in 1624 and as a vice admiral helped capture the Spanish treasure fleet in the Bay of Matanzas in 1628.

In 1639, again a rear-admiral, he served under Lieutenant-Admiral Maarten Tromp and was present at the first skirmish (the action of 18 September 1639) against a large Spanish fleet in the English Channel and the subsequent Battle of the Downs.

On the return voyage, he suddenly fell ill and died at sea.