Pieter de Bitter

His name first emerges in 1653, when during the First Anglo-Dutch War he is mentioned as the captain of the Mercurius, a vessel of forty cannon of the Dutch East India Company, that had been allocated to the squadron of Commodore Michiel de Ruyter, just prior to the Battle of Scheveningen.

[1] In that fight De Bitter distinguished himself by disabling English ship Triumph of 62 guns, the flagship of Vice-Admiral James Peacock who was killed.

In August 1655, during the Dutch–Portuguese War, De Bitter was flagcaptain on the Ter Goes of Director-General Gerard Pietersz Hulft, who commanded a fleet attacking the Portuguese colony of Ceylon from Batavia, the main stronghold of the Dutch East Indies.

After Colombo had been taken, De Bitter was in July 1656 sent on a galiot back to Batavia to inform the Council of the Indies of the good news – and bring the sad tidings that Hulft had been killed in action.

In November 1656, De Bitter was made Vice-Commandeur, under Commandeur Adriaan Roothaas, of a fleet sent to blockade the Portuguese ports on the coast of Malabar.

The flotilla having been joined by the main force of Colonel Rijcklof van Goens in November,[3][4] it was decided to split off a large part of the fleet to attack the remaining Portuguese possessions on Ceylon.

De Bitter managed to inspire his crews to an effective defence and in this Battle of Vågen beat off the attack with heavy losses for the English, but also suffering himself 108 men killed or wounded.