Fin de la Guerre

Fin de la Guerre

Engraving of the Fin de la Guerre by Frans Hogenberg

Ship data flag  United Netherlands Ship type Warship

Ship dimensions and crew

Rigging and rigging Number of masts 4th

Armor Iron plates

The Fin de la Guerre (for "end of the war"; also named after its Spanish or Latinized name as Fin de la Guerra or Finis belli ) was a warship of the Dutch rebels, which was defeated by the Spanish attackers during the siege of Antwerp in 1585 Spanish-Dutch war was used.

The ship had a large, rectangular battle tower in the middle, on which numerous cannons and around a thousand musketeers were posted. Apparently it was also armored with thick iron plates. Its name was intended to express the great hopes that the hard-pressed Dutch defenders placed in their construction in order to turn the tide against the Spanish besiegers. When it was first used, the extremely heavy ship promptly ran aground in the shallow waters around Antwerp, whereupon some Spaniards mockingly renamed it Los gastos perdidos (The Lost Issues).

After another failure of the Antwerp troops, in which all forces were mobilized again, also failed, the only option left for the rebels to do in August 1585 was surrender.

literature

• Juan Giménez Martín: Tercios de Flandes. Falcata Ibérica, 1999, ISBN 84-930446-0-1 . Pp. 180-186 books.google
• Robert Henry Thurston: The Earliest Iron-Clad. In: Cassier's Magazine. Vol. 6, 1891, pp. 312-314 (digitized version ) .
• Johannes Rudloff : The introduction of armor in warship construction and the development of the first tank fleets. In: Contributions to the history of technology and industry. Vol. 2, 1910, No. 1, pp. 1-58, here p. 2 f. (Digitized version) . Rudloff refers to the ship as Finis Bellis , obviously a typo, since all previous reports are Finis Belli , especially Rudloff's Thurston document.
• Frans H. Mertens: Geschiedenis van Antwerpen sedert de Stichting der Stad tot onze Tyden uitgegeven door de Rederykkamer de Olyftak. Vol. 5. Antwerp 1849, pp. 231-233 .

Web links

Commons : Fin de la Guerre  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Siege of Antwerp (1584–85) ( Memento from October 26, 2009 on WebCite ) (Spanish)

supporting documents

1. ↑ ^{a b} Juan Giménez Martín ( Memento from October 26, 2009 on WebCite )
2. ↑ Johannes Rudloff: The introduction of armor in warship construction , p. 2 f.
3. ↑ On the author Steven van Impe: The Librarian as a Nation Builder: Frans Hendrik Mertens (1796–1867) and the Antwerp City Library. In: Quaerendo. Vol. 42, 2012, pp. 221-230, doi : 10.1163 / 15700690-12341250 .