Scene on the Sound: w/e Aug 28 2026

By The Captain (Royal Navy retired) - the Beagle's maritime correspondent keeps his eye on the comings and goings in The Sound

The change in the weather brought the Trinity House Vessel Patricia into anchor off Cawsand for a couple of days.  Probably the sea was too rough for her to carry on her usual work of inspecting of servicing buoys and navigational marks. 

Meanwhile the Superyacht Aviva initially left Plymouth and proceeded up Channel, but as the weather worsened, she returned to a secure (and calmer) anchorage in the Sound. 

The new arrival this week has been the Dutch Navy’s amphibious ship HNlMS Johan de Witt, equivalent to the RN’s ‘lost’ amphibious ships Albion and Bulwark - both still in the dockyard, but Bulwark (the younger of the two, by two years) is destined to join the Brazilian Navy as NDM Oiapoque – where she will, no doubt, remain in service for many years.  Albion’s future is still not 100% clear, but she may well end up as a ‘set of spares’ for NDM Oiapoque.    

HNlMS Johan de Witt is only one year younger than Bulwark and is about 15% smaller than her British sisters.  She is probably here for training, but may well be embarking some Royal Marines for exercises.  The Royal Marines and the Royal Netherlands Marines work very, very closely together.   

So, who was Johan de Witt?  Well – some Beaglers will be aware that one of the greatest Royal Navy embarrassments was when the Dutch fleet, in 1667, sailed as far up the Medway as Chatham and burned or captured several British ships, including HMS Royal Charles.  It is recorded that there was a great panic in London, where the thunder of the Dutch fleet’s guns could be clearly heard. 

Johan de Witt was the de facto head of the Netherlands Navy at this stage.

Despite this glorious victory over the British in the Second Anglo-Dutch War (1665-67), Johan de Witt’s career in politics was far from smooth – the Netherlands at the time was riven by violent, political differences between the Republicans and the (quasi-monarchical) Orangists.  In 1672, after the outbreak of the Third Anglo-Dutch War, Johan and his brother Cornelius were set upon by the mob (actually The Hague Civil Militia), lynched and then, according to several reports, roasted and eaten….  

HNlMS Johan de Witt’s motto is “Ago quod ago”, meaning “I do what I do”, which is perhaps indicative of the fact that he didn’t bow to public opinion.  Many nations’ warship’s names remember people and events from the past and there are often surprising stories behind the names chosen to be remembered! 

Nowadays, it is safe to say that the Royal Netherlands Navy thinks that the Royal Navy are the second-best navy in the World and the judgement is completely reciprocated.  Both have suffered from an over enthusiastic ‘peace dividend’ and are jointly struggling to rebuild. 

As well as HNlMS Johan de Witt, there have been two fleet auxiliaries around in the Sound this week: RFA Proteus, the multi-role ocean surveillance ship has been in and out quite a bit and RFA Tideforce, a replenishment tanker, came into Devonport for a day. 

Finally, on the British side, there was an unscheduled sailing on Wednesday afternoon, when HMS Portland went out to sea.  Destination unknown, but if she’s watching Russians, that’s another group of families with a spoilt bank holiday weekend – that’s “Life in a Blue Suit” as the saying goes.