BEWARE ... there is confusion here. This Thomas Fuller's uncle was the Divine and author who died in 1661. We are now in 1664. Our Encyclopedia has info on both.
If I were Pepys, I'd be less enthusiastic about doing business with Capt. Taylor. Not only did Pepys waste a lot of afternoons haggling over insurance issues on Taylor's behalf in 1663, but also the Eagle was not handled in a business-like manner either:
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… Monday 13 June 1664 So up at 5 o’clock, and with Captain Taylor on board her at Deptford, and found all out of order, only the soldiers civil, and Sir Arthur Bassett a civil person. I rated at Captain Taylor, whom, contrary to my expectation, I found a lying and a very stupid blundering fellow, good for nothing, and yet we talk of him in the Navy as if he had been an excellent officer, but I find him a lying knave, and of no judgment or dispatch at all. After finding the condition of the ship, no master, not above four men, and many ship’s provisions, sails, and other things wanting, I went back and called upon Fudge, whom I found like a lying rogue unready to go on board, but I did so jeer him that I made him get everything ready, and left Taylor and H. Russell to quicken him, and so away and I by water on to White Hall, where I met his Royal Highness at a Tangier Committee about this very thing, and did there satisfy him how things are, at which all was pacified without any trouble, and I hope may end well, but I confess I am at a real trouble for fear the rogue should not do his work, and I come to shame and loss of the money I did hope justly to have got by it.
From "The Navy White Book" edited by Robert Latham
I think this story concerns a set-to at the office today. Sir William Batten requests that Pett evaluate some of Sir Wm Warren's masts that were delivered some time ago, and not Mr. Shish.
After some demands for an explanation for this break with standard procedures, Batten reveals that Pett in the past evaluated similar masts at a greater price than they were actually worth. Batten thinks Shish will value at a lesser figure which will upset Warren.
Sir Wm Warren is called in, and his defense after some prodding was that Wm Wood had subcontracted him to charge that amount, and Pett had agreed to the valuation, even though it was inferior wood and as Master he had known it but it was the best available from that shipment.
Possibly Capt. Thomas Page, mentioned specifically once by Pepys in 1666?
According to Biographia Navalis. J. Charnock, 1794: after having commanded the Nightingale in 1661, the Pearl and Newcastle in 1664, the Bredah in 1666, the West Friezland (taken from the Dutch in 1667), and the Falcon in 1668, Page served as lieutenant of the Foresight in the same year.
In 1669 Page was, a second time, appointed captain of the Pearl. In 1672 he commanded the Wivenhoe pink, and the small vessels afloat at Sheerness. In 1673 he was made commander of the Francis. His name does not again occur.
Just too delicious not to discuss! ... I trust he didn't hurt his head. Fortunately "Jerome Collins MD writes to Pepys on Sept. 17, 1664 informing him that he (Collins) had been appointed surgeon to Prince Rupert by Charles II's 'positive orders', and would require special medicines: CSPD 1663-4, p. 11. (L&M footnote)"
Seriously, I have Googled and searched this encyclopedia section without success: I'm guessing the 'road' in this case is a protected holding spot for ships off Lee. Lee Essex, Lee Kent and Lee Sussex all seem to be people with exhaustive Facebook profiles. Given the time frame, Lee must be at the mouth of the Thames.
"... and the Prince under sail the next tide after, and so is gone from the Hope. God give him better success than he used to have!"
Rupert's Civil War history as a naval commander was good, considering his funding. So why does Pepys make this snippy remark?
Saturday 29 September 1660 -- I hear, Prince Rupert is come to Court; but welcome to nobody.
Monday 27 October 1662 -- He [CREED] showed me our commission, wherein the Duke of York, Prince Rupert, Duke of Albemarle, Lord Peterborough, Lord Sandwich, Sir G. Carteret, Sir William Compton, Mr. Coventry, Sir R. Ford, Sir William Rider, Mr. Cholmley, Mr. Povy, myself, and Captain Cuttance, in this order are joyned for the carrying on the service of Tangier, which I take for a great honour to me.
Sunday 8 February 1662/63 -- The little Duke of Monmouth, it seems, is ordered to take place of all Dukes, and so to follow Prince Rupert now, before the Duke of Buckingham, or any else.
Friday 3 June 1664 -- At the Committee for Tangier all the afternoon, where a sad consideration to see things of so great weight managed in so confused a manner as it is, ...; Prince Rupert do nothing but swear and laugh a little, with an oathe or two, and that’s all he do.
There's a convoluted few days trying to figure out why Sandwich wasn't given a command until late, and Sandwich concludes it was because York favors Rupert.
Wednesday 31 August 1664 -- Prince Rupert I hear this day is to go to command this fleete going to Guinny against the Dutch. I doubt few will be pleased with his going, being accounted an unhappy man.
So Pepys knows Rupert personally through the Tangier Committee, and apparently doesn't like him. Difficult, since Rupert is currently third in line to the throne.
Yes Marinetti, I think you read it correctly. It's not the first time young foppish Mr. Penn has spontaneously dropped in for a chat with Elizabeth since he got home last month. I think the Blands handled Pepys' "problem" with great aplomb, and hopefully Penn will get the hint without further embarrassment all round. We shall see ...
The Hope (or Hope Reach) is the stretch of the Thames between Tilbury and the mouth of the Medway. Named after the Hope stream that enters the Thames about three miles east of Tilbury. A noted anchorage for fleet assemblages and rendezvous.
"Journal of the Earl of Sandwich" edited by R.C. Anderson: 4th Tuesday. My Lord Culpeper went into the Island and Capt. Herbert and Sydney with him.
The Island - the Isle of Wight
POSSIBLY: July 1661 - Charles II appoints Sir Thomas Culpeper [also spelled COLEPEPPER], 2nd baron Culpeper of Thoresway, captain of and in mid-1664 governor of the Isle of Wight, a post he fills competently until 1668.
POSSIBLY Arthur Herbert, Earl of Torrington, one of the most controversial naval officers of the 17th century.
What a coincidence: "After church I walked to my Lady Sandwich’s, through my Lord Southampton’s new buildings in the fields ..."
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… Monday 26 September 1664 "Journal of the Earl of Sandwich" edited by R.C. Anderson 26 Monday. Went ashore to Tichfield (my Lord Treasurer's house).
Were they checking out Treasurer Thomas Wriothesley, 4th Earl of Southampton's recent expenditures???
I think it is remarkable that Pepys took Tom Edwards with him, intending to go to a Quakers Meeting. Why have a witness with you when embarking on an escapade that could get you arrested? Compound that by admiring Ms. Butler's chin in front of the teenager.
As for Mrs. AND MR. Martin being welcomed into the house for a drink, but Pepys refusing to see Mrs. Martin alone at an Inn, I think the wisdom in that is pretty self-evident.
We know where the fair Miss Butler went to church:
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1… Sunday 27 March 1664 (Lord’s day). "... but it being church time, walked to St. James’s, to try if I could see the belle Butler, but could not; only saw her sister, who indeed is pretty, with a fine Roman nose."
St. James, Clerkenwell. A History of the Church of St. James Clerkenwell -- by Nicholas Riddell This is the story of St. James Clerkenwell from its beginning in the 12th century as the church of the nunnery of St. Mary. It survived the resolution of the monasteries and was rebuilt at the end of the 18th century in its present Georgian form. It is also the history of the parish and how Clerkenwell changed from a country parish into a fashionable suburb and then into an industrialized, densely populated inner-city area. You’ll be introduced to some of its more celebrated parishioners, from Mad Madge, Duchess of Newcastle to Thomas Britton the musical coal man. Above all this is an account of how St. James with its steadfast Low Church and Evangelical tradition, has sought to bring Christ into the lives of its increasingly pagan parishioners. ... Book can be purchased online through Amazon.co.uk or in person in the office of St. James, Clerkenwell. 0207 2511190
You are the fount of info, Terry. Perhaps J.D. Davies will come to our rescue, if he can retire from rescuing the archives around the country. Mold seems to be getting into everything.
Just to keep the record straight, Edward is our current Charles' youngest brother, not his son. His sons, William and Harry, are leaders and heroes in every sense of the word.
"If every woman who married a ne'er do well was to be punished in this way, there would be no end to it."
Yes, women were "punished" for being married to a ne'er-do-well. There was no divorce, so they often lived in terrible circumstances.
Consider Robert Boyle's sister, Lettice, who was given a ten thousand pound dowry by her father, Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork, when she married George Goring. Good ol' George owed a lot of gambling debts at Court, and was a drunkard and a womanizer, and soon the dowry was gone. So he goes back to the Earl and cadges more, and drags Lettice off to the Continent while he learns military ways, and then comes back to England penniless again, so the Earl pays for him to be general of a regiment during the Civil War to keep him occupied away from Court. Lettice died.
or the saga of Anne Stanley Brydges, Lady Chandos who made a disastrous marriage with Mervin Touchet, Earl of Castlehaven -- http://cupboardworld.blogspot.com…
Life without a bank account, credit, or rights was awful.
"... and so home and to dinner, and thither came W. Bowyer and dined with us; but strange to see how he could not endure onyons ... and so was forced to make his dinner of an egg or two. He tells us how Mrs. Lane is undone, by her marrying so bad, and desires to speak with me, which I know is wholly to get me to do something for her to get her husband a place, which he is in no wise fit for. After dinner down to Woolwich ..."
Louise, Bowyer "dined with US," "he tells US how Mrs. Lane is undone." It sounds to me like Bowyer is talking to Pepys about his girlfriend's desire to speak with him [Pepys] in front of Elizabeth. The only thing Pepys can do is agree and say he'll do what he can for Mr. Lane, who he doesn't consider employable, and change the subject. Just the fact Mrs. Lane is mentioned by Bowyer in front of Elizabeth implies pressure.
UNLESS, as suggested before, this didn't happen at the table, and Elizabeth wasn't there, in which case two of Mrs. Lane's admirers had a whispered conversation in the hallway as Bowyer was leaving. Pepys used the Royal We, and is trying to resign himself into being manipulated into employing the dude. Which is a nice, gentle form of arm twisting -- or blackmail -- by Mrs. Lane in this case. Pepys clearly isn't volunteering for the role.
I'm surprised Robert Gertz didn't do a riff about this highly compromised encounter.
Delft is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland (Zuid-Holland), in the Netherlands. Delft is located between the larger cities of Rotterdam and The Hague. Delft is primarily known for its historic town center with canals; also for the painter Vermeer, Delft Blue pottery (Delftware), the Delft University of Technology, and its association with the Dutch royal family, the House of Orange-Nassau.
From a rural village in the early Middle Ages Delft developed to a city, which in the 13th century (1246) received its charter.
The town's association with the House of Orange started when William the Silent took up residence in 1572. At the time he was the leader of growing national Dutch resistance against Spanish occupation of the country, which struggle is known as the Eighty Years' War. By then Delft was one of the leading cities of Holland and it was equipped with the necessary city walls to serve as a headquarters.
After the Act of Abjuration in 1581 Delft became the de facto capital of the newly- independent Netherlands, as the seat of the Prince of Orange.
When William the Silent was shot dead in 1584 by Balthazar Gerards in the hall of the Prinsenhof, the family's traditional burial place in Breda was still in the hands of the Spanish. Therefore he was buried in the Delft Nieuwe Kerk (New Church), starting a tradition for the House of Orange that has continued to the present day.
The Delft Explosion, also known as the Delft Thunderclap, occurred on 12 October, 1654 when a gunpowder store exploded, destroying much of the city. Over 100 people were killed and thousands wounded.
About 30 tonnes (66,138 pounds) of gunpowder were stored in barrels in a magazine in a former Clarissen convent in the Doelenkwartier district. Cornelis Soetens, the keeper of the magazine, opened the store to check a sample of the powder and a huge explosion followed. Luckily, many citizens were away, visiting a market in Schiedam or a fair in The Hague.
Artist Carel Fabritius was wounded in the explosion and died of his injuries.
Later Egbert van der Poel painted several pictures of Delft showing the devastation. The Delft Explosion is the principal reason why Delft University of Technology maintains explosion science as a key topic within its research portfolio and graduate skill-set.
The city center retains a large number of monumental buildings, whereas in many streets there are canals of which the borders are connected by typical bridges, making this city a notable tourist destination.
... This morning we had news from Mr. Coventry, that Sir G. Downing (like a perfidious rogue, though the action is good and of service to the King,1 yet he cannot with any good conscience do it) hath taken Okey, Corbet, and Barkestead at Delfe, in Holland, and sent them home in the Blackmore.
1 (“And hail the treason though we hate the traitor.”) On 21 March 1662 Charles II returned his formal thanks to the States for their assistance in the matter. — B. ↩
Comments
Second Reading
About Thomas Fuller (a)
San Diego Sarah • Link
BEWARE ... there is confusion here. This Thomas Fuller's uncle was the Divine and author who died in 1661. We are now in 1664. Our Encyclopedia has info on both.
About Thomas Fuller (a)
San Diego Sarah • Link
BEWARE ... there is confusion here. The Divine and author died in 1661. We are now in 1664. There must have been two Rev. Thomas Fullers.
About Saturday 8 October 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
If I were Pepys, I'd be less enthusiastic about doing business with Capt. Taylor. Not only did Pepys waste a lot of afternoons haggling over insurance issues on Taylor's behalf in 1663, but also the Eagle was not handled in a business-like manner either:
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
Monday 13 June 1664
So up at 5 o’clock, and with Captain Taylor on board her at Deptford, and found all out of order, only the soldiers civil, and Sir Arthur Bassett a civil person. I rated at Captain Taylor, whom, contrary to my expectation, I found a lying and a very stupid blundering fellow, good for nothing, and yet we talk of him in the Navy as if he had been an excellent officer, but I find him a lying knave, and of no judgment or dispatch at all. After finding the condition of the ship, no master, not above four men, and many ship’s provisions, sails, and other things wanting, I went back and called upon Fudge, whom I found like a lying rogue unready to go on board, but I did so jeer him that I made him get everything ready, and left Taylor and H. Russell to quicken him, and so away and I by water on to White Hall, where I met his Royal Highness at a Tangier Committee about this very thing, and did there satisfy him how things are, at which all was pacified without any trouble, and I hope may end well, but I confess I am at a real trouble for fear the rogue should not do his work, and I come to shame and loss of the money I did hope justly to have got by it.
About Saturday 8 October 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
From "The Navy White Book" edited by Robert Latham
I think this story concerns a set-to at the office today. Sir William Batten requests that Pett evaluate some of Sir Wm Warren's masts that were delivered some time ago, and not Mr. Shish.
After some demands for an explanation for this break with standard procedures, Batten reveals that Pett in the past evaluated similar masts at a greater price than they were actually worth. Batten thinks Shish will value at a lesser figure which will upset Warren.
Sir Wm Warren is called in, and his defense after some prodding was that Wm Wood had subcontracted him to charge that amount, and Pett had agreed to the valuation, even though it was inferior wood and as Master he had known it but it was the best available from that shipment.
About Thursday 6 October 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
"Encloses a Commission for Captain Page."
Possibly Capt. Thomas Page, mentioned specifically once by Pepys in 1666?
According to Biographia Navalis. J. Charnock, 1794: after having commanded the Nightingale in 1661, the Pearl and Newcastle in 1664, the Bredah in 1666, the West Friezland (taken from the Dutch in 1667), and the Falcon in 1668, Page served as lieutenant of the Foresight in the same year.
In 1669 Page was, a second time, appointed captain of the Pearl. In 1672 he commanded the Wivenhoe pink, and the small vessels afloat at Sheerness. In 1673 he was made commander of the Francis. His name does not again occur.
About Thursday 6 October 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
"Prince Rupert is fallen into Lee Road."
Just too delicious not to discuss! ... I trust he didn't hurt his head. Fortunately "Jerome Collins MD writes to Pepys on Sept. 17, 1664 informing him that he (Collins) had been appointed surgeon to Prince Rupert by Charles II's 'positive orders', and would require special medicines: CSPD 1663-4, p. 11. (L&M footnote)"
Seriously, I have Googled and searched this encyclopedia section without success: I'm guessing the 'road' in this case is a protected holding spot for ships off Lee. Lee Essex, Lee Kent and Lee Sussex all seem to be people with exhaustive Facebook profiles. Given the time frame, Lee must be at the mouth of the Thames.
Anyone got any ideas?
About Wednesday 5 October 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
"... and the Prince under sail the next tide after, and so is gone from the Hope. God give him better success than he used to have!"
Rupert's Civil War history as a naval commander was good, considering his funding. So why does Pepys make this snippy remark?
Saturday 29 September 1660 -- I hear, Prince Rupert is come to Court; but welcome to nobody.
Monday 27 October 1662 -- He [CREED] showed me our commission, wherein the Duke of York, Prince Rupert, Duke of Albemarle, Lord Peterborough, Lord Sandwich, Sir G. Carteret, Sir William Compton, Mr. Coventry, Sir R. Ford, Sir William Rider, Mr. Cholmley, Mr. Povy, myself, and Captain Cuttance, in this order are joyned for the carrying on the service of Tangier, which I take for a great honour to me.
Sunday 8 February 1662/63 -- The little Duke of Monmouth, it seems, is ordered to take place of all Dukes, and so to follow Prince Rupert now, before the Duke of Buckingham, or any else.
Friday 3 June 1664 -- At the Committee for Tangier all the afternoon, where a sad consideration to see things of so great weight managed in so confused a manner as it is, ...; Prince Rupert do nothing but swear and laugh a little, with an oathe or two, and that’s all he do.
There's a convoluted few days trying to figure out why Sandwich wasn't given a command until late, and Sandwich concludes it was because York favors Rupert.
Wednesday 31 August 1664 -- Prince Rupert I hear this day is to go to command this fleete going to Guinny against the Dutch. I doubt few will be pleased with his going, being accounted an unhappy man.
So Pepys knows Rupert personally through the Tangier Committee, and apparently doesn't like him. Difficult, since Rupert is currently third in line to the throne.
About Wednesday 14 September 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
Yes Marinetti, I think you read it correctly. It's not the first time young foppish Mr. Penn has spontaneously dropped in for a chat with Elizabeth since he got home last month. I think the Blands handled Pepys' "problem" with great aplomb, and hopefully Penn will get the hint without further embarrassment all round. We shall see ...
About Wednesday 14 September 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
Wish I could join you, Mountebank. And I second your thanks to Phil, and everyone else who have made this site into such a time-travel adventure.
About Tuesday 4 October 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
Prince Rupert leaves today for the Hope:
The Hope (or Hope Reach) is the stretch of the Thames between Tilbury and the mouth of the Medway. Named after the Hope stream that enters the Thames about three miles east of Tilbury. A noted anchorage for fleet assemblages and rendezvous.
About Tuesday 4 October 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
"Journal of the Earl of Sandwich" edited by R.C. Anderson:
4th Tuesday. My Lord Culpeper went into the Island and Capt. Herbert and Sydney with him.
The Island - the Isle of Wight
POSSIBLY: July 1661 - Charles II appoints Sir Thomas Culpeper [also spelled COLEPEPPER], 2nd baron Culpeper of Thoresway, captain of and in mid-1664 governor of the Isle of Wight, a post he fills competently until 1668.
POSSIBLY Arthur Herbert, Earl of Torrington, one of the most controversial naval officers of the 17th century.
POSSIBLY Sydney Montagu -- Sandwich's second son?
Any other nominations?
About Sunday 2 October 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
What a coincidence: "After church I walked to my Lady Sandwich’s, through my Lord Southampton’s new buildings in the fields ..."
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
Monday 26 September 1664
"Journal of the Earl of Sandwich" edited by R.C. Anderson
26 Monday. Went ashore to Tichfield (my Lord Treasurer's house).
Were they checking out Treasurer Thomas Wriothesley, 4th Earl of Southampton's recent expenditures???
About Sunday 2 October 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
I think it is remarkable that Pepys took Tom Edwards with him, intending to go to a Quakers Meeting. Why have a witness with you when embarking on an escapade that could get you arrested? Compound that by admiring Ms. Butler's chin in front of the teenager.
As for Mrs. AND MR. Martin being welcomed into the house for a drink, but Pepys refusing to see Mrs. Martin alone at an Inn, I think the wisdom in that is pretty self-evident.
About Sunday 2 October 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
We know where the fair Miss Butler went to church:
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
Sunday 27 March 1664 (Lord’s day).
"... but it being church time, walked to St. James’s, to try if I could see the belle Butler, but could not; only saw her sister, who indeed is pretty, with a fine Roman nose."
Highlights from: http://www.jc-church.org/our-hist…
St. James, Clerkenwell. A History of the Church of St. James Clerkenwell -- by Nicholas Riddell This is the story of St. James Clerkenwell from its beginning in the 12th century as the church of the nunnery of St. Mary. It survived the resolution of the monasteries and was rebuilt at the end of the 18th century in its present Georgian form. It is also the history of the parish and how Clerkenwell changed from a country parish into a fashionable suburb and then into an industrialized, densely populated inner-city area. You’ll be introduced to some of its more celebrated parishioners, from Mad Madge, Duchess of Newcastle to Thomas Britton the musical coal man. Above all this is an account of how St. James with its steadfast Low Church and Evangelical tradition, has sought to bring Christ into the lives of its increasingly pagan parishioners. ... Book can be purchased online through Amazon.co.uk or in person in the office of St. James, Clerkenwell. 0207 2511190
About Friday 16 September 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
You are the fount of info, Terry. Perhaps J.D. Davies will come to our rescue, if he can retire from rescuing the archives around the country. Mold seems to be getting into everything.
About Wednesday 7 September 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
Just to keep the record straight, Edward is our current Charles' youngest brother, not his son. His sons, William and Harry, are leaders and heroes in every sense of the word.
About Monday 5 September 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
"If every woman who married a ne'er do well was to be punished in this way, there would be no end to it."
Yes, women were "punished" for being married to a ne'er-do-well. There was no divorce, so they often lived in terrible circumstances.
Consider Robert Boyle's sister, Lettice, who was given a ten thousand pound dowry by her father, Richard Boyle, 1st Earl of Cork, when she married George Goring. Good ol' George owed a lot of gambling debts at Court, and was a drunkard and a womanizer, and soon the dowry was gone. So he goes back to the Earl and cadges more, and drags Lettice off to the Continent while he learns military ways, and then comes back to England penniless again, so the Earl pays for him to be general of a regiment during the Civil War to keep him occupied away from Court. Lettice died.
or the saga of Anne Stanley Brydges, Lady Chandos who made a disastrous marriage with Mervin Touchet, Earl of Castlehaven -- http://cupboardworld.blogspot.com…
Life without a bank account, credit, or rights was awful.
About Monday 5 September 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
"... and so home and to dinner, and thither came W. Bowyer and dined with us; but strange to see how he could not endure onyons ... and so was forced to make his dinner of an egg or two. He tells us how Mrs. Lane is undone, by her marrying so bad, and desires to speak with me, which I know is wholly to get me to do something for her to get her husband a place, which he is in no wise fit for. After dinner down to Woolwich ..."
Louise, Bowyer "dined with US," "he tells US how Mrs. Lane is undone." It sounds to me like Bowyer is talking to Pepys about his girlfriend's desire to speak with him [Pepys] in front of Elizabeth. The only thing Pepys can do is agree and say he'll do what he can for Mr. Lane, who he doesn't consider employable, and change the subject. Just the fact Mrs. Lane is mentioned by Bowyer in front of Elizabeth implies pressure.
UNLESS, as suggested before, this didn't happen at the table, and Elizabeth wasn't there, in which case two of Mrs. Lane's admirers had a whispered conversation in the hallway as Bowyer was leaving. Pepys used the Royal We, and is trying to resign himself into being manipulated into employing the dude. Which is a nice, gentle form of arm twisting -- or blackmail -- by Mrs. Lane in this case. Pepys clearly isn't volunteering for the role.
I'm surprised Robert Gertz didn't do a riff about this highly compromised encounter.
About Delft, Netherlands
San Diego Sarah • Link
Notes from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delf…
Country Netherlands Province South Holland
Delft is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland (Zuid-Holland), in the Netherlands. Delft is located between the larger cities of Rotterdam and The Hague. Delft is primarily known for its historic town center with canals; also for the painter Vermeer, Delft Blue pottery (Delftware), the Delft University of Technology, and its association with the Dutch royal family, the House of Orange-Nassau.
From a rural village in the early Middle Ages Delft developed to a city, which in the 13th century (1246) received its charter.
The town's association with the House of Orange started when William the Silent took up residence in 1572. At the time he was the leader of growing national Dutch resistance against Spanish occupation of the country, which struggle is known as the Eighty Years' War. By then Delft was one of the leading cities of Holland and it was equipped with the necessary city walls to serve as a headquarters.
After the Act of Abjuration in 1581 Delft became the de facto capital of the newly- independent Netherlands, as the seat of the Prince of Orange.
When William the Silent was shot dead in 1584 by Balthazar Gerards in the hall of the Prinsenhof, the family's traditional burial place in Breda was still in the hands of the Spanish. Therefore he was buried in the Delft Nieuwe Kerk (New Church), starting a tradition for the House of Orange that has continued to the present day.
The Delft Explosion, also known as the Delft Thunderclap, occurred on 12 October, 1654 when a gunpowder store exploded, destroying much of the city. Over 100 people were killed and thousands wounded.
About 30 tonnes (66,138 pounds) of gunpowder were stored in barrels in a magazine in a former Clarissen convent in the Doelenkwartier district. Cornelis Soetens, the keeper of the magazine, opened the store to check a sample of the powder and a huge explosion followed. Luckily, many citizens were away, visiting a market in Schiedam or a fair in The Hague.
Artist Carel Fabritius was wounded in the explosion and died of his injuries.
Later Egbert van der Poel painted several pictures of Delft showing the devastation.
The Delft Explosion is the principal reason why Delft University of Technology maintains explosion science as a key topic within its research portfolio and graduate skill-set.
The city center retains a large number of monumental buildings, whereas in many streets there are canals of which the borders are connected by typical bridges, making this city a notable tourist destination.
About Delft, Netherlands
San Diego Sarah • Link
http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
Wednesday 12 March 1662
... This morning we had news from Mr. Coventry, that Sir G. Downing (like a perfidious rogue, though the action is good and of service to the King,1 yet he cannot with any good conscience do it) hath taken Okey, Corbet, and Barkestead at Delfe, in Holland, and sent them home in the Blackmore.
1 (“And hail the treason though we hate the traitor.”) On 21 March 1662 Charles II returned his formal thanks to the States for their assistance in the matter. — B. ↩