Piet Heyn and the Spanish Treasure Fleet

  Piet Heyn, to many Dutch people still a famous "sea hero", next   to Michiel de Ruyter. Children's songs still sing of his glorified   heroic deed. This heroic deed consisted of capturing the   famous Spanish Treasure Fleet. ThisTreasure Fleet  was a fleet   of Spanish ships, containing the Inca treasures, stolen by the   men of Francisco Pizarro, the thief and Indian butcher and   founder of the Peruvian capital of Lima. In these days the   Netherlands were invaded and occupied by the rather cruel   Spanish general Alva who was governor of Holland. His reign   led to much Dutch resistance and to the formation of the United   Seven Provinces of the Netherlands. This is why Piet Heyn   received a letter of marque from the Dutch authorities, which   gave him permission for piracy, which was legal at the time, to   capture the Spanish Treasure Fleet to which he eventually   succeeded. The Treasure Fleet consisted of a colonial loot of   treasures stolen from Asia and South America and the   enormous value of it was in the millions.

Piet Pieterszoon Heyn

The ship Hollandia

The WIC emblem

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