Action of 23 March 1654

Action of 23 March 1654
	Part of Dutch-Portuguese War
Date	23 March 1654
Location	Near Colombo, Ceylon
Result	Portuguese victory
Belligerents
Portuguese Empire	Dutch Republic
Strength
5 galleons	3 ships

This article does not contain any citations or references. Please improve this article by adding a reference. For information about how to add references, see Template:Citation.

The Action of March 23, 1654 is the name given to a naval battle which took place near Colombo, Ceylon, when a force of 5 Portuguese galleons which were escorting 5 merchant galliots to Colombo, fought its way through a Dutch blockading squadron of 3 ships. 2 of the Dutch ships were captured, but the Portuguese in the confusion of having their 2 top officers killed, these ships were recaptured. They ran aground but were refloated.

Ships involved[]

Portugal[]

Nazaré 42 (flag, António Pereira)
São João 38 (second flag, Álvaro de Novais)
Santo António de Mazagão 36 (António Sottomaior)
São José 34 (Francisco Machado Deca)
São Filipe e Santiago 24 (António de Abreu)

Netherlands[]

Windhond (flag?)
Renoçer (Rhinoceros) (second flag?)
Drommedaris (yacht)

Renoçer and probably Windhond were the captured ships.

All or a portion of this article consists of text from Wikipedia, and is therefore Creative Commons Licensed under GFDL.
The original article can be found at Action of 23 March 1654 and the edit history here.