Beschrijving
‘Magnanimus vir. D. Henricus Cornelius Longkius, Rosendaliensis Brabantus, Societatis Indiae Occidentalis, permissae, a Provinciis Confoederatis, Praefectus Classis strenuissimus.’
Engraving by Willem Hondius (ca. 1599 – ca. 1659) after Isaac Mijtens (1602 – 1666), dated 1630. Sheet size: 418 x 298 mm., cropped to or close to the platemark, some foxing in the margins, otherwise in fine condition. Admiral Hendrick Corneliszoon Lonck (or Loncque and Loncq) (born 1568, Roosendaal – 10 October 1634, Amsterdam), was a Dutch naval hero and the first Dutch sea captain to reach the New World/the Americas. In 1606, Lonck captained the Witte Leeuw (White Lion), a 320-ton merchant ship armed for war, and approached the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Near Tadoussac, he boarded two of Pierre Dugua, Sieur de Mons' ships, pillaging them for cannons, furs, mounts, and munitions.In 1623 and 1624, Lonck participated in the expedition of Admiral Willem de Zoete against the Barbary Coast pirates. Having made admiral by 1628, Lonck, in the service of the Dutch West Indies Company, joined Admiral Piet Hein in the Battle in the Bay of Matanzas, a naval battle during the Eighty Years' War in which a Dutch squadron was able to defeat and capture a Spanish treasure fleet. Lonck replaced Hein in 1629 as captain-general. In 1630, he commanded a Dutch colonizing expedition of 52 ships, 15 sloops, and 3,780 sailors that captured the historic city of Olinda, Brazil on 14 February,[3] followed by the capture of the Brazilian state of Pernambuco after a feeble resistance by Matias de Albuquerque, its Portuguese Governor.[4][5] It was to be his last voyage, returning to the Netherlands on 20 July 1630. He died in Amsterdam and was buried on 10 October 1634 in the Oude Kerk in Amsterdam. Ref.: Hollstein 45 (1/II), LeBlanc 45, Muller 3275.
