Three Ships in a Gale

In 1673, the year painted on this canvas, the Dutch fought three major sea battles against the English and French. Willem van de Velde the Younger had just moved from Amsterdam to London, and he was probably aboard on the English side for the first two. His father, also a marine painter, certainly was, drawing as he sailed, and the son used two of those drawings, now at Greenwich, for this picture. What he painted is weather. Three Dutch ships have taken in their sails and drift before the gale, most likely towing sea anchors, a kind of underwater parachute. The nearest ploughs into a breaking wave under a sudden shaft of light. The next has lost two masts, and its bowsprit has snapped. The red pennants on the front ship are probably the flag of Flushing, a port in Zeeland.