Lot 302 , Sealed commission (in Dutch) issued by the States-General of the United Netherlands to Henry Crofts, knight, as a captain in the regiment commanded by Henry de Vere, eighteenth earl of Oxford; The Hague, 28 August 1624
Sealed commission (in Dutch) issued by the States-General of the United Netherlands to Henry Crofts, knight, as a captain in the regiment commanded by Henry de Vere, eighteenth earl of Oxford; The Hague, 28 August 1624 Registered folio 336 [of a now lost register, to which however an index survives: Netherlands National Archives 1.01.19]
Endorsed: registered by the Council of State of the United Provinces in the presence of Maurits Huygens, 2 September 1624
Red wax seal, the counterseal of the United Provinces, showing a hand issuing from the clouds holding a sheaf of arrows, banded with the inscription CONCORDIA; legend: * SIGILLVM ORDINVM BELGII ADVERSVM
Ink on parchment, 23 x 49cms
Following a treaty between the United Provinces of the Netherlands and the English Crown of June 1624, 6,000 English troops, divided into 12 companies, were sent to assist the Dutch in their rebellion against the forces of Spain. On 27 August the States-General of the United Provinces commissioned four English noblemen as colonels of the four regiments into which the force was divided (Netherlands National Archives 1.01.02 12270 folio 388): Robert Bertie, first earl of Lindsey (1582–1642), Henry de Vere, eighteenth earl of Oxford (1593–1625), Henry Wriothesley, third earl of Southampton (1573–1624) and Robert Devereux, third earl of Essex (1591–1646).
By late August all four regiments were in The Hague, where they joined up with 4,000 Dutch troops. Their task was to relieve the siege of Breda, in which they failed, with the loss of many of the recruits and of the Earl of Southampton.
The English captain to whom the commission was granted is almost certainly the Sir Henry Crofts (c1590-1667) of Little Saxham in Suffolk, who in February of 1624 had been elected MP for Eye in Suffolk. In 1607 he had attended a military academy at Angers (History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1604-1629.
Maurits Huygens (1595-1642) was appointed secretary of the Council of State on 9 January 1624 (Netherlands National Archives 1.01.02 12270 folio 380); his portrait, painted by Rembrandt in 1632, is at the Kunsthalle, Hamburg.
£150-200
Sold for £220