Expedition to the Unare

Expedition to the Unare
Part of the Eighty Years' War
Plan and perspective of the Dutch fort at the Unare, by Juan Bautista Antonelli.
Date August, 1633 Location Mouth of the Unare River, Captaincy General of Venezuela Result Spanish victory
Belligerents
Spain	West India Company
Commanders and leaders
Benito Arias Montano	Unknown
Strength
95 Spanish soldiers 200 Cumanagoto auxiliaries 14 pirogues[1]	200 zoutvaerders 10 cannons[2]
Casualties and losses
3 dead and 4 wounded[3]	80–100 dead and 36 captured[1][2]

The Expedition to the Unare was a Spanish campaign in 1633 against the salt flats recently established by the Dutch West India Company on the mouth of the Unare River, in Venezuela. The battle ended with the Dutch being either killed or expelled from the land.

Background

On 25 August 1633, Captain Bernardo Arias Montano, governor of Cumaná, sailed from the town with a flotilla of 14 pirogues carrying 95 Spanish soldiers and 200 indios amigos to evict the Dutch from the area.^[1] Sailing along the Borracha Islands and the Píritu Islets, embarking there more native allies, they arrived to the Unare on 28 August and during that night landed undetected on the Uchire beach, half a league from the Dutch outpost.

Scouts reported the next day that a Dutch fort and ten fluyts standed next to the salt flats. Arias Montano left 50 men to guard the pirogues and moved with the bulk of his force to attack the fort.^[1]

Battle

On 30 August at dawn, the Spanish came out the jungle and assaulted the fortress under artillery fire from both its defenders and the Dutch ships. By laying boards over the moat and climbing up the walls, they succeeded in driving the Dutch zoutvaerders from the walls into a barrack at the center of the fort, where they made a last stand before surrendering.^[4]

Most of the defenders were either slain or captured, although some of them escaped to the ships, which sailed away as soon as the fort was taken. The Spanish had few casualties, most of them from an attack by natives allied to the Dutch that afternoon. Arias Montano ordered the outpost to be razed, which was done under the supervision of the engineer Juan Bautista Antonelli, and then reembarked with the prisoners and the booty.^[1]

Aftermath

The Dutch came back on 1640, but were expelled again soon by Spanish forces under Joan Orpí.^[5]

Notes

1. Dávila 2015, p. 68.
2. Wright 1934, p. 145.
3. de Lyra 1634, pp. 4–5.
4. de Lyra 1634, p. 4.
5. Dávila 2015, p. 69.

References

• Dávila, Rafael I. (2015). "La sal: objetivo codiciado por Holanda en las provincias de Nueva Andalucía y Venezuela durante el siglo XVII". Tiempo y Espacio (64): 45–71.
• Relacion cierta y verdadera, del famoso sucesso y vitoria que tuvo el Capitan Benito Arias Montano... contra los enemigos Olādeses, q̄ estavan fortificados en una salina que està riberas del rio Vnare [True and certain account of the famous success and victory that Captain Benito Arias Montano had... against the Oladese enemies, who were fortified in a salt mine on the banks of the Vnare River] (in Spanish). Seville: Francisco de Lyra. 1634.
• Wright, Irene A. (1934). Nederlandsche zeevaarders op de eilanden in de Caraïbische zee en aan de kust van Columbia en Venezuela gedurende de jaren 1621-1648. Utrecht: Kemink en zoon.