Schouten Circumnavigation
The independant Dutch Merchant Isaac Lemaire wanted to find another way around South America because the Dutch East India Company (VOC) proclaimed that only VOC ships could go via the Magellan Straits or the Cape of Good Hope. He chose an experienced sailor William Cornelius Schouten van Hoorn to lead the expedition. Schouten had already made three voyages to the Indies. The fleet consisted of the 360 ton Eendracht and the support vessel Hoore of 110 tons.
Schouten left the Texel on 14th June 1615 and sailed via the Cape Verde Islands and Sierra Leone. Schouten loaded hundreds of lemons here which were dried and added to the diet of the crew. Thus Schouten avoided scurvy the whole voyage. Schouten headed for Port Desire and refitted his fleet in preparation for the next section of the circumnavigation. Schouten planned to go around Cape Horn. Drake had been blown below Cape Horn and found open ocean, so he thought it possible to get around there. At Port Desire an accident happened and the Hoore was burnt because sailors were burning barnacles off the hull and the fire got out of control. Luckily they had unloaded most of the stores off the Hoore.
The Eendracht left Port Desire in January 1616 and on the 24th they sighted the Lemaire Strait that was between Tierra del Fuego and Staten Island. Schouten sailed south west in good weather and on the 29th January sailed round Cape Horn, which Drake had sighted and named the Elizabethides. Schouten had named Cape Horn after his home town Hoorn and later generations shortened it to Horn. The Eendracht sailed into the Pacific Ocean in fair weather and on 12th February Schouten changed course to the north. Schouten's discovery of this passage around the horn was significant because doubling the Horn was faster than going through the Magellan Straits if taken at the right time of the year and later more and more ships would use this route.
The Eendracht crossed the Pacific Ocean without any problems and loaded up with spices in the Moluccas. The Eendracht then headed off to Bantam on Java, where the Dutch governor did not believe that they had found a new way around the Horn and had their ship and crew confiscated. Schouten and his men were sent back to Holland under arrest. They arrived back home on july seventh 1617. Schouten had only lost three men, one of them being Lemaire's son, who had died in Mauritius. Lemaire faced a long legal battle to get back his ship and cargo, which he eventually won.
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