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An expeditionary force of exceptional strength was got ready; and, as Piet Hein, at the very height of his fame, unfortunately lost his life in the spring of 1629 in an encounter with the Dunkirk pirates, Hendrik Cornelisz Lonck, who had served as vice-admiral under Hein at Matanzas bay, was made admiral-in-chief, with Jonckheer Diederik van Waerdenburgh in command of the military forces.
Lonck, after consultation with Waerdenburgh, determined to make with the main body of the fleet under his own command an attempt to force the entrances to the Pozo, while Waerdenburgh, with the bulk of the military contingent on sixteen ships, sailed northwards to find some spot suitable for disembarkation. The naval attack was made on February 15, but was unavailing.
A considerable delay was caused by the critical position of the United Provinces when invaded by the Spanish-Imperialist armies at the time of the siege of Hertogenbosch, but the capture of that fortress enabled the last contingents to sail towards the end of the year; and Lonck was able to collect his whole force at St Vincent, one of the Canary islands, on Christmas Day to start on their voyage across the Atlantic.
All the efforts of the Dutch to make their way through any of the entrances to the Pozo, though renewed again and again with the utmost bravery, were beaten off. In the evening Lonck withdrew his ships. He had learnt by an experience, to which history scarcely offers an exception, that a naval attack unsupported by military co-operation against land defences cannot succeed.
Against the Spanish fleets arriual, they had provided 25. or 30. good ships, committing the gouernment of them vnto Admirall Lonck, whom they commanded to ioine himselfe vnto the lord Henry Seymer, lying betweene Douer and Cales.
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