Captain John Anderson served in the Dutch East India Company (VOC) as ‘Pilot-Major’ in a fleet of ships that set sail from Europe in December 1640, and returned with his ships in July 1643. This was Anderson’s fourth voyage to the East Indies.
His journey took three years during which time he safely brought a VOC fleet to Java and home again through tempests and full-scale battles with the Portuguese at sea. In this, the first-ever edition of Anderson’s Journal, the editors have complemented his own words with chapters discussing the author’s contributions to the History of Warfare in Asia, Maritime Navigation and Early Modern Travel Writing.