15. A Favorable Peace
The daring Dutch Raid on the Medway accomplished all that its planners had hoped for. It inflicted serious material losses upon England’s Royal Navy. It also publicly demonstrated that the English were unable to protect their own coastline or their own fleet within their own borders. It was one of the greatest humiliations ever suffered by the Royal Navy and England.
So great was the debacle that there were rife speculations about the imminent collapse of the monarchy. It had been restored only seven years earlier, after a decade of rule without a king during the period of the English Commonwealth. The humiliation inflicted by the Dutch did nothing to enhance the restored monarchy’s prestige. Chagrined, broke, and with a monarch seated atop a tottering throne, the English hurried to sign a peace treaty favorable to the Dutch the following month and exited the war.