While the English fleet was painfully filling up with provisions and water, the Dutch had at last got to sea. They were under the command of Baron Opdam de Wassanaer, who had with him Courtenaer, Evertsen, and Cornelius van Tromp. Opdam's first purpose was to cover the return home of Michael de Ruyter with a convoy, then he was to seek out and give battle to the English fleet. The Dutch admiral, though a man of undoubted courage, as he showed in the ensuing action, was not much disposed to engage the English except at an advantage. He was aware of the inferior size of his ships, and also that the military spirit of a number of his captains was not good. Therefore, though he discharged the first part of his duty with success, and even made a great many captures of English merchant vessels, he showed a certain reluctance to force on the battle. Although he was short of men, the Duke of York did not hang back, but stood to sea from Solebay on the 1st of June, when he heard of the approach of Opdam and his capture of some English merchant ships from Hamburg. He had an additional motive for acting with vigour, since the coaling fleet was then on its way south from the northern ports. The capture of this convoy by the Dutch would have caused immense inconvenience to London, and would, moreover, have been a serious misfortune to the duke himself, since it would have deprived him of his best chance of recruiting his fleet by pressing the colliers. The promptitude of our movements averted this misfortune. The coal fleet was met on the 1st of June, and the duke reinforced his ships by taking out the crews. The vessels were probably left at anchor near the coast under the charge of one or two watchmen. The wind was easterly, with a tendency to turn to the S.W. Opdam, distrusting the quality of his own command, was unwilling to engage, but his reluctance to fight was overcome by the emphatic orders of John de Witt. The Grand Pensionary, who was not a man of military training either on sea or land, may have underrated the difficulties which weighed on the mind of Opdam, but as a politician he understood that it is sometimes better to fight and be beaten than not to fight at all, and his common-sense must have told him that if the Dutch fleet only fought hard enough, it would certainly make the English pay very dear for their victory. It may be, too, that John de Witt was secretly conscious of sufficient resolution of character to make use of those means of keeping the captains up to their duty which Cornelius de Witt had in vain threatened to set in motion in the previous war. There was much to be said for bringing on a battle in order to find who would do his duty and who would not, provided it was also decided to make a necessary example of such as showed the white feather.