By Pike and Dyke

Name: By Pike and Dyke
Rating: 2.5 (5 reviews)

by G. A. Henty

First published 1890

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2.5(5)

Ned Martin is the son of an English sea captain and a Dutch mother, giving him a personal stake in the Netherlands’ revolt against Philip II of Spain. After violence touches his mother’s family, Ned commits himself to the Dutch cause and enters the service of William the Silent, where his knowledge of both England and the Low Countries makes him useful on dangerous missions.

He experiences the revolt through sea fighting, secret journeys, imprisonment and siege warfare, including the struggles around Haarlem and Leiden. The novel follows the Dutch resistance during some of its most desperate years, when Spanish military power, religious persecution and local divisions threatened to destroy the rebellion before an independent republic could emerge.