Walter Boyd

Walter Boyd was the East Indiaman Oosthuizen of the Dutch East India Company. Oosthuizen was launched in 1789 and made one voyage to the Far East. She was on her second voyage in 1794 when the British seized her. In 1795 British interests purchased her and named her Walter Boyd. She made one voyage for the British East India Company. She then became a West Indiaman. On her last voyage, in 1801, Walter Boyd captured a Spanish schooner but then foundered on the way back to London from Martinique. Oosthuizen Oosthuizen was built in 1789 by the Hoorn shipyard for the Hoorn chamber of the Dutch East India Company. The Hoorn chamber was probably the first of the chambers to adopt copper sheathing for (Dutch) East Indiamen, and she may have been coppered. Captain Gerrit Scheler sailed from the Texel on 17 December 1791. Oosthuizen arrived at the Cape on 3 April 1792, and Batavia on 9 July. She returned to the Netherlands via China. She left China on 3 December, arrived at the Cape of Good Hope on 14 March 1793, left on 1 April, and arrived at Texel on 27 July On 22 December 1794 Captain Scheler again sailed from the Texel, bound for China. This was some weeks before the French invaded the Netherlands. Nevertheless, when Oosthuizen called at the Isles of Scilly some six days later the British put her under an embargo. On 31 January 1795 a squadron under Captain Sir John Borlase Warren detained the Dutch East India Ship Ostenhuyson.