Plan of the redoubt Leiden

Title Leupe: Plan van de redout Lyden, zoo als deselve zig in staat van Defentie bevonden heeft, 24 Julij 1779.

Just as in the case of the redoubt Purmerend, it quickly became apparent that the redoubt Leiden was far too weak to offer any serious opposition to a naval attack through the mouth of the Suriname River. An emergency plan put together and executed in 1766-1767 tried to achieve that the small fort became a bit stronger (see VEL1999), but did little to improve the underlying structural and strategical defects. In the implementation of Dircks’ emergency plan for the redoubt Leiden at the end of 1767, his proposal was probably not followed to the letter. This map by Johan Conrad Hurter shows the situation some eleven years later, when a new plan to improve the small fort was urgently needed. Going by the situation plan, the moat had indeed been filled in, but the wall on the river side had retained its small bastions, albeit in a slightly different form to the original design.

North is upper left.

Scale-bar of 12 Rhineland Rods = [approximately 1 : 550].