 Changing course the following day, the expedition sailed east in the hope of targeting merchants traveling on the trading routes of Eastern Europe.Only a day into their journey, the privateers soon captured nine Dutch merchants en route to Danzig with a cargo of salt.During the next several days, the privateers experienced stormy weather and, prevented from attacking a merchant fleet of thirty merchant ships on 22 August, Captains Michiel Jacobsen and Frans Pleite became separated from the fleet.