The action of 4 February 1781 was a minor naval engagement that occurred on 4 February, 1781 off Sombrero, Anguilla, between a British force of two ships of the line and one frigate under the command of Captain Francis Reynolds-Moreton, 3rd Baron Ducie and a Dutch frigate escorting thirty merchant ships under the command of Rear-Admiral Willem Krull, and resulted in the capture of all Dutch vessels present by the British. The battle occurred soon after a British expeditionary force under the command of Admiral George Brydges Rodney had captured the Dutch colony of Sint Eustatius during the opening stages of the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War, a conflict resulting from tensions between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Dutch Republic over Dutch support for the American rebels during the Revoluti