While trawling through the community section at Dan Carlin's Hardcore History site (mandatory viewing – and listening! – for history geeks), I found a reference to the little-known Kettle War.
What a great story.
In the late 1700s, the Holy Roman Empire declared war on the States of Holland. The Empire used the great might of the Belgian Navy (two warships and a merchant vessel). The States of Holland would have had the help of the Admiralty of Friesland (oh land of my fathers), but my ancestors' warships got stuck in the harbour at Harlingen and had to be dismantled. (Frisians: we are a proud bu simple people.)
Reason it's called the Kettle War is this: When the Dutch caught sight of the Belgian "navy", they fired off a shot, which flew across the Scheldt delta, ricocheted off a kettle the Belgians had boiling on a stove, and plopped harmlessly into the polderwaters. The Belgians immediately surrendered.