He entered military service in the West Indies in 1625

Peter Stuyvesant became the director of the West India Company's colony of Curacao from 1634 to 1644

In April 1644 he led an attack on the the Portuguese island of Saint Martin and was badly wounded. He had to return to Holland, and there one of his legs was amputated. Peter Stuyvesant wore a wooden leg ornamented with silver bands.

In May 1645 he was appointed by the West India Company to supersede William Kieft as director of New Netherland.

He traveled to the New World and arrived in New Amsterdam ( which later became New York) in May 1647

He became unpopular with the leading burghers who were alienated by his violent and despotic methods and by his devotion to the interests of the West India company.

In 1649 the leading burghers sent the famous Vertoogh, or Remonstrance, to the states-general asking for burgher government and other reforms