Changed the connection to:
sql1.Initialize("com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerDriver", "jdbc:sqlserver://192.168.0.76\\SQLEXPRESS;databaseName=SampleLogs;user=USER;password=PWD")
And now the error changed to:
Error occurred on line: 18 (Main)
com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerException: The connection to the host 192.168.0.76, named instance \sqlexpress failed. Error: "java.net.SocketTimeoutException: Receive timed out". Verify the server and instance names and check that no firewall is blocking UDP traffic to port 1434. For SQL Server 2005 or later, verify that the SQL Server Browser Service is running on the host.
Still in darkness...