The Duke of Medina Sidonia, a man who had never commanded a ship, was forced to lead the largest naval force the world had ever seen. In February 1588, the original commander, the Marquis of Santa Cruz, died, leaving King Philip II of Spain with no choice but to appoint his cousin, Alonso de Guzmán, to the role. Medina Sidonia was a competent administrator and a loyal servant of the crown, but he possessed no naval experience whatsoever. He wrote to the King expressing grave doubts about the feasibility of the campaign, warning that the fleet was ill-prepared and the plan was flawed. His message was intercepted by courtiers who believed that God would ensure the success of the enterprise and that the King would not tolerate such pessimism. Consequently, the Duke was left to sail into the English Channel with a fleet of 141 ships, carrying 10,138 sailors and 19,315 soldiers, without the ability to steer his own destiny or command his own men effectively. The fleet was delayed by bad weather in the Bay of Biscay, forcing four galleys and one galleon to turn back, leaving 137 ships to face the English. The Spanish fleet was a motley collection of 24 purpose-built warships, 44 armed merchantmen, 38 auxiliary vessels, and 34 supply ships, all carrying 1,500 brass guns and 1,000 iron guns. The sheer scale of the operation was unprecedented, yet the coordination required to execute it was nearly impossible to achieve.
The English Weather Gage
The English fleet, though smaller in number, possessed a tactical advantage that the Spanish could not match. On the 30th of July 1588, the English fleet was off Eddystone Rocks with the armada upwind to the west. To execute its attack, the English tacked upwind of the armada, thus gaining the weather gage, a significant advantage. At daybreak on the 31st of July, the English fleet engaged the armada off Plymouth near the Eddystone Rocks. The armada was in a crescent-shaped defensive formation, convex towards the east. The galleons and great ships were concentrated in the centre and at the tips of the crescent's horns, giving cover to the transports and supply ships in between. Opposing them, the English were in two sections, with Drake to the north in the Revenge with 11 ships, and Howard to the south in the Ark with the bulk of the fleet. Given the Spanish advantage in close-quarter fighting, the English kept beyond grappling range and bombarded the Spanish ships from a distance with cannon fire. The distance was too great for the manoeuvre to be effective and, at the end of the first day's fighting, neither fleet had lost a ship in action. The English caught up with the Spanish fleet after a day of sailing. The Spanish heavy guns could not easily be reloaded because of their close spacing and the quantities of supplies stowed between decks. Instead, the Spanish gunners fired once and then transferred to their main task, which was to board enemy ships, as had been the practice in naval warfare at the time. Evidence from Armada wrecks in Ireland shows that much of the fleet's ammunition was unused. Their determination to fight by boarding, rather than employing cannon fire at a distance, proved a disadvantage for the Spanish. The manoeuver had been effective in the battles of Lepanto and Ponta Delgada earlier in the decade, but the English were aware of it and sought to avoid it by keeping their distance.
On the 7th of August 1588, the English executed a daring stratagem that would shatter the Spanish formation. The Spanish fleet had anchored off Calais in a tightly packed defensive crescent formation, not far from Dunkirk, where Parma's army, reduced by disease to 16,000, was expected to be waiting. An essential element of the plan of invasion was the transportation of a large part of Parma's Army of Flanders as the main invasion force in unarmed barges across the English Channel. These barges would be protected by the large ships of the armada. However, to get to the armada, they would have to cross the zone dominated by the Dutch navy, where the armada could not go due to the ongoing Eighty Years' War with the Dutch Republic. This problem seems to have been overlooked by the armada's commanders, but it was insurmountable. Communication was more difficult than anticipated, and word came too late that Parma's army had yet to be equipped with sufficient transport or to be assembled in the port, a process that would take at least six days. As Medina Sidonia waited at anchor, Dunkirk was blockaded by a Dutch fleet of 30 flyboats under Lieutenant-Admiral Justinus van Nassau. The Dutch flyboats mainly operated in the shallow waters off Zeeland and Flanders where larger warships with a deeper draught, like the Spanish and English galleons, could not safely enter. Parma expected the armada to send its light pataches to drive away the Dutch, but Medina Sidonia would not send them because he feared he would need these ships for his own protection. There was no deep-water port where the fleet might shelter, which had been acknowledged as a major difficulty for the expedition, and the Spanish found themselves vulnerable as night drew on. Late on the 7th of August, Howard was reinforced by a squadron under Lord Edward Seymour and William Wynter, which had been stationed in the Downs as a reinforcement for the Dutch should Parma make any independent move. Their arrival gave Howard a total of 140 ships. He also received a small amount of powder and shot, which the Earl of Sussex had collected from fortresses and garrisons on the South Coast, and some victuals. The wind and currents were favourable for an attempt to break the armada's formation by sending fireships against it. Walsingham had already sent orders to Dover that fishing smacks and faggots and pitch were to be collected for this purpose. However, the English commanders felt that they could not wait for proper fireships and therefore sacrificed eight of their own warships. Drake, who was a substantial shipowner, offered one of his own ships, the 200-ton Thomas. Hawkins also offered one of his ships, the 150-ton Bark Bond. Six other ships, of between 90 and 200 tons, were volunteered. These ships were filled with whatever pitch, brimstone and tar was immediately available. Because of the haste, the loaded guns and stores were left aboard. In the middle of the night of the 7th to the 8th of August, the English set these fireships alight and cast them downwind among the closely anchored vessels of the armada. The Spanish feared that these uncommonly large fireships were hellburners, specialised fireships filled with large gunpowder charges that had been used to deadly effect at the Siege of Antwerp. Three were intercepted by pataches and towed away, but the remainder bore down on the fleet. Medina Sidonia's flagship and the principal warships held their positions, but the rest of the fleet cut their anchor cables and scattered in confusion. No Spanish ships were burnt, but the crescent formation had been broken, and the fleet found itself too far leeward of Calais in the rising southwesterly wind to recover its position. Another loss, the effect of which would not be felt until later, was almost every anchor the Armada's ships possessed. The English closed in for battle. Parma learned of this the following day.
The Battle of Gravelines
Before dawn on the 8th of August 1588, Medina Sidonia struggled to regather his fleet after the fireships scattered it, and was reluctant to sail further east than Gravelines, knowing the danger of running aground on the shoals off Flanders, from which his Dutch enemies had removed the sea marks. The English learned of the armada's weaknesses during the skirmishes in the English Channel, and concluded it was possible to close in to within 500 yards to be able to penetrate the oak hulls of the Spanish warships. They had spent most of their gunpowder in the first engagements and had, after the Isle of Wight, been forced to conserve their heavy shot and powder for an anticipated attack near Gravelines. During all the engagements, the Spanish heavy guns could not easily be reloaded because of their close spacing and the quantities of supplies stowed between decks, as Drake had discovered on capturing the Santa Ana in the Channel. Instead, the Spanish gunners fired once and then transferred to their main task, which was to board enemy ships, as had been the practice in naval warfare at the time. Evidence from Armada wrecks in Ireland shows that much of the fleet's ammunition was unused. Their determination to fight by boarding, rather than employing cannon fire at a distance, proved a disadvantage for the Spanish. The manoeuver had been effective in the battles of Lepanto and Ponta Delgada earlier in the decade, but the English were aware of it and sought to avoid it by keeping their distance. While Medina Sidonia was gathering the armada ships together into their traditional crescent formation the English fleet moved in, and at dawn the flagship with four other ships found themselves facing the entire English fleet. The English provoked Spanish fire while staying out of range. The English then closed, firing damaging broadsides into the enemy ships, all the while maintaining a windward position, so the heeling armada hulls were exposed to damage below the water line when they changed course later. Many of the Spanish gunners were killed or wounded by the English broadsides, and the task of manning the cannon often fell to foot soldiers who did not know how to operate them. The ships were close enough for sailors on the upper decks of the English and Spanish ships to exchange musket fire. A couple of hours into the battle, a few more armada warships closed in to form wings on either side of the five ships already under attack. After eight hours, the English ships began to run out of ammunition, and some gunners began loading objects such as chains into their cannons. Around 4 pm, the English fired their last shots and pulled back. Five Spanish and Portuguese ships were lost: the 605 ton Santa Ana, a carrack which had been part of Don Diego Flores de Valdes' Castile Squadron which had attempted to surrender to Captain Robert Crosse of the Hope, sank off Blankenberge with the loss of 275 men the Spanish only managing to rescue a single boatload of survivors. The galleass San Martin, the flagship of Don Hugo de Moncada which had been holed below the waterline, was forced to run aground at Calais to avoid sinking. On sight of this, Admiral Howard ordered a flotilla of ship's boats to carry her by boarding. Moncada was killed during an exchange of small arms fire, a shot to his head from an arquebus. The ship was then taken after murderous fighting between the crew, galley slaves and the English. The French meanwhile could do little except to watch as the ship was plundered, but they opened fire to ward off the English who quickly left to join the rest of the fight. The next day, the severely crippled galleon San Juan de Portugal ran aground in between Sluis and Ostend; it was taken by a combination of Dutch ships and English troops led by Francis Vere. The captain, Don Diego Pimmental, surrendered along with the survivors of his crew. Later that day, the equally crippled San Martín, commanded by Maestre de Campo Don Fransico de Toledo, drifted away as she was sinking and ran aground on the island of Walcheren. The English troops sortied from Flushing to the wreck, attacked the stricken vessel, and took the crew prisoners. A Dutch force of flyboats led by Justinus van Nassau then took possession of the ship. A pinnace was also run aground by her crew to prevent her from sinking. Many other Spanish ships were severely damaged, especially the Portuguese and some Spanish Atlantic-class galleons, including some Neapolitan galleys, which bore the brunt of the fighting during the early hours of the battle: the Spanish San Salvador, San Juan de Portugal, and San Martín; the Neapolitan San Juan de Sicilia; and the Portuguese San Mateo and San Felipe. The Spanish plan to join with Parma's army had been frustrated.
The Protestant Wind
On the day after the battle at Gravelines, the disorganized and unmanoeuvreable Spanish fleet was at risk of running onto the sands of Zeeland because of the prevailing wind. The wind then changed to the south, enabling the fleet to sail north. The English ships under Howard pursued to prevent any landing on English soil, although by this time his ships were almost out of shot. On the 12th of August, Howard called a halt to the pursuit at about the latitude of the Firth of Forth off Scotland. The only option left to the Spanish ships was to return to Spain by sailing round the north of Scotland and home via the Atlantic or the Irish Sea. As the Spanish fleet rounded Scotland on the 20th of August, it consisted of 110 vessels and most made it around. The San Martín, heavily damaged during the Gravelines engagement, had struggled North and limped into Tobermory bay on the Isle of Mull on the 23rd of September, but was later destroyed by an English agent sent by Francis Walsingham with most of the crew on board. The Spanish ships were beginning to show wear from the long voyage, and some were kept together by strengthening their damaged hulls with cables. Supplies of food and water ran short. The intention would have been to keep to the west of the coasts of Scotland and Ireland, seeking the relative safety of the open sea. There being no way of accurately measuring longitude, the Spanish were not aware that the Gulf Stream was carrying them north and east as they tried to move west, and they eventually turned south much closer to the coast than they thought. Off Scotland and Ireland, the fleet ran into a series of powerful westerly winds which drove many of the damaged ships further towards the lee shore. Because so many anchors had been abandoned during the escape from the English fireships off Calais, many of the ships were incapable of securing shelter as the fleet reached the coast of Ireland and were driven onto the rocks; local inhabitants looted the ships. The late sixteenth century and especially 1588 was marked by unusually strong North Atlantic storms, perhaps associated with a high accumulation of polar ice off the coast of Greenland, a feature of the Little Ice Age. Brian Fagan, Brian (2000), The Little Ice Age: How Climate Made History 1300, 1850, New York: Basic Books More ships and sailors were lost to cold and stormy weather than in direct combat. Most of the 28 ships lost in the storms were along the jagged steep rocks of the western coast of Ireland. About 5,000 men died by drowning, starvation and slaughter by local inhabitants after their ships were driven ashore on the west coasts of Scotland and Ireland. The English Lord Deputy William FitzWilliam ordered the English soldiers in Ireland to kill any Spanish prisoners, which was done on several occasions instead of asking for ransom as was common during that period. Reports of the passage of the remnants of the Spanish Armada around Ireland abound with onerous accounts of hardships and survival. One of the costliest wrecks was that of the galleass La Girona, which was driven on to Lacada Point in County Antrim on the night of the 26th of October. Of the estimated 1,300 people on board, there were nine survivors. 260 bodies washed ashore, including Don Luis de Requesens, knight and member of the Council of Thirteen of the Order of Santiago. Captain Francisco de Cuéllar was wrecked on the coast of Ireland and gave a remarkable account of his experiences in the fleet, on the run in Ireland, defeat of an English army besieging Rosclogher castle, flight through Scotland, surviving a second shipwreck and ultimate return to Spain.
The King's Despair
Continental Europe had been anxiously awaiting news of the armada all summer. The Spanish postmaster and Spanish agents in Rome promoted reports of Spanish victory in hopes of convincing Pope Sixtus V to release his promise of one million ducats upon landing of troops. In France, the Spanish and English ambassadors promoted contradictory narratives in the press, and a Spanish victory was incorrectly celebrated in Paris, Prague, and Venice. It was not until late August that reliable reports of the Spanish defeat arrived in major cities and were widely believed. The first rumours of a setback for the armada began to reach Spain when news of the English fireships breaking the Spanish formation at Calais was received, but this was disbelieved. The King noted I hope God has not permitted so much evil. Nothing was heard for nearly two weeks and it was not until the 21st of September that the first of the ships of the armada began to arrive into Spain , the first of eight entered into Coruña which included Medina Sidonia's San Martín. Over the next few days Diego Flores took 22 more into Laredo harbour and Miguel de Oquendo brought five more into the port of Guipuzcoa. After Medina Sidonia entered Coruña, and following the death of Admiral Miguel de Oquendo, Captain Diego de Medrano was appointed interim Admiral to command the remaining armada back to Spain. By mid-October it was becoming more apparent for the Spanish that few if any more of the remaining missing ships of the armada would return. Even in November, three months after the battles through the Channel, a few Spanish ships were still attempting the journey home. One of the last, the Spanish hospital ship San Juan Bautista, carrying some 200 sick and wounded survivors, came into Hope Cove in Devon on the 7th of November, the commander trying to find a suitable place to ground her. The crew were taken prisoner and the sick were treated in Bodmin and Plympton. The news of the disaster brought shock and despair and the nation went into mourning. Its defeat was even more devastating because hopes of its success had been raised by false rumours. These included Drake and Howard being taken prisoner, the Isle of Wight and Plymouth taken and Parma's army even approaching London. The King took the news hard and shut himself away for days. The daily business of government was also brought to an abrupt halt. The King is claimed to have said I sent the armada against men, not God's winds and waves. News of the loss of La Girona bore more despair for Philip: not only De Leiva but also his followers from almost every noble house in Spain had drowned with it. The number of ships lost has been debated. A detailed study by Spanish naval historian Fernandez Duro in the mid-1880s claimed that 63 in total were lost. Historian Colin Martin examined the fate of each ship creating individual dossiers and claimed that 35 ships were lost. In addition it was noted that of the 122 armada ships that entered the English Channel, 87 returned from their voyage through the Channel and around the British isles. These figures do not include eight that were unaccounted for. Other historians have done further research; Neil Hanson, Robert Hutchinson, Colin Martin and Geoffrey Parker all researched the armada ships that had returned, coming to the same conclusion of between 44 and 51 ships being lost overall, with more detailed breakdowns in the number of ships that set sail along with their fate. That figure represents a third of the fleet having been sunk, captured, wrecked, or scuttled. American historian Garrett Mattingly noted that only 66 ships returned to Spain, with another returning later in the year. The losses did not include the smaller vulnerable ships like the pataches and zarbas, of which around seventeen were lost. Even though most of the ships had returned, many of them were severely damaged from either the storms or English gunfire. One hulk, the San Juan de Sicilia, sank after they had cast anchor in Santander, and the San Martín was accidentally burned within a few days of entering San Sebastian. In addition the severely damaged galleons San Juan de Portugal and San Martín were broken up, the guns and the timber being sold off. As many as half of the fleet were unfit for further service and as a result a number were scuttled, broken up or left to rot. Furthermore, Spanish sources state that no more than 11,000 perished. Philip's administrators, bureaucrats and secretaries documented, dated and filed everything that went on in all corners of the Spanish empire, and all those records are still kept in the National Archives of Spain and the Escorial. The number of men lost was extracted from the paymaster distribution lists. A detailed analysis of the human cost of the campaign reveals that 25,696 men left Coruña and 13,399 returned. The lowest estimate is 9,000 dead. Even after arrival the men were near death from disease, as the conditions were very cramped, and most of the ships had run out of food and water. More armada survivors later died in Spain or on hospital ships in Spanish harbours from diseases contracted during the voyage. A large number of prominent Spanish commanders also died, many after having arrived in port. Vice Admiral of the fleet and commander of the Guipuzcoa Squadron, Miguel de Oquendo, suffering from battle wounds and a fever, died at Coruña two days after arriving. Another was the Biscayan squadron commander Juan Martínez de Recalde, who also succumbed the same way. The Duke of Medina Sidonia also fell ill on his return and nearly succumbed; he was not blamed by Philip, who allowed him to return home to convalesce. Hutchinson claimed that the number of survivors was just over 50%, but these numbers do not include the Portuguese, the Neapolitans and the galley slaves; while Hanson claimed that fewer than 10,000 men (38%) survived the expedition.
The English Counter-Armada
The following year the English with Dutch conscripts launched the Counter-Armada under Sir Francis Drake and Sir John Norris with three tasks: Destroy the battered Spanish Atlantic fleet, which was being repaired in ports of northern Spain; Make a landing at Lisbon, Portugal, and raise a revolt there against King Philip II (Philip I of Portugal) installing the pretender Dom António, Prior of Crato to the Portuguese throne; Take the Azores if possible so as to establish a permanent base. The expedition ended in a heavy defeat and none of the objectives were achieved. Dozens of ships were lost, thousands of English soldiers and sailors died, and heavy economic losses were incurred, in a similar disaster to the Spanish Armada. Fernández Duro, Cesáreo (1972). Naval Museum of Madrid, vol. III, chapter III. Madrid. p. 51 The attempt to restore the Portuguese Crown from Spain was unsuccessful, and the opportunity to strike a decisive blow against the weakened Spanish Navy was lost. The expedition depleted the financial resources of England's treasury, which had been carefully restored during the long reign of Elizabeth I. Through this lost opportunity, Philip II's naval power marked a revival through the next decade. The following year he sent 37 ships with 6,420 men to Brittany where they established a base of operations on the Blavet river. The English and Dutch ultimately failed to disrupt the various fleets of the Indies despite the great number of military personnel mobilized every year. During the course of the war, the Spanish struggled to gain control of the English Channel or stop the English intervention in Flanders or English privateer transatlantic raids. From their base in Brittany, Spanish corsairs did make several incursions on the English coast and plundered English and Dutch ships. The Spanish launched a number of small scale attacks such as the Raid on Mount's Bay in Cornwall on the 26th of July 1595, where over two days, Penzance, Newlyn, Mousehole, and Paul were raided and torched. Another smaller raid on Cawsand bay, also in Cornwall, took place the following year but ended in failure. In June 1596, England and the United Dutch Provinces sent a second armada to Spain, where they seized and held Cadiz for two weeks causing economic losses, but failed to seize the treasure fleet. After this, three more armadas were sent by Spain , the second sent in 1596 (126, 140 ships) was scattered by a storm, as was the third sent the following year (140 ships), with a number captured or sunk by the English fleet. The last Armada (33 ships) sent in October 1601 to Ireland, ended with the surrender at Kinsale three months later. The conflict subsequently wound down with diminishing military actions, finally ending with the signing of the Treaty of London in August 1604.
The Technological Revolution
The Spanish had 117 ships to go up against more than 200 English ships. The opposing forces were experienced in completely different fighting styles. The Spanish style can be studied from the Battle of Lepanto. Their tactics were to fire one cannon volley, ram and grapple the enemy ship, board, then engage in hand-to-hand combat. In contrast, the English style was taking advantage of the wind (the weather gage) and line-to-line cannon fire from windward, which exposed the opponent ship's hull and rudder as targets. Also instilled was the use of naval cannon to damage enemy ships without the need to board. Until then, the cannon had played a supporting role to the main tactic of ramming and boarding enemy ships. The failure of the Spanish Armada vindicated the English strategy and caused a revolution in naval tactics. The English also had the advantage of fighting close to home, whence they could be easily and frequently resupplied so as not to be weighed down, unlike the armada ships which were loaded with all the materiel needed for their invasion force to wage a ground-based war. Nevertheless, when the fleets actually came to blows at the Battle of Gravelines, the armada was outnumbered 10:1, and during the 8-hour fight, the English managed to sink one carrack and forced two galleons, a pinnace and an armed merchant to run aground. Despite those odds, not once did the armada turn away from a fight; each time it challenged the English fleet, the latter raised its sails to keep its distance. After the final engagement with the English fleet, the Spanish fleet sailed away, retaining its ability to effectively wage war. Most military historians hold that the battle of Gravelines reflected a lasting shift in the balance of naval power in favour of the English, in part because of the gap in naval technology and cannon armament which continued into the next century. In the words of historian Geoffrey Parker, by 1588, the capital ships of the Elizabethan navy constituted the most powerful battlefleet afloat anywhere in the world. The English navy yards were leaders in technical innovation, and the captains devised new battle formations and tactics. The sleeker and more manoeuvrable full-rigged ship, with ample cannon, was one of the greatest advances of the century and permanently transformed naval warfare. English shipwrights introduced novel designs, first demonstrated in the Dreadnought in 1570 and the Victory in 1573, that allowed the ships to sail faster, manoeuvre better, and carry more and heavier guns. Whereas before warships had tried to grapple with each other so soldiers could board the enemy ship, they were able to stand off and fire broadside cannonades that could sink the vessel. English ships and seamanship had foiled the invasion. The English also benefited from Spain's unworkable strategy that required coordination between the invasion fleet and the Spanish army on shore. The outdated design of the Spanish cannon meant that they were much slower in reloading in a close-range battle, allowing the English to take control. Spain still had numerically larger fleets, but England was catching up.