Spanish Armada

The brainchild of Spanish King Philip II, the Spanish Armada was a fleet of warships that attempted to invade England in 1588.

Animosity between Spain and England escalated during the decade of the 1570s and must be considered amid the political and religious backdrops of the second half of the 16th century. In 1556 Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, abdicated the throne, allowing his son Philip to come into full inheritance. He found himself in command of not only Spain and its American possessions, but also of Sicily, Naples, Burgundy, and the Duchy of Milan. Philip already controlled the Netherlands and was married to English claimant Mary Tudor. In addition to these vast holdings, Philip stood to inherit the throne of Portugal when Sebastian, then king, died. Although already allied to the throne of Spain, the throne of Portugal would cement Spain’s already strong military position, especially in the maritime realm, in which the addition of Portugal’s fleet would solidify Spain’s dominance in the Atlantic sea trade.

A number of events combined to undermine Philip’s strong geopolitical position. In 1558 Mary died without leaving Philip, or for that matter England, an heir. The English throne passed to Mary’s sister Elizabeth I, whose long reign upheld Protestantism in a divided country. By political necessity Elizabeth I became Philip’s enemy. During the early years of her reign, she concentrated on consolidating her position as the Protestant queen of a nation with a large Catholic minority. Although Philip looked forward to a few years of peace, the revolt of the Netherlands, led by William the Silent, along with the growth of Huguenot power in France under the direction of Henry IV, placed Catholicism’s most powerful political leader on the defensive.

The destiny of Philip’s future plans and potential successes hinged on maintaining control of the English Channel. With the burgeoning seaboard trade of the 16th century, the English Channel became the essential highway for the nations of northern Europe seeking riches in the oceans of the world. Equally important for Philip, control of the channel could be a check on English ambitions.

Slow to enter the world of maritime trade, England’s naval power was on the rise during the Elizabethan era. Led by merchant adventurer Sir John Hawkins and privateer Sir Francis Drake, English ambitions on the open seas soon clashed with those of Spain. Engaging in the burgeoning slave trade between the coast of Africa and the West Indies, Hawkins’s third triangular voyage, in 1568, ended in disaster at San Juan de Ulua in the West Indies because of Spanish interference. Only one of the English ships was destroyed, and Hawkins, along with Drake, escaped to England. In immediate retribution for the attack, England captured some Spanish treasure ships in the Atlantic. More detrimental to Philip was Drake’s new passion to exact vengeance upon the Spanish. Carrying out this goal throughout the decade of the 1570s, Drake struck Spanish vessels on the open seas and pillaged Spanish possessions on the Spanish Main, in Panama, and in the West Indies. Historians often refer to his raid of the Spanish controlled West Indies in 1585-86 as the de facto starting point of the war involving the Spanish Armada. In truth, Philip had started plans for an invasion of England years earlier, but it was in January 1586 that he began assembling the armada. More than two years in the making, the armada combined existing Spanish and Portuguese ships, already impressive in number and power, with a new building program. Many in Europe thought of Philip’s end result as invincible.

While the English and Spanish each hoped to exert control over much of the Atlantic, technological and technical developments were already changing the nature of naval warfare. Through the middle of the 16th century, most sea battles had been fought at close range, with ships lying next to one another. In 1571 the Spanish, with the help of other Christian forces, defeated the Turkish navy, a power in the Mediterranean Sea, at Lepanto by using galleys propelled by oars, the general type of ship used since Greek and Roman times. However, by then the English Sea Dogs, led by the likes of Drake and Hawkins, were perfecting very different tactics. They began to rely on low-lying and highly maneuverable vessels that could be turned windward so they could pound the enemy’s fleet from a distance and thus avoid hand-to-hand combat with the skilled Spanish infantry on the ships.

Departing from Lisbon on May 30, 1588, the armada entered the English Channel on July 30, skirmishing in long-range gun battles with English warships over the next few days. Philip’s fleet contained 124 vessels of varying sizes carrying 27,000 men and 1,100 guns. The English countered with 197 ships, 16,000 men, and 2,000 guns. Half of the Spanish men were soldiers, while all of the English were seamen. On August 6 the armada anchored at Calais, France. Median Sidonia planned a rendezvous with barges carrying Spanish troops from nearby Dunkerque, a port belonging to the Netherlands at the time, but Dutch gunboats prevented the barges from meeting the armada. Moreover, Drake dislodged the Spanish vessels with fireships—boats filled with combustibles and set afire to drift into the enemy fleet. Attempting to escape the flames, the Spanish ships sailed out to sea. Chaos ensued. Later in the morning 60 English ships attacked an equal number of Spanish ships outside the French port of Gravelines. Employing nimble steerage with a combination of long-and short-range shooting techniques, the English defeated the armada, killing 600 Spanish sailors, wounding 800 more, and taking still others prisoners. The new long-range tactics employed by the English were taken up by other naval powers in the ensuing centuries, replaced only by the advent of steam and armor after 1850, which once again changed the nature of naval warfare.

A mix of anticipation and confusion within the international community characterized the months after the armada fled the English Channel. What remained of the crippled fleet sailed to the North Sea, returning to Spain by sailing northward around the British Isles. Only 67 ships returned to Spain, as heavy winds and storms combined to ground many of the ships off the coast of Ireland. Although rumors passed through France indicating a Spanish victory, the truth of the situation slowly dawned on the Spanish. In their response to the defeat, the Dutch cast a medal depicting the world slipping from the grasp of Philip as larger reverberations echoed across Europe and even the world.

Scholars have long argued that the defeat of the armada was a turning point in Spanish history, although some historians shy away from the phrase “defeat of the Spanish Armada.” The Spaniards remained strong enough to keep possession of their established colonies in Central and South America, although they no longer attempted to monopolize America north of Florida. Nor did they expend much effort in defending the Asian empire once controlled by the Portuguese but by then under Spanish control. The English, Dutch, and French took advantage, expanding their influence into the East. In 1600 the English East India Company was chartered. The Dutch East India Company (1602) and French East India Company followed.

England, France, and the Netherlands were also able to take advantage on the North American continent. On the immediate horizon the defeat of the armada allowed Sir Walter Ralegh to send supplies to the 110 colonists who were left behind at Roanoke, but by the time the English arrived, the colonists had disappeared. Despite the apparent tragedy, the English as well as the French and the Dutch could ply the seas more easily in the years following the demise of the armada.

Further reading: Colin Martin and Geoffrey Parker, The Spanish Armada (New York: Norton, 1988); Garrett Mattingly, The Armada (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1959); Geoffrey Parker, “Why the Armada Failed,” Military History Quarterly 1 (1988): 18-27; R. A. Stradling, The Armada of Flanders: Spanish Maritime Policy and European War, 1568-1668, Cambridge Studies in Early Modern History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992).

—Matthew Lindaman