The Spanish Armada
The 'invincible' Armada of 1588 was wrecked less by English guns than by Atlantic gales, and hundreds of Spanish sailors ended up washed ashore in Scotland and Ireland.
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Quick Facts
- What happened
- Philip II of Spain sent a huge fleet to ferry an army to invade England; it was repelled and then shattered by storms on the long way home
- Date
- Sighted off the Lizard on 29 July 1588 (New Style/Gregorian calendar; 19 July Old Style); the main fighting ended in early August New Style
- Spanish commander
- Alonso Pérez de Guzmán, Duke of Medina Sidonia
- English commander
- Charles Howard, Lord Howard of Effingham, with Francis Drake, John Hawkins and Martin Frobisher
- Fleet size
- Around 130 ships, with roughly 30,000 men aboard
- Key battle
- The Battle of Gravelines, 8 August 1588
- Turning point
- Fireships sent among the anchored fleet off Calais on the night of 7–8 August
- Outcome
- Dozens of ships lost, many to wrecks on the coasts of Scotland and Ireland; Spain's invasion plan failed
The plan that needed two armies to meet
In one sentence: Spain's king sent a vast fleet up the Channel to link up with an army in the Netherlands and carry it across to England, and the plan fell apart. Philip II had good reasons for fury. Elizabeth I had backed the Dutch rebels against Spanish rule, English privateers such as Francis Drake had raided Spanish treasure and ports, and in 1587 Mary, Queen of Scots had been executed, removing a Catholic alternative to Elizabeth. The flaw was in the logistics. The Armada was meant to sail to the Netherlands and escort the Duke of Parma's veterans across the narrow sea. But the Spanish ships were not built to fight in the shallow waters off the Flemish coast, and Parma's barges could not safely put to sea while Dutch warships lurked nearby. The two halves of the plan never properly met.
Fire on the water at Calais
The fleet was sighted off Cornwall in late July 1588, and the English followed it up the Channel in a running fight. The Spanish stuck to a tight crescent formation, and English gunnery did less damage than the English had hoped. Then the Armada anchored off Calais. On the night of 7–8 August, the English packed eight ships with combustibles and sent them drifting towards the Spanish fleet. Nobody needed to be hit. Panicked captains cut their anchor cables and scattered into the dark, and the formation that had held for a week was broken. Next morning, off Gravelines, the English closed in and pounded the scattered ships. Spanish powder and shot ran low. With the wind pushing them towards the sandbanks, the Armada escaped only when it shifted.
The wind, not the navy, finished the job
With the Channel route home blocked, Medina Sidonia ordered the fleet north around Scotland and Ireland, then back down the Atlantic. It was a route many of his pilots barely knew, and his ships were damaged, short of water and carrying sick men. Autumn gales did the rest. Ships were driven onto the rocks of the Irish west coast and the Scottish islands. Survivors who reached land met mixed fortunes: some were helped, others were killed or captured. Many Spanish sailors died of hunger and exposure. In all, dozens of ships never returned, and thousands of men were lost. Spain rebuilt its navy and fought on for years, but the fleet's failure was a heavy blow to Philip's prestige.
Myths versus reality
The Armada was not simply David against Goliath. England's ships were fast, well armed and handled by experienced crews, and many were as large as the Spanish galleons. It also was not destroyed in one glorious battle. The English did not sink the fleet outright; they harried it, scattered it and forced it into the open sea. The story that Drake calmly finished his game of bowls on Plymouth Hoe when the fleet appeared is famous, but it only appears in print decades after the event. Treat it as legend rather than record. Another myth is that every Spanish survivor in Ireland was swarthy-looking and left a distinct bloodline. The tales of 'Black Irish' descended from Armada sailors are more folklore than fact.
Why 1588 still matters
The defeat became a founding story of English identity. Elizabeth's speech to her troops at Tilbury, in which she said she had the heart and stomach of a king, is among the most quoted moments of her reign. It did not end the war with Spain, which dragged on until 1604, and it did not make England a great empire overnight. But it protected Protestant England from invasion and boosted the idea that the sea was England's best defence. The Armada also left physical marks. Wrecks off Scotland and Ireland are still studied by archaeologists, and objects recovered from them can be seen in museums. Plymouth's Hoe, with its statue of Drake, remains the best place to feel the legend, while the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich holds Armada portraits and relics that tell the story.
Notable people
- Philip II of Spain
- Elizabeth I
- Alonso Pérez de Guzmán, Duke of Medina Sidonia
- Charles Howard, Lord Howard of Effingham
- Francis Drake
- John Hawkins
- Martin Frobisher
- Alexander Farnese, Duke of Parma
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