sandbanks. When dawn came, the English moved in and the exhausted Spaniards
prepared themselves for death. But the English were almost out of ammunition. No
attack came.
Slowly, the Spaniards forged their way through the shallow waters. At
any moment, they could feel the terrible lurch of a ship grounded on the sands.
Then, in the afternoon, the wind changed and blew them away from the deadly
sandbanks. The Duke of Medina wrote: “We were saved by the wind, by God’s mercy,
it shifted to the southwest.” (McKee 181)
It is rather strange that only 100 Englishmen had been killed since the
first encounter. Why didn’t the Spanish artillery do any damage to the English
fleet? One answer may be that the Spanish cannon balls were badly cast and
splintered when fired. Their gunpowder was finer ground than the English, and
perhaps was unsuited to the heavy cannon. Their guns may even have exploded on
their gun decks. The merchant ships were not built to take either the weight or
the recoil of heavy cannon. Continual pounding from their own guns put an
immense strain on the ships’ timbers. Their carpenters had the never-ending task
of caulking the leaks. Sometimes the guns were not properly lashed to the gun
decks. When fired, the recoil sent the guns bounding across the decks, severely
damaging the ships and wounding the men. (Graham 287)
When the English fleet turned back, Medina and his captains held a
council of war. Now their task was to get the Armada safely back to Spain.
Medina wrote to the King that “the Armada was so crippled and scattered, it
seemed my first duty to Your Majesty to save it, even at the risk of a very long
voyage in high latitudes.” The Armada was in no condition to turn back and fight
its way through the Channel. Besides, the wind was still taking it north. They
decided to sail around Scotland and southward in the Atlantic, keeping well away
from Ireland, back to Spain.
The English, having given up the chase, sent two pinnaces to trail the
Armada as far as the Orkneys. Then they headed south. The veteran Captain Thomas
Fenner of the Non Pareil wrote predicting the fate of the Armada. As he wrote,
another terrible storm arose.
Spanish accounts of this storm describe the scattering of the fleet. But
the Armada held on course. On August 19, in a moderate wind, they sailed safely
through the Fair Isle channel between Shetland and the Orkneys, where Scottish
fishermen fish. Food was running out. Only a little slimy green water was left
in the unseasoned wooden casks. Most of the biscuits, salt beef, and salt fish
had gone bad. Medina had to ration food, giving each man a daily allowance of
eight ounces of a biscuit, and a pint of half wine/half water. Horses and mules
were thrown overboard. Of the 130 ships that had set sail from Lisbon, eight
great ships had been sunk. Many pinnaces and small craft had been swept way.
Half the remaining ships needed drastic repairs. (Howarth 234)
Off the Orkneys, Medina sent a message to the King to say that the
Armada was still together, and capable of getting back to Spain, although,
besides the wounded, there were 3,000 sick on board. But soon the moderate
weather changed and in the terrible seas off Cape Wrath, the Armada began to
break up.
In gale force winds, the fleet was swept backward and forward around the
north of Scotland, facing a fiercer enemy than the English: the wild sea. The
groaning, leaking ships were kept afloat by tired, hungry men working non-stop
at the pumps. Scurvy, dysentery, and fever were rife. Many ships sought land,
looking for food and water. Because they had abandoned their sea anchors at
Calais and had only small anchors, they were often driven onto the rocks. As the
weather worsened, ships were swept away from the main body of the fleet. Many
sank with all hands. (Howarth 245)
Four great ships were blown back toward Shetland. The Castello Negro was
never seen again. On September 1, the Barca de Amburg fired a gun to signal she
was sinking. The Grand Gonfon took off her crew, many of them wounded and dying,
but was herself wrecked off Fair Isle a month later. All her 300 crew were saved,
though many died afterward of hunger and fever. On September 17, the Trinidad
Valencera struck a reef off northeast Ireland. Of the 450 men aboard, some of
whom had been rescued from other ships, only 32 reached France. The rest had
been slaughtered, or died of exposure or fever. (Marx 224-226)
On about September 18, one of the worst storms hit the Atlantic. The
Rata Santa Maria Encoronada and the Duquesa Santa Ana took refuge in Blacksod
Bay, County Mayo, Ireland. Battles and the beatings of storms shook the Rata,
but worst of all, she too had lost her sea anchors. In the rising wind and tide
she dragged her remaining anchor and grounded on the shelving beach. Her
commander, Don Alonso de Leyva, transferred his men to the Santa Ana. This was a
tremendous feat, as the Santa Ana was anchored in another part of the bay and de
Leyva had to march his men miles across a bleak headland through bogs and across
rivers. The heavily laden ship set sail for Scotland, but was driven on the
rocks at Loughros More in the county Donegal. With great courage de Leyva, who
had broken his leg, got his crew ashore. They had news that three Spanish ships
were sheltering in the harbor of Killybegs. So again, they set out across the
mountains. At Killybegs they discovered that two of the ships were wrecked. Thi
rteen hundred men crammed onto the Girona and again set sail for Scotland. In
the night the wind changed. The Girona hit a reef near the Giant’s Causeway.
Less than ten men survived; everyone else was drowned, including de Leyva who
had led his men so bravely. (Walker 176)
When Philip was told the dreadful news about his splendid ships, he said,
“I sent them to fight against men, not storms.” Regardless of cost, he set about
building better ships and making arms that were more powerful to overcome the
English.
Elizabeth’s treasury was almost empty, but, with money collected from
the City of London and from her courtiers, she sent a fleet of 126 ships,
commanded by Drake, to attack the remains of the Armada in Santander. But Drake
and his captains wanted booty as well as naval victory and sailed to Corunna,
hoping to attack Lisbon. Sickness broke out among the crews, and bad weather
dispersed the ships. The dispirited fleet straggled back to Plymouth. The Queen
was furious and Drake was in disgrace for several years.
Five years later, Philip II sent 100 ships to invade England, but more
than half of them were destroyed by a fierce gale in the Bay of Biscay. The
following year another Spanish fleet almost reached the southern coast of
England, but again the “winds of fate” blew them back to Spain.
Overall, the defeat of the Spanish Armada by the hands of the English
had almost been like the defeat of the great Philistine Goliath by David. This
naval battle, however, did much more good for England, than just an increase in
pride. After this battle, England took the role as the greatest power in Europe,
and Spain, with a damaged army and damaged pride, could do nothing to prevent
this from happening.