Tag: Spanish Armada

The [Spanish] Armada’s new Captain General was Don Alonso Perez de Guzman el Bueno, the seventh Duke of Medina Sidonia. He was a country aristocrat of 38, short in stature, broad-shouldered, with brown hair and beard, and a melancholy countenance. His name was one of Spain’s oldest, and his fortune was considerable: He owned orange groves in Andalusia and controlled the revenues of the local tuna industry. In his role as a provincial overlord, he was known for diligence and tact. But his talents as a military leader were largely untested; when Francis Drake had raided Cadiz harbor the year before, the Duke had hurried in with troops to defend the town—but the town had never come under attack. And nothing seemed to mark him for naval leadership. He had never captained a fleet of ships. He had never seen a battle at sea.

The last thing Medina Sidonia wanted was to conduct the Armada to England. While [the Marquis of] Santa Cruz still tossed with fever on his deathbed, [King] Philip wrote Medina Sidonia a letter that hinted at the forthcoming command; the Duke’s response was prompt and plaintive. “I wish I possessed the talents and strength necessary for such a great task,” he wrote. “But, Sir, my health is too poor, for I know by my small experience afloat that I soon become seasick, and always catch cold. I am deeply in debt. My family owes 900,000 ducats, and I have not a single real to spend on the expedition.”

Medina Sidonia’s letter did no good, for Philip had made up his mind. “If you fail, you fail,” the King wrote back, “but the cause being the cause of God, you will not fail. Take heart and sail as soon as possible.” Undoubtedly the King placed special importance on Medina Sidonia’s possession of a great name. In an age when ancestry counted for much, the Duke would command automatic respect from the proud and jealous sea captains at Lisbon. No lesser nobleman could quiet the squabbles over honor and precedence that were bound to develop after the death of the Marquis of Santa Cruz. And no doubt the King reasoned further that, despite his cries of poverty, the Duke would contribute handsomely to the Enterprise. In that the King would prove correct….

— The Armada, pp. 63-64

To astrologers and other seers of the period, 1588 [C.E.] was a year of dreadful portent. All manner of omens, from an alleged rain of blood in Sweden to a series of monstrous births in France, pointed to some earth-shaking catastrophe. Much of the foreboding harked back more than a century to the German astronomer Regiomontanus, author of the star tables used by Columbus and of a horoscope for the current year. According to Regiomontanus, there would be an eclipse of the sun in February, followed by two total eclipses of the moon. Saturn, Jupiter and Mars, harbingers of war and chaos, would linger in baleful conjunction in the moon’s house. “If land and sea do not collapse in total ruin,” Regiomontanus had concluded, “yet will the whole world suffer upheavals, empires will dwindle and from everywhere will be great lamentation.” Students of numerology, sifting through the Bible, found reasons for alarm in the Book of Revelations and in selected passages from Isaiah. Events since the birth of Christ appeared to have moved in complex but predictable cycles, and the last cycle would conclude, with apocalyptic finality, in 1588. Surely the fall of some great kingdom was at hand. As to the identity of the kingdom, there was lively speculation. Spain—Europe’s only true empire—was a likely candidate for toppling, and nervous mariners throughout her possessions began deserting their ships in the ports where the Armada was assembling. To counter the mounting apprehension, King Philip ordered sermons denouncing all forms of wizardry and soothsaying. In England the omens seemed particularly worrisome; the second lunar eclipse, in August, would fall on the cusp of Virgo, Queen Elizabeth’s birth sign. Like Philip, the English government tried to dispel the fears, issuing a pamphlet to refute the soothsayers. Catholics in France, presumably too full of Gallic elan to contemplate their own downfall, predicted Almighty punishment for the English Jezebel.

— The Armada, p. 63

[In 1587 C.E., English Captain Francis] Drake had captured the single richest prize of his swashbuckling career, one of the grandest hauls of the century. The [Spanish galleon] San Felipe carried an imperial fortune in pepper, cloves, cinnamon and other spices, in silks and calico, in indigo and ivory, in gold, silver and caskets of gem stones. The total worth came to £114,000, more than three times the value of all the goods and shipping captured or destroyed at Cadiz. The Queen took £40,000 as her share, Drake £17,000, and the rest was split among officers, crew members and other shareholders. At a time when the Navy Board under Hawkins’ direction spent £6,000 a year, Drake had brought home more than enough money to underwrite England’s defense against any impending invasion. The capture also gave another hard knock to [King] Philip’s credit rating, further delaying his preparations for the Armada.

— The Armada, pp. 60

Armies are like prize fighters training for a bout: They reach a moment of supreme preparedness—muscles taut, reflexes swift, determination fixed at the highest pitch. But with a lull in activity they start growing flabby. This is what happened to [the Duke of] Parma’s invasion force [in 1587-8 C.E.]. All through that dismal winter, as the snows and freezing rains held the battalions in camp, the war machine began to disintegrate. Provisions were consumed at an alarming rate—Parma had to send the cavalry inland to scavenge—and budgeted funds began to give out. As spring passed, the men went unpaid and unfed, and they began to sicken and to desert. “We are bound to conclude that the delay is for God’s greater glory,” Parma wrote in exasperation to Philip, “but the Enterprise, once so easy and safe, will now be infinitely more difficult, and will incur a much larger expenditure of blood and trouble.”

— The Armada, pp. 70

Not all recruits were destitute or base-born, however. The Army of Flanders, especially in the sixteenth century [C.E.], needed quality as well as quantity; men who excelled in single combat, in the “actions” of the war, were required as well as cannon-fodder for the great battles. Every captain therefore tried to enlist a number of gentlemen (particulares) to serve as common soldiers in his company, offering a bonus-pay (ventaja) to every gentleman who agreed to do so. Some of these volunteers would be the relatives of the captain, others would no doubt be poor gentry unable to gain a living in other ways (Spanish gentlemen were not supposed to demean themselves by manual labour or commercial transactions), others still would be aspiring noblemen who began their military service in the ranks and hoped before long to rise to a position of command.

Most army commanders set the highest value upon these gentleman-rankers. The duke of Alva, for example, was overjoyed to find that a large number of particulares had volunteered to serve in the Spanish infantry which he led to the Netherlands in 1567.

Soldiers of this calibre [wrote Alva] are the men who win victory in the “actions” and with whom the General establishes the requisite discipline among the troops. In our nation nothing is more important than to introduce gentlemen and men of substance into the infantry so that all is not left in the hands of labourers and lackeys.

Throughout the Eighty Years’ War the same sentiment was expressed in remarkably similar terms. As late as 1640, for example, a Netherlander—and a civilian at that—could write:

Gentleman-rankers…are the people who bear the brunt of the battles and sieges, as we have seen on many occasions, and who by their example oblige and enliven the rest of the soldiers (who have less sense of duty) to stand fast and fight with courage.

Service as a volunteer among the infantry was particularly popular among the Spanish gentry, but particulares were also to be found in considerable numbers in the ranks of other “nations”. The English units in the Army of Flanders, for example, regularly included Catesbys, Treshams and other members of the leading recusant gentry families—including Guy Fawkes. Not all these gentleman-rankers were poor. On one celebrated occasion the Emperor Charles V lent additional dignity to the military profession by himself taking up a pike and marching with his men; later, in the 1590s, the dukes of Osuna and Pastrana and the prince of Asculi, scions of the most illustrious houses of Spain, were all to be found serving as simple soldiers in the Army of Flanders. Naturally these volunteers, especially the nobles, aspired to an eventual position of command, but they first received an admirable apprenticeship and, in addition, their presence in the ranks helped to maintain morale and reduce insubordination. In this way the Spanish Habsburgs assembled armies which were supremely capable of victory without resort to any compulsion.

— The Army of Flanders and the Spanish Road 1567-1659, pp. 40-41

Emphasis mine.

Some time in 1614 [C.E.] a complete set of toy soldiers, made of wood, was presented to the young prince of Spain, later King Philip IV. There were regiments and companies with their various banners, weapons and equipment, there were horses and cannon for the artillery, even the distinctive shops and tents of the armourers, sutlers and barbers who followed every army. Special materials were included for the construction of artificial lakes, forests and pontoon bridges, and there was a toy castle for the “army” to besiege. And this, the first child’s “war-game” known in Europe, was proudly described by its inventor in a special publication in Spanish and Latin. The toy was no less grandiose in intention than in execution: it was to give education as well as enjoyment. “This army will be no less useful than entertaining” the designer, one Alberto Struzzi, wrote to the prince. “From it one may observe the expenditure which is necessary if a King is to emerge victorious, and how if money (which is the sinews of war) fails, the prince’s intentions cannot be achieved.” Armies which are not paid invariably fall prey to disorders, desertion and defeat, warned the inventor.

The ultimate aim of this war-game was to make Prince Philip aware of the existence of the Spanish Netherlands and of the army which defended them. The prince’s splendid toy was in fact a perfect replica of the most famous army of the day, the Army of Flanders, maintained by Spain in the Low Countries since 1567. It was never too early to teach a future king of Spain that his power was underpinned largely by military strength and that his armies could function only for as long as they were paid.

— The Army of Flanders and the Spanish Road 1567-1659, p. 3