JJ's on Tour - Tenerife and the Battles of Santa Cruz (Part One).

Nelson’s fleet bombarding Castillo San Cristóbal, Santa Cruz in July 1797, with the cutter Fox now lying sunk before its walls - Esteban Arriaga.

The Canary Islands or Canaries are an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean and the southernmost autonomous community of Spain, located about 60 miles off the northwest coast of Africa, with a population of approximately 2.27 million inhabitants mostly concentrated on the two capital islands, with around 43% on Tenerife and 39% on Gran Canaria. 

The seven main islands, listed from largest to smallest by area, are Tenerife, Fuerteventura, Gran Canaria, Lanzarote, La Palma, La Gomera, and El Hierro, and historically, the island chain was referred to as "the Fortunate Isles"

This year Carolyn and I decided to get a bit of winter sun in Tenerife with its subtropical climate, historical interest and some great walks over rugged terrain created by its volcanic past centred around  Mount Teide, a World Heritage Site, and the highest peak in Spain and the 3rd tallest volcano in the world, measured from its base on the ocean floor.

Tenerife – the largest of Spain’s Canary Islands with this satellite view clearly showing Mount Teide which dominates the island, and stands at around 12,198 feet, but given that much of the volcano’s height is hidden, if measured from the ocean floor, its height of 24,606 feet makes Teide the third-highest volcano in the world. Teide is also an active volcano: its most recent eruption occurred in 1909 when a lava flow buried much of the town and harbour of Garachico on the northern coast.

Of course, as well as enjoying the climate, food, of which fish and sea food is in abundance, and which both Carolyn and I enjoy eating, together with the delights of the great outdoors, Tenerife has much historical significance for the historical wargamer and particularly those of us with an interest in the age of sail and the role Tenerife played in the management and transport of the precious metals transported to Spain from her possessions in the Americas. 

The view of our local beach from our apartment in the tiny fishing village of San Miguel de Tajao, famous for its fantastic seafood restraunts.

I think it is worth stressing that I like to combine my historical explorations with the finer parts of life and our first night in San Miguel de Tajao was a delight when it came to eating out that evening after a four hour flight from Bristol, with the opportunity to choose from a selection of freshly caught local fish, delivered to the table beautifully cooked and prepared.

Needless to say we had a very enjoyable evening and have booked ourselves a table for a few repeat visits during our stay.

The local area and the island as a whole is a hikers paradise with the rugged terrain created by the magma flows from Mount Teide producing a very varied walking experience combined with vegetation and wildlife quite different from home but with many of the rock formations created from the previously liquid pumice bringing back memories of similar formations and terrain observed in Iceland.

 

One such formation immediately recognisable was the pumice archway near where we were staying that was remarkably similar to ones we saw in Iceland, a result of air pockets trapped withing the molten lave flow, setting to create a large internal cavern within the rock, later eroded over the succeeding centuries to leave these astonishing features that seem manmade or something straight out of a Tolkienian Mordor picture.

Once we were settled in and I had got my bearings I was soon digging out my notes and maps that I had prepared prior to our trip in readiness for our hour's drive along the southwest coast road from San Miguel de Tajao to Santa Cruz de Teneriffe, the sight of three battles with the 'English', or more correctly to one battle with the English and two others with the British, after the Treaty of Union signed on July 22, 1706.

The coat of arms of Santa Cruz de Tenerife
proudly bears three lion heads in 
commemoration of the city's three victories 
against the British - more of that later!

To begin my tour of Santa Cruz, which today is a busy commercial shipping harbour alongside berths for the regular visiting cruise ships from P&O and Fred Olsen to name but a few, and a thriving town centre of restaurants and gift shops, I had a list of key buildings and sites that were pertinent to my visit and started with the Military Museum with its own car park and close to the centre of the old town, and a useful place to get ones bearings on the other landmarks.

The satellite image of the area of old Santa Cruz showing the fortress of San Cristobal, the Military Museum where I began my exploration of the town and to the top of the picture and now surrounded by commercial dockland, the old battery of Paso Alto. Much of the old shoreline is now overbuilt by the additional land reclamation on which the modern commercial docks have been constructed.

A quick glance at a satellite view of Santa Cruz today reveals a waterfront very different from that of times past and given that the three battles in question were fought in off and along that waterfront, the visitor to the town needs to reference where the various actions may have been contested by what remains of fortifications and buildings that were in situ over 350 years ago; and so we are looking at churches and fortresses such as San Cristolbal and Paso Alto, and a few other buildings that have been subjected to change that require a bit more imagination to recreate how they and the place once looked.

The Historical Military Museum of the Canary Islands is located in the remarkable Almeyda Fortress, with its rooms, bunkers, powder magazines and outdoor areas providing a very appropriate display venue for around 1,200 items of military history relating to Spain and the Canary Islands.

Construction of the Almeyda Fortress began on the 6th November 1859 and was completed in 1884, and today, as well as housing maps, uniforms and militaria from the conquest of the Canary Islands in the 15th century to the loss of Spain's last overseas possessions in Africa, together with major events in the 20th century such as the Civil and Moroccan War it is also home to the Historical Military Library and Military Archive of the Canary Islands.

In the compound of the fort are several military vehicles, guns and aircraft relating to Spain's more recent military history and I took a few moments to have a quick look around before heading inside.

A Spanish M41 - Walker Bulldog tank, a 76mm armed American light tank developed for armed reconnaissance purposes, which was produced by Cadillac between 1951 and 1954 and marketed successfully as a replacement for World War II-vintage M24 Chaffee tanks. Spain operated 245 of them

The 7.5cm German PaK 40 ant-tank gun is an immediately recognisable weapon to the WWII buff, but this example although displayed in German Dunkel Gelb is one of the many such weapons that were in service with the Spanish forces during and after WWII. 

As interesting as much of the other militaria was, and I enjoyed working my way around the museum collection, my primary focus was on the materials and items relating principally to the three naval actions fought in and around Santa Cruz and which are commemorated by the three lion heads on the town's coat of arms.

The George under Admiral Robert Blake at the 1657 Battle of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, by Charles Edward Dixon.

Santa Cruz was a key link in the supply of gold and silver from Spain's South American possessions providing as it did a key revictualing base for treasure ships progressing back to Spain, and principally Cadiz, and at times of war with England and Great Britain a useful stop off port before making the dash for safety from any enemy blockading force on the Spanish coast.  

A 1745 interpretation of the Santa Cruz Roads where the Spanish treasure fleets would anchor.

This fact alone made it a tempting target for English and later British naval attention offset by the fact that the rocky coastline of Tenerife, with few easy landing points of beaches, coupled with its treacherous Atlantic tides, currents and winds made it a difficult place to attack at the best of times, and of course the Spanish made sure that Santa Cruz, its main harbour was well defended with heavy gun batteries and fortifications to help ward off any such attempts.

General at Sea Robert Blake, 1599 to 1657.

The first of these battles took place on the 20th April 1657, when an English Protectorate fleet under Admiral Robert Blake penetrated the heavily defended harbour at Santa Cruz de Tenerife and attacked their treasure fleet.

In 1654, the Commonwealth of England decided to support France in its war with Habsburg Spain, with this intervention being mostly motivated by hopes to profit from the war through attacks on the Spanish West Indies; and war was openly declared in October 1655 and endorsed when the Second Protectorate Parliament assembled the following year.

Sir Richard Stayner - Robert Blake's enterprising captain.
He was knighted by the Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell for services
in Admiral Robert Blake's destruction of Spanish ships at Santa Cruz, 1657.

One of the prime enterprises became the blockade of Cádiz, which had not previously been attempted on such a scale, and Robert Blake was to be in charge and also was to come up with methods that he had used in his previous encounters with the Dutch and Barbary pirates, by keeping the fleet at sea throughout an entire winter in order to maintain the blockade, during which a Spanish convoy was destroyed by one of Blake's captains, Richard Stayner, seeing a huge loss for the Spanish, with the English taking nearly £1 million in goods, another £250,000 in Silver, as well as hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of treasure lost to the ocean depths.

The Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora de las Maravillas (Our Lady of Miracles) is illustrative of the type of ships used by the Spanish at the time of Blake's attack on Santa Cruz, with two such ships protecting the treasure fleet, and was built and launched in 1647 as a large galleon armed with 56 bronze cannons of various calibres, seen here in convoy with another galleon showing its transom adorned with an image of the Virgin, the two galleries and its large central lantern of the crowning characteristic of the galleons of the 17th century - Carlos Parrilla Penagos.

In February 1657, Blake was blockading the Spanish port of Cadiz when he received news that a fleet carrying silver and gold from the Spanish colonies in the Americas was approaching. Consisting of 17 ships, the fleet docked at Santa Cruz to wait out the blockade, and when they became aware of the oncoming threat, the Spanish carried their silver bullion ashore.

Blake refused to divide his forces and waited until victualling ships from England arrived to re-provision his fleet at the end of March, after which Blake (with only two ships to watch Cádiz), sailed from Bay of Cádiz on the 13th of April 1657 to attack the plate fleet.

A Dutch engraving depicting the English attack on Santa Cruz de Tenerife in 1657.
The Fort of San Cristobal can be seen in the background, but the shape of the bay with the town of Santa Cruz jutting out on a spit is somewhat over emphasised against the backdrop of mountains which are much more representative.

Blake's fleet of 23 ships arrived off Santa Cruz on the 19th April, with the harbour defended by the Castle of San Cristóbal, armed with forty guns and a number of smaller forts connected by a triple line of breastworks to shelter musketeers. 

Blake planned to send twelve of his smaller warships, under the command of Rear-Admiral Stayner in the 50-gun Speaker into the harbour to attack the galleons while he followed in George with the rest of the fleet to bombard the shore batteries.

The attack began at 9:00 am on the 30th April as Stayner's division manoeuvred alongside the Spanish ships, which protected the English ships to some extent from the guns of the castle and forts. No shot was fired from the English ships until they had moved into position and dropped anchor. While Stayner's division attacked the galleons, Blake's heavier warships sailed into the harbour to bombard the shore defences. 

Blake ordered that no prizes were to be taken; the Spanish fleet was to be utterly destroyed, and most of the Spanish fleet, made up of smaller armed merchantmen, were quickly silenced by the superior gunnery of Stayner's warships. The two galleons fought on for several hours. Blake's division cleared the breastworks and smaller forts, with smoke from the gunfire and burning ships working to the advantage of the English by obscuring their ships from the Spanish batteries.

Around noon, the flagship of the Spanish admiral, Don Diego de Egues, caught fire, and shortly afterwards she was destroyed when her powder magazine exploded. English sailors took to boats to board Spanish ships and set them on fire, and by 3:00 pm, all sixteen Spanish ships in the harbour were sunk, ablaze or had surrendered. 

Contrary to orders five of Stayner's division each took a surrendered ship as a prize and attempted to tow them out of the harbour; causing Blake to send peremptory orders that the prizes were to be burnt, having  to repeat his order three times before the reluctant captains obeyed.

Having achieved its objective of destroying the Spanish vessels, the English fleet was faced with the hazardous task of withdrawing from Santa Cruz harbour under continuing fire from the forts, but according to accounts the wind suddenly shifted from the north-east to the south-west at exactly the right moment to carry Blake's ships out of the harbour

The English fleet worked its way back out to the open sea by warping out, or hauling on anchor ropes, a tactic Blake had introduced during the raid on Porto Farina. Speaker, which was the first ship to enter the harbour and last the to leave, had been badly damaged, but no English ships were lost in the battle. Blake's force had suffered 48 men killed and 120 wounded.

Blake worn out by his years of campaigning, died aboard his flagship the George 
on the 7th August 1657 as his fleet approached Plymouth Sound.

Even though he had failed to capture the treasure, Blake was hailed as a hero in England and was awarded the same honours that Parliament had bestowed on Sir Thomas Fairfax after the Battle of Naseby, but Blake worn out by his years of campaigning, died aboard his flagship the George on the 7th August 1657 as his fleet approached Plymouth Sound.

Lacking a fleet, the Spanish, already low on funds to finance their war effort, were now unable to transport their treasure from the Canary Islands to Spain.

The Battle of Santa Cruz was hailed as the greatest victory over the Spanish since the Armada in 1588, and indeed Horatio Nelson ranked Robert Blake as one of the greatest naval generals ever known, and in a letter two months previous to his outlining his own plans to attack Santa Cruz stated;

'I do not reckon myself equal to Blake'.

The plaque below in the museum records the battle fought by Blake in 1657 and makes reference to the English fleet having ten more ships than it did, and the sixteen Spanish ships present but not to their ultimate fate - Isn't history interesting!

The plaque on the wall of the museum records the 'Spanish Victory' of the 30th April 1657:
'English Admiral Blake, leading a fleet of 33 ships, attacked the port of Santa Cruz with the aim of seizing the garrison of 16 ships of the New Spain fleet anchored there. The batteries of the fort responded magnificently, and although losses were significant on both sides, the English did not achieve their objective and suffered more than 200 casualties. The Spanish had 5 dead. This victory is represented by one of the lion heads that appears on the coat of arms of Santa Cruz.'

King Pyrrhus of Epirus, who noted after the costly battle of Asculum against Rome in 279 BC, 

"One more such victory and we are lost", 

and I guess 'par exemple' alongside Malplaquet 1709, and Bunker Hill 1775 we can add Santa Cruz 1657.

Immediately below the plaque commemorating Blake's victory in Santa Cruz harbour was reference to the next victory commemorated with a lion on the city coat of arms.

The lower commemoration plaque records the attack on Santa Cruz on the 6th November 1706 by Admiral John Jennings and reads:

'An English squadron of 13 ships, commanded by Admiral Jennings, appeared before Santa Cruz. They launched 37 landing craft, but fire from San Cristóbal Castle and other batteries forced the English to weigh anchor. A second lion's head on the Santa Cruz coat of arms commemorates this victorious defence'.

Now this second reference does indeed warrant a lions head, for indeed Admiral John Jennings did arrive off Santa Cruz on the 6th November 1706 with 12 ships of the line planning to capture the town as a precursor to taking control of the island as part of a disputed claim of sovereignty over them by King Charles II of England and Scotland, the king of the newly created state of Great Britain. 

Admiral John Jennings (1664 -1743) - Godfrey Kneller.

Similarly the British ships were indeed subjected to a heavy gunfire from hidden shore batteries, and  suffered many casualties, and after an initial landing attempt was repulsed by the Spanish artillery of Castle of San Cristóbal, Jennings sent an emissary to the authorities of Santa Cruz who apologized for the attack saying that it was an error.

In addition, the emissary urged the authorities of the island to join the Hapsburg side in the War of Spanish Succession under the menace of taking the city by force, but the mayor José de Ayala y Rojas, head of the defence of Santa Cruz in the absence of Governor Agustín de Robles, was having none of it and robustly refused, confirming the loyalty of the islands to King Philip V, stating that 'If Philip, our king, had lost his all in the Peninsula, these islands would still remain faithful to him.' and following this, the British fleet withdrew.

The pièce de résistance in the list of victories records Nelson's failed attempt to capture the town on the 25th July 1797 and reads:

'On this day, Spanish arms achieved a resounding victory over the landing troops of Rear Admiral Nelson, who were attempting to seize the fortress of Santa Cruz. Nelson lost an arm while trying to disembark, struck by shrapnel from a projectile fired by the Tiger cannon. The powerful English squadron, composed of 8 warships with a total of 393 cannons and 3,700 armed men, faced 1,669 Spaniards and 91 cannons. After fierce fighting, the English capitulated. The British suffered 226 dead and 123 wounded; nine landing craft and the cutter Fox were sunk. Spanish casualties included a lieutenant colonel, a sub-lieutenant, fifteen soldiers, and six civilians. Two French sailors also died alongside the Spanish. Santa Cruz received the title of Loyal, Noble, and Invincible Town, Port, and Plaza of Santa Cruz de Santiago and erected another monument to commemorate the victory.'

Thus we come to the pièce de résistance in the list of victories over the English/British and which would definitely warrant an extra mark in the old GCE 'O' level History paper, with the question, 'Where did Lord Horatio Nelson lose his arm?' Not only that, but I am happy to concede that Santa Cruz is very entitled to carry a lion's head upon its coat of arms for this victory.

The model depicting Nelson's attacks is an interactive display, with the model in darkness most of the time to reflect the night time conditions that preceded each attack, with the areas that are highlighted at specific times being lit up accordingly. Here the spotlight is on Fort San Cristobal at the foot of the mole before the old town of Santa Cruz.

Not surprisingly, the museum holds several very interesting artefacts and models covering this last battle in some detail, and in the gallery in which these commemoration plaques were displayed there is a very large interactive model of Santa Cruz harbour, the defences and the look of the shoreline then compared with today, modelled to show the three attacks initiated by Nelson's squadron on the nights of the 22nd and 24th of July 1797. 

This part of the model shows the remains of the third and final assault by Nelson's force during which attack the admiral received the wound that would lead to the amputation of his right arm from fire from the end of the mole. The cutter Fox can be seen sinking having been holed below the waterline and landing boats are scattered on the water and beaches indicating where some elements of the landing parties succeeded getting ashore.

In May 1797, Admiral Sir John Jervis's fleet of 20 ships-of-the-line, with his flag in the 110-gun Ville de Paris, was conducting a close blockade of Cadiz following the defeat of the Spanish fleet at the Battle of Cape St Vincent on February 14th, that saw the dismissal of Spanish Admiral Cordoba and the appointment of Admiral Josef de Mazarredo, and this defeat coupled with rock-bottom morale among the Spanish fleet ensured it remained tucked up safely in Cadiz harbour.

Admiral Sir John Jervis, 

Earl of St Vincent (1735-1823) - Lemuel Francis Abbott.

Admiral Jervis was an unhappy and angry man, exasperated that nothing he could do could prize the Spanish fleet out of Cadiz, and always a disciplinarian, mostly short-tempered, he was a man to avoid during those long weeks of blockade.

The principle port in Tenerife, Santa Cruz, in 1797 was a valuable stopping off place for Spanish ships en route to or from the West Indies, and treasure ships called there for provisions and water before the final dash for mainland Spain. As early as April 1797, Nelson had put forward a plan to attack Santa Cruz in co-operation with the Army, but the military had declined the invitation. Now Jervis asked Nelson if he could attack with the Navy alone to seize the town and, more especially, the San José, a ship supposedly carrying cargo worth £30,000 that was sheltering in the harbour.

Fort Castillo de Paso Alto is about a mile and a half along the coast to the north-east of Santa Cruz , that defended the extreme left flank of the enemy where precipitous hills plunge into the sea, and from where Nelson planned after its capture to establish heavy guns to bombard the town into submission, rather than attacking the place frontally.

Of course Nelson was never going to refuse such a mission and was soon in possession of Jervis's orders 'for taking taking possession of the Town of Santa Cruz by a sudden vigorous assault.'

A plan illustrating the defences of Santa Cruz in 1797 consisting of four forts and ten battery positions of three or four guns each. Nelson initially rejected a frontal attack but opting for a night approach to land marines and naval personnel to assault and take Castillo de Paso Alto in preparation for landing 18-pounder guns to bombard the town. 

His initial plan was to avoid a frontal assault on the town, likely to be too costly in casualties and with success very much in doubt and thus chose to make a surprise night landing and assault on Castillo de Paso Alto. However from May to September strong offshore winds funnelled down deep ravines blow with considerable force, known to the locals as 'the white sheet' and these winds meant that the the first attempt left the boat crews pulling hard on the sweeps but still a mile from shore at dawn when Nelson's battle ships hove into view, thus losing the surprise element as Spanish sentries gave the alarm. 

Unfortunately for the British, Captain Troubridge leading the assault, called the attack off and returned to the squadron to consult with Nelson as to what to do next and might have been better advised to have pressed on in the likelihood that the British attack may well have suffered  more casualties but still have overcome the defenders before any help could have arrived.

Troubridge would then lead another landing later in the day further along the coast in an attempt to grab high ground behind Paso Alto that would, it was thought, allow the force to bombard the battery position into submission, but this landing was a complete disaster as the ground selected offered no such position when taken and many men succumbed to heatstroke in the climb to it, followed by the morale sapping decision to abandon the position and return to the boats the next night.

Nelson's second attempt to take Santa Cruz and third assault on the 24th July was effectively a frontal assault on the town that had been rejected in the initial planning but was prompted in the belief that the garrison was in a poor state of morale based on the reports from a prisoner taken in the first attacks. Map from Adkin's 'The Trafalgar Companion' in which there is a very good description of the Santa Cruz operation. 

The third and final assault proved to be Nelson's most serious error of judgement, later calling it a 'forlorn hope' was launched on the night of 24th July and was prompted by intelligence received from a German deserter who under interrogation revealed that 'the Spaniards had no force and were in the greatest of alarm, all crying and trembling, and that nothing could be easier than to take the place, with only 300 regular troops, and the rest peasants who are frightened to death.'

With his captains in agreement that a final assault should be launched, and his personal reluctance to sail away empty handed leaving the expedition to end in failure without having properly crossed swords with the enemy, and given his bold aggressive approach to command, it was inconceivable that he wouldn't try again and this time lead the assault personally.  

Frontal attacks against an alerted enemy behind fortifications are very much a last resort tactic and seldom successful without overwhelming fire support and rarely recommended in military manuals, only made more difficult at night when encountering unpleasant surprises is to be expected.

In summary, the force of 1,000 men including an additional force of Royal Marines from the newly arrived Leander 50-guns, saw the two assault groups on the right led by Nelson and Troubridge intended to storm and take Fort San Cristobal were stymied by the firepower brought to bear on the landing points around the mole and nearby beach with the cutter Fox bringing up reserves of food and powder sunk on the approach. 

The left flank assaults by Captain's Miller and Hood were disrupted by the sea conditions for rowing, thus landing in an uncoordinated attack, but still managing to overcome the defenders and to fight their way into town believing that they were supported by Nelson and Troubridge, whose attacks had failed, but with Troubridge and his surviving force later joining up with Miller and Hood in the town.

With threats of setting fire to the town and causing general mayhem and destruction, the British managed to extract very generous surrender terms from General Gutiérrez allowing them to march back to their ships with their colours and arms with the proviso that they and Nelson would never attack Santa Cruz again.

In the gallery depicting this marvellous model that captures the fact that all three assaults by Nelson's men were made initially in the hours of darkness, are two pictures of the respective commanders, one showing Nelson back aboard HMS Theseus to which he arrived about an hour after being hit and insisting on climbing aboard without assistance exclaiming; 'Let me alone, I have yet my legs left and one arm.' and with Midshipman Hoste watching in amazement as his admiral clambered aboard, later writing to his father 'his right arm dangling by his side while with the other he helped himself jump up the ship's side, and with great spirit which astonished everyone, told the surgeon to get his instruments ready'.  

Nelson arrives back on HMS Theseus, an hour after having received his wound to the arm seen dangling and with a tourniquet applied by his 17 year-old stepson Lieutenant Josiah Nisbet whose forethought to apply it, likely saved his life.

The other picture shows the signing of the truce agreement agreed at 7am on the 25th July agreed between Captain Troubridge of the 74-gun Culloden who had assumed command after Nelson's wounding and signed by Captain Hood of the 74-gun Zealous with the Spanish delegation led by the gallant and able 68 year old Lieutenant General Antonio Gutiérrez who commanded the garrison of some 1,700 men that included just 300 regular soldiers, 700 militia, 400 artillerymen, about 100 stranded French sailors, with the balance made up by local volunteers, often spread thinly to cover all possible landing sites.

Captain Hood meets with Lieutenant General Gutiérrez to negotiate and agree the terms of British surrender, July 25th 1797.

Not surprisingly the museum has a further gallery dedicated to the events of 1797 and I was interested to see what treasures it contained.

The entrance to the gallery containing items relating to Nelson's attack on Santa Cruz in 1797 flanked by portraits of Nelson and General Gutiérrez together with manikins of a British naval officer and ensign of the 1st Battalion Canary Islands Regiment as it might have looked in 1797.

The items that caught my attention included a display cabinet with models of Nelson's squadron.

The vessels that composed Nelson's squadron for his attack on Santa Cruz.
3 x 74-gun ships of the line, his flagship HMS Theseus under Capt. Miller, HMS Culloden under Capt. Troubridge and HMS Zealous under Capt. Hood. The third-rate 50-gun HMS Leander under Capt. Thompson which joined the fleet after the first two attempts at landing. The three frigates HMS Seahorse 38-guns under Capt. Fremantle, HMS Emerald 36-guns under Capt. Waller and HMS Terpsichore 32-guns under Capt. Bowen, the small 10-gun cutter Fox under Lt. Gibson, and lastly the mortar vessel Terror (identified as Ray) under Lt. Crompton.

The model of Nelson's flagship, the 74-gun Theseus.

An interesting artefact on display is this British light carronade, probably carried on one of the ships-boats used to ferry the various landing parties and when rediscovered some two-hundred-years later was found to still contain the remnants of the various components used to load this fearsome weapon, acting as it did as the equivalent of a boat mounted machinegun of its time.

 

The display below gives an impression of how the various components were arranged within the barrel with the white powder charge bag at left rammed home with stones, lumps of wood, small pieces of metal, peach stones, iron nails and topped off with a sturdy wooden plug.

The carronade display shows the charge and ammunition as it would have been rammed home.

Incredibly after the ravages of time, much of the load was still discernible when recovered from the barrel.

The third and final frontal assault was against a hornets' nest of a Spanish defence stirred up by the previous attempts and so surprise was difficult to say the least, but Nelson did attempt to deceive the Spanish as to his next moves by deploying the Terror 'bomb' vessel and his squadron off Paso Alto to bombard the place in the hope that Gutiérrez might be fooled into thinking the British would try another landing there.

A mortar shell from HMS Terror.

The bomb shell seen above was fired by the Terror and failed to explode, whilst the shattered remains of another bomb below were discovered in the chapel of the Paso Alto fort after it had also failed to explode.

British assault groups were arranged in companies or divisions each under a lieutenant, with a master's mate or midshipman as second in command and with each having a strong compliment of warrant and petty officers, including a master-at-arms, carpenter and armourer with their tools, with the job of the three frigates to carry the landing parties, towing their boats (the 1797 equivalent of assault craft) behind them.

A captured Colour from the division of HMS Emerald 36-gun frigate.

These divisions would most likely have carried a colour to act as a rallying point and command group identifier and one such colour, seen above, was captured during the assault on the 24th/25th July, here bearing the name of Emerald, the 36-gun frigate under Captain Waller.

Another British colour captured in the 24th/25th July assault.

The attack plan on the 24th July had an assault force of six divisions led by Nelson and followed by the other five commanded by Troubridge, Miller, Waller, Hood and Thompson, with each divisions boats roped together in preparation for a two mile row towards the mole under the cover of darkness.

Close behind them in support would be the 10-gun cutter Fox, under Lieutenant Gibson, with a reserve of 200 men.

As the battle ashore erupted, and Nelson, now wounded, and with his barge heading back to the squadron in search of a surgeon, the cutter Fox was hit, it is thought, by a 24-pdr shot that went clean through her at the waterline, causing her to sink within minutes of the strike, and forcing the crew and the 200 men of the reserve into the water, where a number drowned including Lieutenant Gibson.

Nelson, despite the pain and the shock of his wound, insisted his boat diverted to pick up several of the struggling men.

It was on the left flank of the British assault that the most progress was achieved with the divisions of Captain's Miller and Hood coming ashore in and around the mouths of the Barranquillo (Stream) del Aciete and the Barranco (River) de Santos that runs through Santa Cruz (see the various maps above).

A reconstruction of an ensign of the Canaries Infantry Regiment

Several landing boats approaching the shore at the Barranco de Santos were given a hot reception by 200 men of the Canaries Infantry Regiment supported by 120 militiamen, with some 300 muskets blazing away at close range as fast as the firers could reload which proved too much, causing the boats to turn back and at least 200 men never landing.

The battalion colour of the Canaries Infantry Regiment, c1795. Interestingly, as well as participating in the Battle of Santa Cruz against the British in 1797, the regiment would fight alongside them against Marshal Soult's French army at Albuera in 1811.

Captain Miller soon realised that the plan to assist in the assault on the citadel of San Cristobal would be a hopeless undertaking, with the seamen having had their powder rendered useless in the soaking they had recieved in the heavy surf 30-yards from shore, and the loss of many muskets together with all their assault ladders, even though some of the marines were willing to make the effort.

The remnants of the British divisions coalesced around the Church of the Concepción and then fought their way into town.

Joined by Captain's Hood and later Troubridge with the remains of their divisions, they first coalesced into a defence of the Church of the Concepción before moving further into the town and occupying the Convento de Santo Domingo with a force of about 400 men which provided an excellent defensive position and they now able to use ammunition and powder taken from Spanish positions overrun earlier.

Nevertheless, the position of the British in the town was hopeless, cut off as they were, with dwindling supplies of ammunition and completely surrounded, and with the only option left to bluff, coupled with the threat to burn the town.

The British had been decisively defeated and Troubridge knew it, sending Captain Hood to negotiate an honourable withdrawal, and by 7.00 a.m. on the 25th July he had signed a truce which Troubridge accepted.

 

The truce was signed in the Palacio de Carta in Plaza de la Candelaria and the museum is now home to General Gutiérrez's table on which it was signed.

The terms allowed the British to leave with full military honours and thus they marched down from the convent to the town square where an impressive parade of Spanish troops and French seamen were drawn up, whilst Gutiérrez arranged for two Spanish vessels to assist in taking the British back to their ships but only after they had been given bread and wine. 

British marines and naval landing parties parade past a Franco-Spanish guard of honour and the Palacio de Carta, the large building with the domed tower on the left, in the Plaza de la Candelaria as they prepare to board their ships.

The officers refused a full breakfast and were given cake and lemonade instead, whilst arrangements were made for the British wounded to be cared for in the local hospital.

Santa Cruz was a serious setback and blow to British morale, costing the lives of 146 all ranks (killed, drowned or missing) and 105 wounded, and with the Fox sunk, and a considerable number of ships boats destroyed, the number of killed and wounded represented a 25% casualty rate, well in excess of the British fleet at Trafalgar.

While the British had been receiving a thorough beating ashore, Nelson was demonstrating remarkable stoicism aboard his barge, having picked up survivors from the Fox, and finally coming alongside the Seahorse, which he refused to board for fear his arrival would alarm the Captain's wife, Betsy Fremantle.

It was about an hour after being hit that he finally arrived aboard the Theseus with surgeon Thomas Eshelby recording in his log about Nelson's injury:

'Compound fracture of the right arm by a musket ball passing through a little above the elbow, an artery divided: The arm was immediately amputated and opium afterwards given.'

 

It seems that Royal Naval surgeons charged a fee for treating officers, certainly senior ones, as Nelson submitted a list of expenses incurred due to his wound to the Court of Examiners of the Company of Surgeons with reference to the Assistant Surgeon receiving 24 guineas for 'assisting in amputating my arm and for attendance from 14th August following during which he sat up 14 nights'. The second item read: 'Paid Thomas Eshelby for amputating my arm, quitting the Theseus to attend me to England in the Seahorse frigate from 25 July to 3rd September . . . £36.' 

Before he was struck down at Trafalgar, Nelson had been wounded five times,
more than any other in the Royal Navy during the French Revolutionary and
Napoleonic Wars.

Nelson seated on a chest had submitted to having his arm cut off above the elbow with a saw, without anaesthetic, and instead of complaining of the awful agony of amputation, he was more concerned that the surgeon's instruments felt cold, a fact important enough to him that forever afterwards he would insist his surgeons warmed their instruments before use.

Before he was struck down at Trafalgar, Nelson had been wounded five times, more than any other in the Royal Navy during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.

• April 1794 - ‘a sharp cut in the back’ at the siege of Bastia. A light wound with no after effects.
• 12th July 1794 - a badly cut right eye at the siege of Calvi, resulting in the loss of sight in the right eye.
• 14th February 1797 - struck in the abdomen by a flying splinter from a block at the Battle of Cape St Vincent, suffering severe bruising and possible abdominal trauma which left him with a weakness and causing problems for the rest of his life.
• 24th July 1797 - while leading the landing party during the attack on Santa Cruz, Tenerife, causing the loss of his right arm, and taking months to heal properly.
• 1st August 1798 - at the Battle of the Nile he was struck in the forehead by a piece of flying metal, resulting in nausea and awful headaches for some months afterwards but no lasting damage.

Within half an hour of losing his arm he was issuing orders and signing a copy of the surrender ultimatum to be sent ashore, though it was never sent as the extent of the defeat ashore became clear.

This portrait of Lieutenant General Gutiérrez seen in the museum is circa 1798 and is a more likely representation of the old warrior than the younger looking portrait more often seen in accounts. The 68-year old asthmatic Gutiérrez had fought the British many times and died just two years after Santa Cruz.

Nelson typically accepted full responsibility for the defeat and dictated a letter of thanks to his Spanish opponent for his chivalrous conduct as the victor, with his letter offering;

'my sincerest thanks for your attention to Myself and your humanity to those of our wounded who were in your possession or under your care as well as your generosity to all that were landed.'

With the letter, signed with a hesitant left-handed signature went English beer and cheese. Gutiérrez responded in kind with another letter and Malmsey wine, where upon Nelson offered to carry dispatches to Cadiz for him. The courtesies of a bygone age.

One of the other interesting items in the Santa Crus Military Museum, the mighty Hercules cannon, an extra long culverin – a ‘Royal or Double culverin’ – was cast by the Flemish master gunmaker Remy de Halut* at his foundry in Mechelen, in 1547 with its 13½ foot barrel capable of hurling a 6-inch cannonball up to 1,476 feet was designed for battering fortresses into submission.

In the second part to this post I will conclude my look at some other interesting items in the Military Museum and take a look at what can still be seen of the old historic town of Santa Cruz, much changed over the intervening centuries but with a few places allowing a reimagining of past events.

As always more anon.

JJ