On This Day ... in 1855 & Others

At Sevastopol, 19 year old Private Strong of the Coldstream Guards, won the Victoria Cross by picking up a live Russian shell which had fallen into a British trench, and throwing it safely away before it exploded.

On This Day ... 1591 & Others

At Flores, in the Azores Sir Richard Grenville lay,
And a pinnace, like a flutter’d bird, came flying from far away;
“Spanish ships of war at sea! we have sighted fifty-three!”
Then sware Lord Thomas Howard: “’Fore God I am no coward;
But I cannot meet them here, for my ships are out of gear,
And the half my men are sick. I must fly, but follow quick.
We are six ships of the line; can we fight with fifty-three?”

Revenge, commanded by Sir Richard Grenville, conducted her epic fight against the Spanish at the Azores. An English squadron was watering at Flores, hoping to ambush the Spanish silver convoy from the Americas, when a large Spanish fleet under Don Alonzo de Bazan was sighted. The rest of the squadron escaped, but Revenge, which had been Sir Francis Drake's flagship against the Armada in 1588, found herself facing 53 Spanish ships on her own. In an action that lasted fifteen hours, Revenge sank 4 Spanish ships and repelled boarders at least five, perhaps as many as 15, times. Finally, with Sir Richard Grenville grievously wounded and most of her crew dead, she was forced to surrender. Grenville received the best medical attention Bazan could offer, but died two days later.

The incident is commemorated in Alfred Lord Tennyson's ballad of The Revenge

Where Granville, boast of freedom, fell,
Your manly hearts shall glow.

The Spanish did not long enjoy possession of Revenge. Badly damaged, she was wrecked in a violent storm a fortnight later. Grenville's cousin, Sir Walter Ralegh, regarded him as a hero who chose to fight rather than abandon a foraging party ashore. Most other contemporaries were less charitable, deploring his failure to escape with the rest of Lord Howard's squadron and losing perhaps the best ship in Queen Elizabeth's Navy Royal.

By way of a footnote, it is worth pointing out that the spelling of Sir Richard's name has led to much controversy. Four different families, each of which claim to be descended from him, spell it Granville, Grenville, Grenfell and Greenfield. The spelling usually accepted is Grenville, but his own signature, in a bold clear handwriting, among the Tanner manuscripts in the Bodleian library at Oxford, is Greynvile.

On This Day ... in 1854 & Others

A Franco-British naval squadron arrived off Petropavlovsk, Russia's chief naval base in the Far East, during the Crimean War. However, as the squadron prepared to commence bombardment, its commander, Rear Admiral David Price, committed suicide. Why he shot himself will never be known. The bombardment eventually commenced the following day, and on 4 September, the British and French ships landed marines and sailors. Unfortunately, the landing party walked into an ambush, suffering heavy casualties, and the operation was abandoned.

On This Day ... in 1350 & Others

The English fleet under Edward III and the Black Prince defeated Spanish ships in the Channel off Winchelsea
(also known as Battle of Les Espagnols sur Mer), some forty to fifty English ships surprising 47 large Castilian vessels returning home from Flanders where they had been raiding English shipping.

This may have been the first naval battle in which cannons were used, albeit very early types of bombard. The navigational dangers of combat in open waters in the ships of the period were marked - King Edward's ship, the Cog Thomas, collided with its target and suffered fatal damage, but the crew managed to board and overwhelm the Castilian, returning safely in their prize.

The Black Prince's ship, also reduced to a sinking condition by collision with its target, was rescued by the Earl of Derby's vessel. Although most of the Castilian ships were captured and their crews killed, English casualties were also high, and sufficient other French and Castilian ships remained operational in the Channel to pose significant risks to English commerce.

On This Day ... in 1640 & Others

A small English force under Lord Conway attempted to stop the invading Scottish army under the Earl of Leven, Alexander Leslie

at Newburn upon Tyne, a few miles from Newcastle, during the Second Bishops' War. The two sides exchanged artillery fire across the Tyne, but the English militia broke when Scottish cavalry started to ford the river, and retreated to Durham. Newcastle fell to the Scots a few days later.

On This Day ... in 1648 & Others

Colchester, which had been held by Royalists led by the Earl of Norwich, finally surrendered to Sir Thomas Fairfax's New Model Army. The Parliamentarians showed no mercy to the defending officers: two of the King's most distinguished commanders, Sir Charles Lucas and Sir George Lisle, were summarily executed.

On This Day ... in 1346 & Others

The English army of Edward III won its first great victory of the Hundred Years War at Crecy. Philip VI had led his French army out of Abbeville that morning to try to cut off Edward from the route back to the coast. The French army marched in some disorder, with the cavalry ahead of Genoese mercenaries and French militia infantry, and in the late morning found the English army waiting for them between the villages of Crecy and Wadicourt. Most of Philip's advisers advocated caution, with due regard to the tiredness of the troops after several hours marching and the straggling bulk of the forces. However, Philip feared that his already damaged reputation could not risk another stalemate, and he opted to attack.

The Genoese probably represented the majority of the infantry which had managed to keep up with the cavalry, and they were placed to lead the attack. Most of the French cavalry formed up behind them. Edward's troops had dismounted, and formed up with the men-at-arms in the centre, flanked by longbowmen, many of them Welsh. Pits had been dug in front of the position, and baggage carts used to protect the flanks from the cavalry. Edward had also brought some early cannon with him, probably the first time that either the English or French had tried using them on the battlefield rather than in sieges.

The Genoese crossbowmen advanced in the late afternoon, just as it began to rain, but suffered heavy casualties from the faster-firing longbowmen, and were forced to retreat. The French cavalry, not appreciating the power of the longbow, took the withdrawal as a sign of cowardice rather than prudence, and led by the Count of Alencon, charged through them. The English arrows brought down many horses, and the noise of the cannon fire, while probably relatively ineffective as a weapon, panicked others. The disordered survivors reached the English lines, however, and bitter hand-to-hand fighting ensued, during which King Edward's 16 year old son Edward, the Black Prince, famously won his spurs. The Prince's standard briefly fell, but was rescued by Sir Thomas Daniel.

Philip's ally, the blind King John of Bohemia, ordered his men to lead his horse into a desperate attack, but was killed. With the French in full flight, Edward had the English horses brought forward, and his men mounted up to conduct a vigorous pursuit. The victory was capped the following morning when a detachment of 2,000 French troops arrived on the battlefield unaware of the disaster the previous day, and were massacred by the English cavalry. Philip had escaped with a handful of men, having been wounded in the face by an arrow.

The victory allowed Edward III to besiege Calais - it fell a year later. Philip, in a fit of anger, murdered most of the Genoese who had managed to survive.

On This Day ... in 1914 & Others

Royal Marines were landed at Ostend to help the Belgian defenders.

Meanwhile, Lieutenant Harvey-Kelly of the Royal Flying Corps gained the first ever British victory in air-to-air combat despite flying an unarmed BE2 aircraft, managing to force a German Taube 2 to land purely by his aggressive flying.

According to 19 Squadron's history, in 1917 during an offensive patrol comprising three Spads being flown by Major Harvey-Kelly (by then having been awarded the DSO), Lieutenants Hamilton and Applin were engaged eleven Albatros's led by Baron Von Richthofen. Major Harvey-Kelly and Lieutenant Applin were killed in action, Major Harvey-Kelly being shot down by Lt Kurt Wolff of Jasta 11. Lieutenant Hamilton was shot down & taken as a POW.

On the ground, Lance-Corporal Wyatt, Coldstream Guards, won the Victoria Cross by fighting a blaze in a farm building which threatened to drive British defenders out of their position, all the time under German fire. He then ignored a serious head wound to remain in the front line.

On This Day ... in 1217 & Others

Hubert de Burgh, commander of Dover Castle, led a squadron of 36 English ships against 80 French vessels under Eustace the Monk. The French had sailed from Calais, and are likely to have been headed for London, which was held by English rebels. De Burgh led his ships around the stern of the French squadron, and Eustace at first thought he was trying to raid Calais. However, de Burgh was in fact seeking the advantage of a windward position, and was able to start picking off the French ships from astern, starting with Eustace's own ship, which was heavily laden with a siege engine and straggling.

Eustace, a very successful pirate based on Sark who had fought for both sides in the previous decade. However as the battle ended with the English being victorious, several French nobles were ransomed, but Eustace was beheaded on the spot.

De Burgh was appointed Lord High Admiral in recognition of his leadership, which effectively ended French attempts to exploit the civil war to conquer England, and won the regent William Marshal time to secure the kingdom for the young Henry III.

On This Day ... in 1338 & Others

English efforts to supply their beleagured duchy of Gascony received a setback when French and Castilian ships ambushed a food convoy off Talmont at the mouth of the Gironde; two of the largest ships were lost with their vital cargo.

On This Day ... in 1139 & Others

Battle of the Standard was fought on Cowton Moor, near Northallerton.

It was the first major engagement between English and Scots since the Norman Conquest. It was one of just two major battles during the Civil War of Stephen and Matilda. In most cases in the 12th century the weaker side would avoid pitched battle and concentrate on small scale action and the control of territory through garrisons and their reduction by siege. But at Northallerton, for reasons that are not clear, King David forced a battle and the English met that challenge.

After perhaps no more than two hours of fighting, the Scots began to flee, leaving many of their number dead on the field. But the victorious English were unwilling or unable to follow up with an effective pursuit and execution of the broken enemy forces. If they had, then the destruction of the Scottish army would surely have been far more complete.

On This Day ... in 1740 & Others

Admiral Edward Vernon, known as "Old Grogram" after the material from which his cloak was made, ordered sailors' rum ration to be served mixed with water. The mixture was quickly named grog.

On This Day ... in 1336 & Others

The long-simmering rivalry between Philip VI of France and Edward III finally boiled over with the French King's declaration of his intent to invade England to aid his Scots allies, effectively marking the start of the Hundred Years War.

On This Day ... in 1415 & Others

Henry V laid siege to Harfleur after landing in France. The town fell six weeks later. (The siege provides the backdrop for one of Shakespeare's best-known speeches, beginning "Once more unto the breach, dear friends...”)

On This Day ... in 1759 & Others

Following the naval battle the previous day, de la Clue's French fleet headed for Lagos Bay hoping that Portuguese neutrality would save them. De la Clue's flagship Ocean and the Redoutable deliberately ran themselves aground, whilst two other ships anchored in the shelter of a Portuguese gun battery, but Boscawen ignored diplomatic niceties and pursued them inshore, capturing the two at anchor and burning the two aground. The remaining French ships, which had scattered in the night, fled to Cadiz.

On This Day... in 1424 & Others

During the Hundred Years War, an English force defeated a Franco-Scots army at Verneuil, killing the Scottish commander, the Earl of Douglas.

On This Day ... in 1652 & Others

Sir George Ayscue, with 40 warships, attacked a Dutch convoy escorted by de Ruyter with 39 warships off the Brittany coast. The only ship lost was an English fireship, but heavy damage was suffered on both sides: the Dutch Eendracht and English Bonaventure were in a particularly battered state, and Ayscue's flagship had over 60 cannon shot embedded in her hull.

On This Day ... in 1416 & Others

Sir Walter Hungerford and the Duke of Bedford fought a French and Genoese fleet off Harfleur, saving the English garrison there.

On This Day ... in 1352 & Others

In one of the more important battles of the Hundred Years War, Sir Walter Bentley defeated the French under Guy de Nesle at Mauron in Brittany. The French cavalry broke the English archers on the right wing, but failed to follow up, whilst attacks on the centre and left wing failed. The English counter-attacked, and the French retreat turned into a rout, with de Nesle being killed. The battle preserved England's control of Brittany.