save them from capture. The Spanish flagship San Felipe, a ship of 1500 tons' burden, blew up and, by her explosion, destroyed two or three craft that lay near her. So rapidly did the flames make progress that the Spaniards, having fired their vessels, often had no time to take to their boats, and, throwing themselves into the water, would have perished, had they not been taken up by the English. Numbers, however, were drowned.
Two ships only of any importance were taken, the San Mateo and the San Andres, galleons of 1200 tons. These were saved by the exertions of the Lord High Admiral and Sir Thomas Gerard,[1] and for several years afterwards they figured in the English navy as the St. Matthew and the St. Andrew. All the rest, except those which escaped by way of the canal, were sunk, burnt, or driven ashore.
While these events were in progress, the Dutch contingent gallantly attacked and carried Puntal, and Essex soon afterwards landed[2] eight hundred men a league from the city, with a view to storming it on the land side. But first Sir Conyers Clifford, Sir Christopher Blount, and Sir Thomas Gerard were dispatched with a party to Suaco to destroy the entrance to the canal by which the fugitive ships had escaped, and to cut the bridge in order to prevent the arrival of succours from the mainland.
When these measures of precaution had been carried out, Essex advanced upon Cadiz. The town was fortified on the south by means of a wall running across the island, and from this wall the enemy kept up a troublesome fire upon the English. But it is probable that the wall was enfiladed by the guns of the English ships in the port, and that it could not have been held easily. A body of about five hundred Spaniards outside the wall retired precipitately, and was so closely followed up that the attackers almost succeeded in entering with it. Sir Francis Vere, at the head of a small body, was one of the first to reach the gate; and while he was forcing it, another party, led by some young military officers, scaled the wall. In a few moments the English were in the narrow streets. From the flat roofs of the houses the inhabitants aided those of their friends who still struggled below, by flinging
- ↑ Created Baron Gerard in 1603. He was at the time a colonel of the land forces. He died in 1618. It may be of interest to add that he returned home in the St. Matthew.
- ↑ The landing-place, according to Monson, was commanded by Puntal Fort, but the garrison promptly abandoned that work. Monson also declares that Essex landed without Howard's privity.
