Siege of Almeida | |||||||
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Part of the Spanish invasion of Portugal | |||||||
The layout of the Fortress of Almeida | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
Spain | Portugal | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Pedro de Bolea | Unknown | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
Unknown | Unknown | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
Unknown | Unknown |
The siege of Almeida took place in August 1762 when a Spanish force besieged and captured the city of Almeida from its Portuguese defenders during the Seven Years' War. The city was taken on 25 August as part of the invasion of Portugal by a Spanish army commanded by the Count of Aranda. [1]
The force that captured Almeida was part of a major Franco-Spanish offensive to overrun Portugal. A northern pincer invaded Portugal from Galicia crossing the Douro and threatening Porto while the southern force crossed the border from Ciudad Rodrigo and proceeded towards the major Portuguese fortification of Almeida. It was captured after a nine-day siege, [2] but a further Spanish advance was stalled by the arrival of 8,000 British troops - and their disruption of Spanish supplies at the Battle of Valencia de Alcántara.
Almeida was garrisoned by Aranda, but it remained the only major fortress in Spanish hands by the close of the war. It was returned to the Portuguese following the Treaty of Paris in exchange for the return of Havana and Manila to Spain by the British. [3]
Several engagements near the port of Cádiz in Spain are known as the Battle of Cádiz:
French involvement in the American Revolutionary War of 1775–1783 began in 1776 when the Kingdom of France secretly shipped supplies to the Continental Army of the Thirteen Colonies when it was established in June 1775. France was a long-term historical rival with the Kingdom of Great Britain, from which the Colonies were attempting to separate.
The Anglo-Spanish War was a military conflict fought between Britain and Spain as part of the Seven Years' War. It lasted from January 1762 until February 1763, when the Treaty of Paris brought it to an end.
Spain, through its alliance with France and as part of its conflict with Britain, played a role in the independence of the United States. Spain declared war on Britain as an ally of France, itself an ally of the American colonies. Most notably, Spanish forces attacked British positions in the south and captured West Florida from Britain in the siege of Pensacola. This secured the southern route for supplies and closed off the possibility of any British offensive through the western frontier of the United States via the Mississippi River. Spain also provided money, supplies, and munitions to the American forces.
In the siege of Almeida, Portugal, the French corps of Marshal Michel Ney captured the border fortress from Brigadier General William Cox's Portuguese garrison. This action was fought in the summer of 1810 during the Peninsular War portion of the Napoleonic Wars. Almeida is located in eastern Portugal, near the border with Spain.
In the Blockade of Almeida a French garrison under Antoine François Brenier de Montmorand was surrounded by approximately 13,000 Anglo-Allied soldiers led by Generals Sir Alexander Campbell, 1st Baronet and Sir William Erskine, 2nd Baronet.
The Spanish invasion of Portugal (1762) between 5 May and 24 November, was a military episode in the wider Fantastic War in which Spain and France were defeated by the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance with broad popular resistance. It involved at first the forces of Spain and Portugal until France and Great Britain intervened in the conflict on the side of their respective allies. The war was also strongly marked by guerrilla warfare in the mountainous country, which cut off supplies from Spain, and a hostile peasantry, which enforced a scorched earth policy as the invading armies approached that left the invaders starving and short of military supplies and forced them to retreat with heavy losses, mostly from starvation, disease, and desertion.
The First Cevallos expedition was a series of Spanish military operations in South America during the Fantastic War. Under the command of the governor of Buenos Aires, Pedro Antonio de Cevallos, the expedition captured the Portuguese settlement of Colónia do Sacramento and fought off a joint Anglo-Portuguese attempt to recapture it. All military activities in the region concluded with the 1763 Treaty of Paris.
The Spanish–Portuguese War between 1762 and 1763 was fought as part of the Seven Years' War. Because no major battles were fought, even though there were numerous movements of troops and heavy losses among the Spanish invaders, the war is known in the Portuguese historiography as the Fantastic War.
The Seven Years' War (1756–1763) was a global conflict involving most of the European great powers, fought primarily in Europe and the Americas. One of the opposing alliances was led by Great Britain and Prussia. The other alliance was led by France, backed by Spain, Saxony, Sweden, and Russia. Related conflicts include the 1754 to 1763 French and Indian War, and 1762 to 1763 Anglo-Spanish War.
Great Britain was one of the major participants in the Seven Years' War, which in fact lasted nine years, between 1754 and 1763. British involvement in the conflict began in 1754 in what became known as the French and Indian War. However the warfare in the European theatre involving countries other than Britain and France commenced in 1756. Britain emerged from the war as the world's leading colonial power, having gained all of New France in North America, ending France's role as a colonial power there. Following Spain's entry in the war in alliance with France in the third Family Compact, Britain captured the major Spanish ports of Havana, Cuba and Manila, in the Philippines in 1762, and agreed to return them in exchange for Spanish Florida. The Treaty of Paris in 1763 formally ended the conflict and Britain established itself as the world's pre-eminent naval power.
The Capture of Minorca saw the island of Menorca captured from Spain by British and Dutch forces acting on behalf of Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor the Austrian claimant to the Spanish throne in September 1708 during the War of the Spanish Succession. The British would later annex the island as their own possession at the Treaty of Utrecht (1713).
The Capture of Belle Île was a British amphibious expedition to capture the French island of Belle Île off the Brittany coast in 1761, during the Seven Years' War. After an initial British attack was repulsed, a second attempt under General Studholme Hodgson forced a beachhead. A second landing was made, and after a six-week siege the island's main citadel at Le Palais was stormed, consolidating British control of the island. A French relief effort from the nearby mainland was unable to succeed because of British control of the sea. The British occupied the island for two years before returning it in 1763 following the Treaty of Paris.
The invasion of Algiers was a massive and disastrous amphibious attempt in July 1775 by a combined Spanish and Tuscan force to capture the city of Algiers, the capital of The Deylik of Algeria. The amphibious assault was led by Spanish general Alexander O'Reilly and Tuscan admiral Sir John Acton, commanding a total of 20,000 men along with 74 warships of various sizes and 230 transport ships carrying the troops for the invasion. The defending Algerian forces were led by Baba Mohammed ben-Osman. The assault was ordered by the King of Spain, Charles III, who was attempting to demonstrate to the Barbary States the power of the revitalized Spanish military after the disastrous Spanish experience in the Seven Years' War. The assault was also meant to demonstrate that Spain would defend its North African exclaves against any Ottoman or Moroccan encroachment, and reduce the influence that the Barbary states held in the Mediterranean.
The Battle of Valencia de Alcántara took place in August 1762 when an Anglo Portuguese force led by John Burgoyne surprised and captured the town of Valencia de Alcántara from its Spanish defenders during the Seven Years' War. The town was taken on 27 August as part of the defence against the Spanish invasion of Portugal.
The Battle of Vila Velha or Battle of Vila Velha de Ródão took place in October 1762 when a British-Portuguese force led by John Burgoyne and Charles Lee surprised and recaptured the town of Vila Velha de Ródão from Spanish invaders during the Seven Years' War as part of the Spanish invasion of Portugal. Burgoyne, who took the Spanish base at Valencia de Alcántara two months earlier then marched against forces preparing to cross the River Tagus into Alentejo.
The Battle for Río San Juan de Nicaragua was one of several battles that took place during the Anglo-Spanish War, a subconflict of the Seven Years' War, which lasted from December 1761 until February 1763. The conflict, which took place in July–August 1762, began when William Lyttelton, the British governor and commander-in-chief of Jamaica, sent a naval expedition to Nicaragua with the primary objective of capturing the town of Granada.
The Castle/Fortress of Almeida is a castle situated in the civil parish of Almeida, in the municipality of Almeida in the Portuguese district of Guarda, in the former-northwestern province of Beira Alta. It was constructed in this region due to its significant strategic importance, due to its close proximity to the border between Portugal and Spain. It is classified as a National Monument. The 1810 explosion: the magazine which was the seat of the explosion was in the cathedral adjacent to the castle, not the castle itself as reported in the text.
The Battle of Marvão was a military action that took place during the Fantastic War and the Anglo-Spanish War and was part of the attempted Spanish and French invasion of Portugal in late 1762. A sizeable Spanish force attacked the castle town of Marvão but was repelled and defeated by an Anglo-Portuguese force under the command of Captain Thomas Browne.
The Kingdom of Spain entered a new era with the death of Charles II, the last Spanish Habsburg monarch, who died childless in 1700. The War of the Spanish Succession was fought between proponents of a Bourbon prince, Philip of Anjou, and the Austrian Habsburg claimant, Archduke Charles. After the wars were ended with the Peace of Utrecht, Philip V's rule began in 1715, although he had to renounce his place in the succession of the French throne.
40°43′34″N6°54′22″W / 40.7260°N 6.9061°W