Spain
Peninsular War (1807-1814)Â II
Second of May 1808: the defenders of MonteleĂłn make their last stand. Penned up inside Portugal, the British, meanwhile, could do nothing to arrest the march of French conquest, and much the same was true of the Spanish guerrillas, who at the same time were coming under more and more pressure. In the end, indeed, it is clear that Napoleon’s…
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Second Siege of Tenochtitlán, (April 28–August 13, 1521)
Hernán CortĂ©s returned to Tenochtitlán with an enlarged force of conquistadores and much more important, large numbers of allied Mesoamerican warriors who came to complete what the Spanish had started but could not finish on their own. CortĂ©s first systematically dismantled the supports of the Aztec Empire, forging alliances with…
Pedro de Valdivia
(c. 1500-1553) Spanish conquistador Pedro de Valdivia, a Spanish conquistador, is best known as the conqueror of Chile. He was born about 1500 at La Serena, Estremadura, Spain. He joined the Spanish army at a time of near constant warfare in Europe. As a soldier in the army of Charles…
Peninsular War (1807–1809)
The Spanish Army’s triumph at BailĂ©n was the French Empire’s first defeat. Painting by JosĂ© Casado del Alisal. The Spanish Division of the North sent to fight the British in Denmark pledging to turn against France and side with the British. A bloodbath that might have cost the lives of…
Bernardo de Gálvez
Bernardo de Gálvez (1746-1786), a Spanish colonial administrator, was captain general of Louisiana during the American Revolutionary War. His heroic exploits against the British during the war won him fame both in Spain and in America. Bernardo de Gálvez was born in Macharaviaya in the province of Malaga on July…
(First) Castilian Civil War
Battle of Nájera, from a fifteenth-century manuscript, the English and Pedro are on the left. (1362-1369) The naval Battle of La Rochelle took place on 22 and 23 June 1372 between a Castilian fleet commanded by Ambrosio Boccanegra and an English convoy commanded by John Hastings, 2nd Earl of Pembroke.…
Iberian cavalry
Iberian cavalryman, 2nd C. BC. Iberian cavalry were certainly trained and equipped to fight en masse (Polybios 3.65.6) The ancient writer Strabo described Hispanics wearing helmets with three crests, and there are also references to iron helmet-masks rather in the manner of those worn by the Romans for their cavalry…