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NAVAL AND MILITARY ANNALS:--

GIBRALTAR AS IT WAS AND IS:--

GIBRALTAR FROM THE NORTH-WEST, FRONTISPIECE

ROCK OF GIBRALTAR FROM THE NEUTRAL GROUND, 12

VIEW FROM THE SIGNAL-STATION, 30

THE LANDING-PLACE, AND REMAINS OF MOORISH CASTLE, 32

EUROPA POINT, 38

MAP OF GIBRALTAR AT THE TIME OF THE GREAT SIEGE, 72

LARBOARD AND STARBOARD SIDES OF A SPANISH BATTERING-SHIP, 80

THE GRAND ATTACK UPON GIBRALTAR, SEPTEMBER 13, 1782, 86

THE KING'S BASTION, AND OLD MOORISH CASTLE, 96

THE ROCK AND BAY OF GIBRALTAR , 116

THE SIGNAL-STATION, 118

THE MARKET-PLACE, 120

THE ALAMEDA, 122

A MOTLEY GROUP IN THE MAIN STREET, 126

O'HARA'S TOWER ON THE SUGAR-LOAF, 130

CATALAN BAY FROM THE MEDITERRANEAN BATTERY, 132

MARTIN'S CAVE, 136

ST. GEORGE'S HALL, 140

THE ROCK OF GIBRALTAR.

Naval and Military Annals.

SIEGE OF GIBRALTAR IN 1704.

The year 1704 was the year of Blenheim, that wonderful victory of Marlborough's which dissipated Lewis the Fourteenth's dreams of universal empire. As stars are extinguished in the light of dawn, so in the lustre of this great triumph England's minor successes by sea and land were forgotten. And to this day, while most men remember when Blenheim was won, few are mindful of the year in which Gibraltar was taken. Yet it may well be doubted whether the latter, though the less famous, was not, so far as British interests are concerned, the more important success. It is difficult, perhaps, to determine any direct advantage which England gained by the battle of Blenheim; but by the possession of Gibraltar she secured the command of the Mediterranean and of the highway to India.

Gibraltar was captured in the same year in which the battle of Blenheim was won.

The expedition landed at Barcelona, but found the people indisposed to welcome or support it. It was, therefore, re-embarked; and Rooke, sailing down the Mediterranean, passed through the Strait, and effected a junction with the fleet under Sir Cloudesley Shovel. The two admirals were unwilling that so powerful a force should return to England without accomplishing something; and a council of war was held on the 17th of July, at which several schemes were proposed and discussed--among others, an attack upon Cadiz. This, however, was deemed imprudent with so small a body of troops; and at length it was decided to strike a swift and vigorous blow at Gibraltar. The strength of the fortress was well known; but it was equally well known that the garrison was weak, and that the Spaniards relied too confidently on the assistance supplied by Nature.

A heavy cannonade was now hurled against the fortifications. In five or six hours no fewer than fifteen thousand shot were expended; and the enemy, though they showed the most admirable intrepidity, were driven from their guns. Captain Whitaker, with the armed boats, was then ordered to carry the Mole head; a position from which the town would be at the mercy of the attacking force. The landing was effected with the utmost alacrity; but Captain Hicks and Jumper, who lay next the mole, got ahead with their pinnaces, and dashed headlong

against the works. The Spaniards had prepared for the assault, and before abandoning their post sprung a mine, which blew up the fortifications, killed two lieutenants and forty men, and wounded sixty. The survivors, however, would not surrender the ground so hardly gained; and Captain Whitaker coming up, they warily pushed forward, and carried a small redoubt half-way between the Mole and the town. A second summons being addressed to the governor, the Marquis de Salines, the garrison capitulated; and thus, on the 24th, this famous fortress fell into the hands of the assailants.

Having appointed the Prince of Darmstadt governor, and left as many men to garrison the Rock as could be spared from the fleet, Sir George Rooke sailed for Tetuan to take in wood and water. He then went in search of a French fleet which had been equipped at Toulon, and was under the orders of the High-Admiral of France, the Comte de Thoulouse, who had been joined by some Spanish vessels. Rooke came up with the enemy off Malaga on the 13th of August. The superiority of force lay with the French, who counted fifty line-of-battle ships, carrying 3543 guns and 24,155 men; eight frigates, mounting 149 guns, with 1025 men; nine fire-ships; and a couple of transports. Sir George Rooke had under his command forty-one English and twelve Dutch sail of the line, carrying 3700 guns and 23,200 men, with six frigates, and seven fire-ships. The French vessels, however, were better built than the English, and better armed. They included three ships of 104 guns, and four of 92 and 90 guns, all the rest being from 88 to 52 guns. On the other hand, the combined fleet contained only three of 96 guns and two of 90 guns, the remainder being from 80 to 50.

The Court of Madrid felt the loss of Gibraltar to be a very serious blow, and, before the autumn was passed, despatched the Marquis of Villadaria, with 8000 men, to attempt its recovery. The Earl of Galway, then in command of the Allied forces in Portugal, sent four regiments, with supplies of provisions and ammunition, to the relief of the garrison; and Sir John Leake soon afterwards arrived in the Bay with twenty sail of English and Dutch ships. Meantime, the Spaniards prosecuted the siege with much vigour, and harassed the garrison with a constant and heavy fire.

Sir John Leake, hearing that the enemy were preparing to attack him with a very powerful fleet, withdrew to Lisbon, in order to refit, and pick up some ships which he had left behind. On the 25th he again put to sea; and on the 27th suddenly made his appearance in the Bay, where he surprised three frigates, two English prizes, and some small vessels. He then landed the reinforcements, and six months' supplies of stores, together with a body of five hundred sailors to assist in repairing the breaches made by the hostile guns. His arrival is described as very opportune, for the Spanish general had fixed on that same night for an attack by sea and land at five several points.

The Marquis of Villadaria was not disheartened by this failure, and though the garrison was well supplied with stores by the English fleet, while his own army was ill-fed and ill-clothed, he kept up a continual fire. Having received considerable reinforcements, he resolved to storm a breach which had been effected at two points of the fortifications. One of these, on the hill, was occupied at night by a captain, three subalterns, and ninety men; but at daybreak the captain, two of the subalterns, and sixty men were accustomed to retire. The other breach, in the Round Tower, was defended by one hundred and eighty men, under a lieutenant alone. Through deserters from the garrison the marquis had ascertained these dispositions, and planned his attack accordingly. The forlorn hope detailed for the upper breach scaled the Rock at night, and sheltered themselves in its hollows until the captain withdrew in the morning. They then pushed forwards, and, with a discharge of grenades, cleared the works of the subaltern and his small party. Simultaneously the Round Tower was surrounded by three hundred men, and Lieutenant-Colonel Bain, after a gallant defence, was forced to seek shelter in the covered way. But, as before, just when the Spaniards thought success within their grasp, they were doomed to discomfiture. The garrison had taken the alarm; drum and bugle summoned the regiments to their different quarters; and a body of five hundred men flung themselves on the enemy with such determined valour that they were forced to yield. The tower was retaken, and the Rock cleared of Spanish soldiers.

The Governments of Spain and France did not yet abandon all hope of recovering Gibraltar. The Marquis of Villadaria having failed, was superseded by a veteran French general, the Marshal Tess?; and a powerful fleet, under Admiral Pointis, was ordered to blockade the port. The besieging army was reinforced; the entrenchments were repaired and mounted with new and heavier guns. The English Ministry, apprised of these measures, strengthened Sir John Leake with some additional ships; and the gallant admiral, sailing from Lisbon on the 6th of March, came up with M. Pointis on the 10th, and cut off five of the French ships--three of which were taken, while the others were driven ashore and burned. He then stood into the Bay and landed supplies for the use of the garrison. Despairing of success in any direct attack, the marshal withdrew his troops from their old positions, and entrenched himself across the isthmus, so as to prevent the English from making any forays into the interior.

No further attempt was made upon a fortress which, in the hands of English soldiers, had proved impregnable; and by the Treaty of Utrecht, in 1713, Gibraltar was formally ceded to England.

AN INTERVAL.

We read of no further attempt upon Gibraltar until 1720. At that time the Spanish fortress of Ceuta, on the African coast, was beleaguered by the Moors; and with the professed intention of relieving it, a large armament was collected in Gibraltar Bay, under the Marquis de Leda. The British Government, however, received information that the real object of the expedition was the surprise of Gibraltar; and accordingly ordered the governor of Minorca to embark immediately with a portion of his troops and reinforce its garrison. On his arrival, he found that this important post was defended by three battalions only; that the stores contained provisions for scarcely fourteen days; and this with a strong Spanish fleet in the Bay. He took such active measures, however, that the Marquis de Leda was obliged to abandon all hopes of carrying the Rock, and to sail for Ceuta.

Towards the end of 1726 the Spaniards assembled an army near Algesiras, which, in the following January, they moved to the plain below San Roque. Soon after this camp was formed, the Count de Los Torres, the Spanish commander, advanced within reach of the garrison. Brigadier Kane then despatched a message, desiring the count to retire from the range of his guns, or he would do his utmost to force him. The count replied that, as the garrison could command no more than they had power to maintain, he should obey His Catholic Majesty's orders, and push forward as far as he was able. The English general was forced to bear with this insolence, because war had not yet been formally declared between England and Spain.

The situation was altered, however, when in February the Spaniards began to erect batteries on the Neutral Ground. It was felt that this movement was an open declaration of hostile intentions, and the English guns began to fire on the Spanish workmen. Information having been received that the enemy were constructing a mine, our engineers succeeded in discovering the spot, and baffling their operations. On the morning of the 22nd a sharp fire was opened on the garrison, and new batteries were run up which commanded the Old Mole and the town. The besieged, however, relaxed nothing in their efforts, and maintained the defence with persistent vigour, though their ordnance, being old, were constantly bursting, and inflicting almost as much injury on our own gunners as on the enemy.

The English admirals, on the 2nd of April, resolved on bombarding Algesiras, whence the Spaniards received their supplies of ammunition; but the ships being becalmed, were compelled to drop anchor; after which, says Drinkwater, the navy never gave themselves any further concern about annoying them in that quarter. On the 16th, two sergeants, with ten men each, were ordered to push along under the Rock, and alarm the enemy in the trenches; the governor intending, when they were sufficiently aroused, to rake them with discharges of grape. The sergeants did their duty, and the enemy instantly beat to arms; but the bombardier charged with the duty of signalling to the batteries fired too soon, and the Spaniards, discovering the manoeuvre, quickly retired under cover.

Shortly afterwards news arrived of the conclusion of peace, and the Spanish accordingly dismantled their works and retreated to their different quarters.

The Rock now continued in the possession of the English for many years, without any attempt being made to disturb them; and we may pass over half a century in silence, taking up our record again in 1776, when the Right Hon. General George Augustus Elliot was appointed Governor. His name will long be remembered in connection with the famous siege of 1779.

THE GREAT SIEGE.

Before entering on a description of the Great Siege, which stands foremost among the brilliant episodes of our military history, it will be necessary for the reader's understanding of its details to put before him a view of the Rock and its defences as they then existed. In doing so we must necessarily avail ourselves of the close and careful account furnished by Captain Drinkwater, who wrote from personal knowledge, and shared in the various experiences of the siege. We shall, however, as far as possible, spare our readers the infliction of purely technical language.

The Rock of Gibraltar forms a kind of promontory rising seaward to a height of 1300 feet, and connected with the mainland by a low sandy isthmus. The landward face varies considerably in elevation. The breadth of the isthmus at the foot of the Rock is about 2700 feet, but towards the country it broadens rapidly. Across this neck of land, which, with the Rock and the Algesiras coast, forms the Bay, the Spaniards, before the Great Siege, had erected a line of fortifications, 1700 yards in length, and distant about a mile from the nearest posts of the garrison. At each extremity a fort of twenty-four guns was erected; one christened St. Barbara, and the other St. Philip. Their cross-fire completely commanded the so-called Neutral Ground, a narrow belt or strip between English Gibraltar and the Spanish mainland.

The Rock, we must add, is divided into two unequal parts by a ridge extending from north to south. The western section is a gradual slope, broken up with precipices; but the eastern, which looks out upon the blue Mediterranean, and the northern, facing the Spanish batteries, are both very steep, and, in fact, inaccessible.

At the foot of the north-west slope, and surrounded by irregular fortifications, lies the town, which communicates with the isthmus by a long, narrow causeway, strongly bristling with defensive works. These, and the causeway itself, are over-looked by the guns mounted in the King's, Queen's, and Prince's lines; ramparts excavated out of the solid rock, and practicable only to birds of prey. At different heights, up to the very crest, batteries are planted so as to present to an enemy a peculiarly grim and forbidding aspect. The Old Mole, to the west of the Grand Battery, joined with the above lines to pour a tremendous cross-fire on the causeway and Neutral Ground. So great an annoyance did this battery prove to the besiegers, that, by way of distinction, they named it the Devil's Tongue; and the entrance into the garrison, with its batteries here, there, and everywhere, and its cannons and mortars on the causeway and Old Mole, suggested to them the picturesque title of the Mouth of Fire.

Following a line of ramparts along the beach, the visitor, at the time we are speaking of, came to the New Mole, with its 26-gun battery, and thence proceeded to the well-known quay of the Ragged Staff, usually employed for the landing of stores for the garrison. Ships of the line could lie along the Mole, such was the depth of water; and at the Mole head was stationed a circular battery for heavy cannon. The Rock is not easily accessible from the New Mole fort to the north end of Rosia Bay, but it was defended, like every other point, by batteries and ramparts.

Whether the young reader can or cannot follow in every particular the foregoing description, he will at least derive from it the idea of a not insufficient system of defensive works, which did credit to the ability of the engineer-officers of the time. Every point of vantage had its battery or bastion. The natural advantages of the position were carefully utilised, and the approaches were commanded by heavy guns, which could pour on an advancing enemy a withering fire. In all, the fortifications were armed with six hundred and sixty-three pieces of artillery.

Most conspicuous among the buildings was the old Moorish castle, which recalled to the spectator the palmy days of Saracenic supremacy in Spain. It was situated on the north-west side of the hill, and originally consisted of a triple wall, the outermost of which rose sheer from the water's edge. The lower portions, however, had been destroyed before the siege, and on their ruins was planted the Grand Battery. The walls formed an oblong, ascending the hill, with the principal tower, or governor's residence, at the upper angle. The remains of a mosque were still visible; as also those of a Saracenic court, and a tank or reservoir for water.

Ruins of Moorish edifices were discernible also on Windmill Hill, and at Europa. Those on the hill were in a condition which rendered it impossible to determine their original character; at Europa they have been converted by the Spaniards into a chapel, dedicated to the Virgin Mary. Fragments of Moorish walls run along the water's edge; and near Europa Advance is a Moorish bath, which our English soldiers named the Nuns' Well. It is sunk eight feet deep in the rock, and measures seventy-two feet by forty-two feet. Over it is an arcaded canopy, supported by graceful Saracenic columns.

In the hill are numerous caves and hollows, some natural, and some improved by the hand of man. Of the former the most considerable appears to be St. Michael's Cave, which lies on the south side, about eleven hundred feet above the sea-level. The remains of a strong wall are visible near this entrance, which is only five feet wide. On entering, the stranger finds himself in a considerable cavity, about two hundred feet in length, and ninety feet in breadth; and the light of his torch, if he penetrate into the interior, reveals the mouths of several other caves. From the roof depend stalactites of great size and curious shape, giving to the whole that character of Gothic architecture which is noticeable in all stalactitic grottoes. There are also numerous stalagmites, which in some cases almost join the calcareous droppings from the roof, and appear to form supporting pillars.

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