Dr Kat and the Spanish Armada

hello and welcome back to the channel if you're new here hi you're very welcome this is reading the past and I'm dr. Kat and I can scarcely believe it but we are already in August I simply have no idea where this year has gone however if we were able to time travel which I'm sure as many people's dream and we were able to go back to 1588 the August of that year would have been one of Terror in August 1588 England found itself under a greater threat to its sovereignty and governance and it had been under since arguably the Norman conquest of 1066 August was also the month where this threat dissipated I'm talking about the Spanish Armada and in today's video I'd like to think about its causes events and aftermath let's look at it as is the case with virtually every historical event and particularly conflict the causes are multiple they are personal and private but also public national and international they are about bruised egos and fear of national threat they are political religious and economic and that is also the case with the Spanish Armada but to look at its causes we have to go back to the early 1500s now Spain England had not always been at loggerheads as is shown by the marriage pact that Henry 7th and Elizabeth of York arranged for their eldest son Prince Arthur he was to marry the Spanish inventor Catherine of Aragon and all seemed well with Arthur's premature death negotiations then began for her to marry his younger brother the future Henry the eighth ultimately Henry would marry her after his father's death and all seemed well there was a loving Union Henry and Catherine England and Spain until Henry believed that Catherine would not give him a son and heir and suddenly he realized that he had to get out of his marriage and in 1527 he began taking steps to do just that 15:27 was the official start date of the Kings great matter it's when he put in an application to have his marriage to Catherine an old at this point cath of Aragon is the aunt of the Emperor of Spain charles v henry's request was blocked by catherine her nephew and ultimately the pope at one point the pope was even in her nephews custody charles v had sacked Rome and so it was quite unlikely that the Pope was going to grant a annulment for a marriage that would directly affect the aunt of the man who essentially had him to ransom so in 1534 this personal matter becomes religious and political the domestic and private becomes national and international in 1534 henry has himself acknowledged as the supreme head of the Church of England signaling a break from Rome and the Pope and similarly a break from all of mainstream Catholic Europe with Henry's death in 1547 his son Edward the sick ascends to the throne he himself appears to have been a committed Protestant and also seems have been surrounded by many members of his Council who were also committed Protestants in 1553 Edward the sick that Protestant King passes away aged just 15 by this point the head of his Council is 1 John Dudley and he is keen to avoid another Catholic monarch and return to Rome so his idea is to marry his son Guilford Dudley to one of EDS relatives Lady Jane Grey she was the granddaughter of Henry the eighth's sister Mary and herself a committed Protestant she is ultimately perhaps best known as the nine days queen she arrived at the tower to be prepared for her coronation and never left it her reign was a short unsupported failure it would seem that for the vast majority of the English people faith was of less importance than bloodline they were most concerned with getting somebody with Henry the eighth's blood on the throne than they were with a potential return to Rome and so Henry's elder daughter Edwards half-sister Mary the first comes to the throne she is a committed Catholic and she goes about reversing her parents divorce and also the split from Rome in the following year 1550 for Mary Mary's her cousin Charles the fifth son Philip with Mary's marriage to Philip of Spain we could perhaps see it as a restoration of trust and friendship between these nations much as when Arthur and then Henry had been matched with Catherine of Aragon however for the English people Mary sex made this problematic with a Spanish king rather than a Spanish Infanta as the marriage option they had questions would England essentially be ruled by Spain if wives must submit their husband is the same thing true when the wife is a regnant queen and should marry die would that mean that philip then ruled England after her death such was the dis trust that the English had for this new Spanish match that protest broke out and one nobleman Thomas Wyatt led a rebellion he intended to block the marriage and more than that replace Mary with her half-sister Elizabeth rather than bringing back a trust between these two nations a level of friendship that had been broken with the preceding events Philip would have known he was coming to an England that didn't want him and while we may never know his precise feelings on the matter one wonders how this reception might have affected the way he viewed England and the English in later years there was high hopes that Mary was about to produce a Catholic heir to England settling the question of religion once and for all however her purported pregnancies ultimately turned out to be we believe phantom pregnancies or possibly a form of cancer that ultimately led to her death in 1558 Mary dies without a child to succeed her her heir is therefore her half-sister Elizabeth the first and she becomes Queen in the year after she exceeds the throne the year 1559 Elizabeth rejects her brother-in-law's proposed of marriage Philip had wanted to keep England under his control Elizabeth it seems was having none of it also in that year the act of uniformity and the act of Supremacy were passed this meant that once again England's faith identity had changed they were Protestant and now elizabeth is named the Supreme Governor of the Church of England also in this year a 1559 there were already rumors that Philip of Spain was considering invading Elizabeth England in order to return it to Rome and to protect Catholics living there in 1568 Elizabeth's Catholic cousin Mary Queen of Scots flees her Protestant nation in disgrace and fear she arrives in England now there is a potential rival Catholic claiming for Elizabeth's throne in her kingdom and being held under house arrest in 1570 pope pius v excommunicates elizabeth what this means is for Catholics in England Elizabeth is no longer their sanctioned Queen according to the Pope she is a false queen who they can willingly depose and even execute it's unclear what pope pius v was intending to achieve with this but what it certainly did do was placed the catholics in england under an increasing amount of suspicion was it now possible to have a middle ground could Elizabeth get by without making Windows into men's souls probably not because to be a loyal Catholic now meant you could not be a loyal English person the Pope has directly come out against your queen he has said that she is false he has excommunicated her so it's almost impossible to be both a loyal observant Catholic and also remain a loyal English person if these suspicions did exist it would seem they were well-placed the following year 1571 the Ridolfi plot is uncovered this is the plan to depose and kill Elizabeth and replace her with Mary Queen of Scots then in the following year in August 1570 - word gets back to England of the st. Bartholomew's Day Massacre in Paris the Roman Catholic nobility had gone about slaughtering Protestants in the streets and in their homes the rivers and roads ran with blood for people in England this would have been terrifying their catholic neighbors could ostensibly rise up against them murder their queen and also kill them their wives and their children this had happened just across the channel then 1583 the Throckmorton plot is discovered which again intended to pose Elizabeth the first and replace her with Mary Queen of Scots in the aftermath of the Throckmorton plot Elizabeth councilors led by Francis Walsingham were able to trade in fear and change the law in the Parliament of 1584 285 they passed the act of association and act the Queen's safety in both cases this ensured that anybody who could be found to be complicit in plotting it's the Queen's life would find their own life forfeit similarly if somebody were plotting against the Queen's life and succeeded in order to put themselves on the throne their claim to the throne would be at forfeit as we will see it will not be long before these new laws are put to the test in the most extreme way in 1585 the usually anti-war on account of her being parsimonious more than anything else elizabeth is prevailed upon to send English troops to the Netherlands in order to protect Dutch Protestants from seemingly rising Catholic Spanish aggression the troops are led by Elizabeth's favorite Sir Robert Dudley and it seems that Elizabeth puts Dudley under instruction that he is not to escalate the fighting it would seem that Elizabeth still wants to negotiate with Philip and Spain in 1586 the Babington plot finally sees the light of day it would seem that Elizabeth's chief ministers had known about it for quite some time and they had been working with the knowledge they had to entrap Mary Queen of Scots they had willingly allowed her to send letters to Babbington and his conspirators and they had been reading them decoding them and building the case against her in the aftermath of that law change with the active Association in the act of the Queen's safety the fact that Mary is unquestionably implicated in this plot against visitors life renders her own life forfeit however in 1586 Elizabeth knows that signing this death warrant will absolutely bring the wrath of Spain down upon her and her England and so she avoids signing her death warrant Elizabeth would have been aware that at this time when the question the death warrant is raging that Philip of Spain is building his naval fleet he it seems has plans to act against visitors England because of the way Catholics are being treated the threat to Mary Queen of Scots and also in no small part because of revenge he wants to deal with the fact that Elizabeth's England has supported the Dutch Protestants against him in the Netherlands so with all of this as a foundation personal and national international religious economic and political as England entered 1587 they must have been aware they were sitting on a powder keg on the 8th of February of that year 1587 a match was struck Queen of Scots was executed at fotheringay castle according to reports Elizabeth was incredibly distressed and angry at the news she had signed the death warrant on the explicit proviso that it was not to be delivered her counsel at this time led by William Cecil had gone against her wishes and delivered it anyway and apparently without her knowledge her cousin lost her life as I mentioned a moment ago by 1586 Philip of Spain was already building his naval fleet for use against England if necessary the next year the same year that Mary Queen of Scots is executed 1587 Sir Francis Drake goes to Cadiz Drake is one of Elizabeth's privateers which is a polite term for pirate at Cadiz Drake singes the king of Spain's beard by this he sacks the port and destroys much of Philips fleet that's being held there the ships are ruined and any stores or provisions within them are either also destroyed or stolen in the name of England so if Elizabeth had held any hope of coming to some kind of peace accord with her former brother-in-law by 1587 she must know that all of those hopes are dashed and for Philip of Spain what Prince of Europe what Catholic king could stand by while another regnant Catholic queen is executed and a vast proportion of their shipping fleet is destroyed by another nation he has to act the fuse has been lit on the fire of war and the Spanish Armada against England is mobilized on the 25th of April 1588 Pope 6 as the 5th blesses the banners of the Armada in doing so he from the highest Catholic office in the land is blessing the plan to overthrow Elizabeth and reinstate Roman Catholicism in England now Philip of Spain and his Armada could set sail secure in the knowledge that God would of course be on the side of their military campaign with the events of 1586 and 5th seven Elizabeth knows she isn't going to get her former brother-in-law Philip of Spain to come to the peace table but she hasn't given up hope on his ally the Duke of Parma at this point the Duke of Parma has brought his fleet to join with Philips in the launch of the Armada nevertheless she has her representative Valentine Dale in the Netherlands talking to representatives of the Duke of Parma in an attempt to secure just such a peace altum Utley as we will see that fails on the 28th of May 1588 the Armada had left Lisbon by the 6th of July those negotiations between Elizabeth's representative and the Duke of Parma's had fully broken down the Armada was coming and it was coming in full force there were no more peace negotiations that were going to happen now England had to fight and pray on the 19th of July the Armada fleet was spotted in the English Channel from Cornwall later in that day the Armada came across 66 English ships in Plymouth for some reason the Spanish commander decided not to attack them rather they moved towards the Isle of Wight when the 21st of July 55 English ships went after the Armada there was some brief but ultimately undecisive skirmishing as darkness fell on that same night Sir Francis Drake put out his lantern in an attempt to hide from the Spanish fleet however he had been at the head of the English fleet and had been guiding them using that Lantern therefore they were all sailing blind the English fleet was therefore separated from one another and as such could not pose a real threat to the Spanish Armada until they managed to regroup after daybreak on the morning of the 29th of July the English made decisive move the Armada had been anchored in open sea near Calais they decided to send eight fire ships fire ships were vessels that they intended to ruin by setting fire to them unsurprisingly and the intention was that by sacrificing these ships they would burn the vessels they were attacking as it turns out they did not burn any of your modest ships but the panic of seeing these flaming vessels coming towards them was sufficient to make the Armada separate from one another parts of the Armada attempts to form back up near the port of gravelly however the English fleet led by many explorers privateers or pirates had learnt a lot from their tangles with the Spanish their ships were light and quick and maneuverable and at the Battle of graveling the English fleet was able to do considerable although not decisive damage to the Armada the pots the Armada that survived the battle of graveling did manage to escape into the North Sea the winds it seems had turned against the Armada and pushed it north the English fleet despite apparently being out of ammunition continued to give chase Lord Howard of Effingham who was in command of the English fleet called off the pursuit the Armada by this point was in the Firth of Forth what occurred on the 9th of August 1588 was arguably the most defining moment of the whole Armada and it took place without a single shot being fired Elizabeth went to meet her troops at Tilbury in Essex what she didn't know was by this point much of the threat of the Armada had already passed nevertheless she gave what was arguably one of the most rousing speeches in all of history my loving people we have been persuaded by some that are careful of our safety to take heed how we commit ourselves to armed multitudes for fear of treachery but I assure you I do not desire to live to distrust my faithful and loving people but tyrants there i have always so behaved myself under god i have placed my chiefest strength and safeguard in the loyal hearts and goodwill of my subjects and therefore I am color Monk Jew as you see at this time not for my recreation and de sport but being resolved in the midst and heat of the battle to live and die amongst you all to lay down for my god and for my kingdom and my people my honour and my blood even in the dust I know I have the body of a weak and feeble woman but I have the heart and stomach of a king and a king of England too and I think foul scorn that Parma or Spain or any Prince of Europe should dare to invade the borders of my realm to which rather than any dishonour shall grow by me I myself will take up arms I myself will be your general judge and reward earth every one of your virtues in the field I know already for your forward miss you have deserved rewards and crowns and we do assure you on a word of a prince they shall be duly paid in the meantime my left hand in general shall be in my stead then whom never Prince commanded a more noble or worthy subject not doubting but by your obedience to my general by your Concord in the camp and your valor in the field we shall shortly have a famous victory over these enemies of my god of my kingdom and of my people just two days off Elizabeth gave this speech at Tilbury the men she had met with and spoken to were being disbanded and sent home the threat of an invasion on English soil posed by the Armada it seemed had passed for now at least however they couldn't relax the Armada ultimately did not return home until October it's perhaps little hard to imagine how those two months must have been experienced in England by Elizabeth and her people on the one hand the ultimate pressing threat seems to have passed and yet there still its echo they are waiting will the Armada regroup will this invasion on English soil actually come will it be when we aren't paying attention so while there may have been celebrations I imagine there would still have been a large degree of hyper-vigilance as was often the case in Elizabeth England success was celebrated through painting and that is also the case with the Armada in 1588 this was produced it is known as the armada portrait there are three extant of this painting there's one at woven Abbey one in the National Portrait Gallery and one that hangs in the Queen's House on the original site of Greenwich palace it was formally attributed to George Gower although according to the National Portrait Gallery we should more appropriately list it as being by English artist unknown as you may be aware Elizabeth is a big fan of symbolism in her portraits and that is certainly on display here behind her are seemingly two windows showing moments from the Armada on the left in calm seas the English fire ships are being ranged against the Spanish fleet while on the right the Spanish fleet is being tossed by storms it would seem to represent that Protestant wind that blew in Elizabeth and England's favor against the Armada at her right elbow sets her crown symbolizing her right to rule and her monarchy she places her right hand on a globe it has been stated that she is pointing to the Americas particularly to Virginia an area of the new world that has been named for her her ornate dress is decorated with pearls and strings of pearls hang around her neck pearls were a symbol of purity and unity they connect with Cynthia the goddess of the moon and also Jesus Christ who was known as the pearl of the world in this Elizabeth is showing off her purity as England's virgin queen in the bottom right hand corner of the image is a mermaid mermaids were mythical beasts known to inflame the lust of sailors and tempt them to their death is Elizabeth seemingly supernatural might in the face of Spanish aggression being shown through this figure here what is perhaps particularly striking is that despite the presence of this sale alluring mermaid the chaos of ships being wrecked by storm and in the other image of fire ships being launched against the Armada Elizabeth sits in the center her face is calm and serene with all the chaos that is going on around her and in Europe it would seem that here Elizabeth is being presented as the Protestant Queen a force of calm and miss in opposition to the chaos that was going on on the continent with the violence of the Spanish Inquisition and the division and conflict that was going on over religion England may have been able to Pat itself on the back however rightly as a relatively peaceful place in comparison but what do you think of this topic I'd love to see your ideas in the comment section down below or come and find me over on my social media I'll leave the links of that in the description box you can follow me there and we can continue the conversation also if you've got any ideas for video topics that you'd like me to do then please leave that either in the comment section or over on my social media I do hope you've enjoyed this video though and found it useful if you did then please let me know by hitting the thumbs up please also subscribe to the channel and click the belly icon so that YouTube tells you when I've next uploaded I hope you're going to have a great day whatever you're doing and I look forward to speaking to you in my next video take care of yourselves bye bye for now [Music] [Music]

Channel: undefined

Views: 20,098

Rating: 4.9615383 out of 5

Keywords: Elizabeth I, Spanish Armada, England 1588, Sir Francis Drake, Sir Robert Dudley, Education, Literature, Culture, History, Early Modern, Renaissance, Navy

Id: 8nwbso0USXY

Length: 24min 32sec (1472 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 23 2019