The Royal Navy (1907) (14589487010)

Identifier: cu31924028018574 (find matches)
Title: The Royal Navy
Year: 1907 (1900s)
Authors: Swinburne, Henry Lawrence Wilkinson, Norman, 1878-1934 illus Jellicoe, John Rushworth Jellicoe, Earl, 1859-1935, illus
Subjects: Great Britain. Royal Navy Great Britain. Royal Navy
Publisher: London, A. and C. Black
Contributing Library: Cornell University Library
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN



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attackfrom the sea. For Blake, like Drake, there wasno such word as failure in his vocabulary, and hedetermined that he would make no attempt tobring out the treasure-ships, but destroy the wholefleet as it lay at its anchorage under the guns ofthe forts. The Tunis tactics were to be repeated:Blake and the battleships would engage the forts,while Stayner, with the smaller craft, would compassthe destruction of the ships. The enterprise wassuperbly accomplished, and never did Britishgunnery prove more effective and destructive.In a four hours fight the forts were so hotlyengaged as not only to be prevented from hinder-ing Stayners mission of destruction, but were sosilenced as to leave Blake free to aid the latter inthe completion of his work. Two hours later everyship in the land-locked and fort-surrounded harbourwas sunk or burnt, and the loss to Spain, both inblood, treasure, and morale, was enormous. Blake,moreover, had Drakes luck, for the wind that BLAKES ACTION AT STA. CRUZi6S7
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NAVY OF THE COMMONWEALTH 75 had been fair to bear him into the harbour shiftedright round at the moment when the operationswere completed, and was of equal aid to him whenthe time to retreat came. Santa Cruz is a navalincident of special interest, because it shows thatthe freebooting and looting of the Tudor days wasbecoming a thing of the past. There lay the gold ;but the object of the enterprise was not to seize itfor the benefit of its captors, but to destroy it forthe benefit of the commonwealth that they served.This makes the fight at Santa Cruz an epoch-marking incident in the story of the Royal Navy.Patriotism, not profit, was to be the keynote ofthe new Navy; glory, not gold, was to be itsreward. Santa Cruz was the great admirals last exploit.Worn out with scurvy and dropsy, induced byarduous service and long confinement on board ofship, the great patriot and the great seaman diedon the very day that the St George, his flagship,dropped her anchor in Plymouth Sound. In the stru