The Spanish Armada​—A Voyage to Tragedy

BY AWAKE! WRITER IN SPAIN

OVER four centuries ago, two fleets fought in the narrow waters of the English Channel. The battle pitched Protestants against Catholics and was part of the 16th-century struggle between the armies of Protestant Queen Elizabeth I of England and Roman Catholic King Philip II of Spain. “To them the clash of the English and Spanish fleets in the Channel was,” explains the book The Defeat of the Spanish Armada, “a final struggle to the death between the forces of light and the forces of darkness.”

Why the Attempted Invasion?

English pirates had plundered Spanish ships for years, and England’s Queen Elizabeth actively supported Dutch rebellion against Spanish rule. In addition, Catholic Philip II felt duty-bound to help English Catholics rid their country of the growing Protestant “heresy.” To that end, the Armada carried some 180 priests and religious advisers. Even as the crews of the Armada assembled, each man had to confess his sins to a priest and receive Communion.

The religious mood of Spain and of its king was personified by the eminent Spanish Jesuit Pedro de Ribadeneyra, who said: “God our Lord, whose cause and most holy faith we are defending, will go before us​—and with such a captain we have nothing to fear.” As for the English, they hoped that a decisive victory would pave the way for Protestant ideas to sweep across Europe.