English Navy Vs Spanish Armada

The Spanish and English navies would go down in history as two of the strongest fleets of their time. The Spanish Armada was establishing itself as the powerhouse navy in Europe, while the English navy was set up before King Henry VIII death in order to defend against a Catholic attack after being excommunicated from the church. King Phillip II would attack England, with their much larger fleet, with the intent of destroying in in the sake of religion, while England’s newer navy would be defending their homeland and decision to change to the Protestant religion, achieve victory, and become the new power house of the seas. England adopted many of their naval strategies form the Spanish, improved on them and used it to defeat their bitter

Both fleets primary weapons were their soldiers and their own power. Both fleets would approach enemy ships, while the soldiers would board and siege. Then, the English ship under new command changed designed of their ships and switched to less soldiers and more seamen on board. The Spanish soldiers would carry their own weapons, mostly the arquebuiser, which was good for close range combat, and there were about 6,000 musket men on board whose guns were meant for long range battles. They also had men who carried bombas, weapons that would be thrown and explode, releasing fire and shrapnel. The English also took pride in the musket men who were featured on their ships. They also had archers skilled in firing the yew longbows, these archers could fire up to six arrows a minute. The big difference in weaponry was the fleets artillery. The Spanish fleet had land cannons mounted on their ships which were hard to reload and took up a lot if space. Tee English revolutionized this by taking cannons and mounting them on carriage tracks, this allowed for less space and quick reload, which gave them a huge

Spanish used Galleons, which were large ships with either three or four mast, they had high castles fore and aft, multiple decks to allow their gunman to roam on the ships. These galleons would be the main ships of the fleet, while there were also galleasses, heavily armed battleships that were slow with oars and clumsy under their sails. The ships were impressive in stature but their big weakness was the rudders that hung awkwardly and susceptible to damage. While the English ships were of the newest design. The Queen’s shipwrights proposed the idea of a new design called race-built. The new design called for reduction in the castles fore and aft, sleeker lines and longer gun neck. Fewer soldiers and more seamen were carried on these ships, so their rings and sails can be more complex and more efficient. These ships would prove to be much faster and able to bring their weapons up to the enemy ships with great dexterity. The new English ships were able to carry more artillery than the galleons. Spanish galleons were able to carry four percent of their total tonnage in weapons while the fast build were able to carry five percent. The Englishmen John Hawkins proposed the idea of rebuilding the old ships and make them like the new ships and battle ready, while King Phillip had older ships within the fleet, ships that were captured and annexed, these powerful ships would prove no match for the royal