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Documentary, 12 Days to Save England Part: 1
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00:00We remember Elizabeth the first as one of our greatest monarchs,
00:14Queen of Shakespearean England, patron of great voyages of discovery,
00:22and protector of the Protestant Church of England.
00:30But things could have been very different.
00:37In the summer of 1588, Elizabeth and the people of England faced an overwhelming threat.
00:43The country was on the verge of invasion by the most powerful military fleet ever assembled,
00:50the Spanish Armada.
00:59The defeat would have led to the imprisonment and execution of Elizabeth.
01:06My throne is unstable.
01:08And a future for England under the control of Catholic Spain.
01:14My kingdom tottering.
01:16With dramatic consequences for the whole of Europe.
01:21Now, to understand this defining moment in history, I'm going to take to the waters I love.
01:30Right, let's get out into the rough stuff.
01:33Following the course of the English Navy as it battled the Spanish Armada in the Channel.
01:38There's now a howling gale, similar conditions to the ones that Drake and the fleet faced.
01:45While access to unique eyewitness accounts.
01:48This is one of the most remarkable letters I have ever seen.
01:52Will take us for the very first time inside the minds of the commanders themselves.
01:58Your problem is that your fleet is divided.
02:01And offer unprecedented insight into the corridors of power.
02:05In England.
02:07Gentlemen.
02:08And Spain.
02:09Allowing us to bring to life 12 days in the summer of 1588.
02:20When England's very survival hung in the balance.
02:25This is a tale of astonishing twists and turns.
02:28Which saw England and its queen come within a whisker of disaster.
02:33This is the real story of the Spanish Armada.
02:55When Elizabeth Tudor, Queen of England, woke on Friday the 29th of July 1588.
03:18She knew that her life and her realm were in grave danger.
03:23A good night.
03:28My mind was tossing on the ocean.
03:32The cause of Elizabeth's nightmares was 700 miles away.
03:41King Philip II of Spain.
03:46The most powerful man on earth.
03:49Hell bent on the Queen of England's destruction.
03:52His weapon, a mighty armada.
03:59125 ships.
04:05Packed with men.
04:08Bristling with cannon.
04:11Sent to crush a rogue state that stole from Spanish treasure ships.
04:20And lived by the terrible heresies of Protestantism.
04:24This was a crusade for the safety of Spain and the glory of God.
04:30England was a small country on the very edge of Europe.
04:43A Protestant outpost surrounded by Catholic powers.
04:47Good morning, ladies.
04:50Elizabeth had been in a Cold War standoff with Spain for years.
04:56Your Majesty.
05:00But now she knew that the armada had sailed.
05:03And she was under immense strain.
05:09Las Vegas.
05:10This was a great dream of becoming a woman.
05:12And when we had the time in the west, the workshop was rich.
05:14It was very rich.
05:15On the eve of the Armada,
05:16Elizabeth is looking every single one of her 54 years.
05:18Her skin is pot marked.
05:19She had smallpox when she was some 25 years younger.
05:21Her hair has largely fallen out.
05:22So, she really is looking like an old woman.
05:24So she really is looking like an old woman, even though she's only in her mid-fifties.
05:30She was God's anointed. She was the head of the body politic.
05:34She was England. Her face was the landscape of her country.
05:38She couldn't afford for it to look withered or decayed.
05:44It was a mammoth operation, getting Elizabeth ready in the morning.
05:48And we're talking about make-up that one critic at the time described as being half an inch thick.
05:55Elizabeth is having to slap it on.
06:00She would have certainly been startling in appearance, almost frightening, I think.
06:06And I think that was part of it for Elizabeth.
06:08She didn't want to look like an ordinary human being.
06:11She was appointed by God, and therefore she was going to appear at court as some kind of semi-God-like figure.
06:18This was England's Virgin Queen.
06:25Ageing.
06:27Politically isolated.
06:29Your Majesty.
06:30Thank you, Blanche.
06:32And under threat.
06:34There we are, then.
06:35Two hundred miles from Elizabeth, on the coast of Devon, the men of the English Navy were preparing for the battle of their lives.
06:54I've been fascinated by the momentous battles of the Armada since I was a child.
06:59And I've been sailing in the English Channel for just as long.
07:05There you go, look at that.
07:09Now, I'm going to be following every manoeuvre of the naval and the Armada as they fought in these very waters 400 years ago.
07:17But on the morning of Friday the 29th of July, the English were still in harbour, and they had no idea just how close the Spanish were.
07:32Elizabeth had a big international network of spies, and they'd spent months learning all they could about Spain's preparations for the Armada.
07:42But unfortunately, what none of them could tell the English government was exactly where or when the Armada might arrive.
07:49And that meant through the early summer of 1588, England was on high alert.
07:59Over a hundred ships had been assembled at Plymouth, under the command of England's Lord High Admiral, Charles Lord Howard of Effing.
08:10Good afternoon, men.
08:13Please, continue.
08:14Howard was a leading aristocrat, a former ambassador to France, and Elizabeth's own cousin.
08:22The problem was, Howard had never commanded a fleet in battle before.
08:24He was an administrator. He was used to giving orders from behind a desk.
08:29Whoa! Easy, boy.
08:31We don't want to do the Spaniards' job for them.
08:34To be honest, he got the job mainly because of his aristocratic pedigree, rather than his naval fighting skills, which was a bit alarming.
08:43Come on, men.
08:44This is your home. Keep it tidy.
08:47Thankfully, Howard had a crack team of experienced commanders.
08:50Are we ready?
08:52We're patching up.
08:53Most famously, his deputy, Sir Francis Drake.
08:56Good. Good. Excellent work, Drake.
08:58That's why I'm here.
09:00Drake was just a few years younger than Howard, but he was from very different stock.
09:04He was the son of a Devon farmer, and he'd spent nearly his entire adult life at sea.
09:09He was one of a new breed of self-made men, lived by their wits.
09:13He'd managed to complete, quite recently, the second ever circumnavigation of the globe, and he'd been knighted for services to his country, which basically meant that he'd managed to fill Queen Elizabeth's coffers with stolen Spanish gold and silver.
09:28In short, Drake was England's most brazen pirate.
09:36Elizabeth had knighted him and made him second in command of her navy.
09:40And it needed all the help it could get.
09:45The ague, how about it?
09:47The fleet wasn't just in harbour.
09:49It was recovering from a failed mission.
09:52And munitions.
09:54We're holding what we can.
09:56But we could always do it more.
09:57As ever, men don't make do.
10:00My ships will be ready.
10:02They will be ready.
10:03An impetuous plan of Drake's, to attack first, had seriously backfired.
10:11Drake had just returned from a disastrous attempt to intercept the Spanish out at sea.
10:16Terrible weather had battered his fleet, and no-one had even spotted one single Spanish vessel.
10:21So, this quayside would have been a scene of chaos and confusion.
10:26Men were lying sick, vessels were being hastily repaired, and provisions being piled on board.
10:32This was hardly the battle-ready fleet that Drake had promised.
10:40Time was running out.
10:43Philip's great armada was just 40 miles west of Plymouth.
10:47An inching ever closer to London, and Elizabeth.
11:00The armada had left port a week before and was now approaching English waters.
11:05It was a massive fleet, 125 ships crammed with 16,000 soldiers and 7,000 of Spain's finest sailors.
11:13They were in a variety of ships, but they'd kept perfect formation as they approached the Channel,
11:19and their sails darkened the southern sky.
11:22Now, the English know they're coming.
11:23They haven't seen them yet, but that's why they're positioned here at Plymouth,
11:26so they can get them before they get into the main body of the Channel.
11:28We've got about 105 ships here.
11:31Bit of a mixed bag, but a lot of powerful galleons among them.
11:33Not so many soldiers, of course, but add to this force another 30 ships over here,
11:38just off the Kent coast, about 135 in total.
11:41Pretty similar numbers.
11:42But your problem is that your fleet is divided,
11:45which means these ships alone have to be able to try and stop our armada.
11:50Well, that's what they're worried about, of course, in Plymouth.
11:52They know the armada is coming.
11:53They haven't seen it yet, but they must have feared it's going to be unstoppable.
11:56The destruction of Tudor England had been plotted here, in Spain's capital.
12:08In the 16th century, Madrid was the hub of a vast empire,
12:14stretching from Peru to the Philippines.
12:20Spain was the superpower, immensely powerful.
12:24It controlled not only the Iberian Peninsula, but also the New World and all that bullion.
12:31Spain had a foothold in North America, South America, the West Indies, the East Indies, Africa,
12:37great swathes of Europe.
12:39It was famously the empire upon which the sun never set.
12:46The nerve centre was this royal palace and monastery, 30 miles to the north of the capital.
12:52From a small cell at its heart, King Philip orchestrated his empire.
13:00His motto matched his ambitions.
13:04The world is not enough.
13:09Philip was an obsessive.
13:12Not the sort of person you'd like to sit next to it at dinner party.
13:17Only two things concerned him, his empire and his religion.
13:22In 1588, Philip was 61 years old and in failing health.
13:30But he remained driven by a singular zeal.
13:35Your Majesty.
13:37Philip was a dure, rather dull character, to be honest.
13:41More papers for you to sign.
13:44He was known as the bureaucrat king.
13:46What he liked was nothing better than to sit in a very plain, simple apartment, doing his paperwork.
13:52He didn't like personal contact with his minions.
13:54They had to submit their reports on paper, even if they were sitting in the next room.
14:01Professor Geoffrey Parker is the world's leading expert on Philip and his empire.
14:05He spent an entire career, over half a century, unearthing ancient documents in archives from California to Madrid.
14:15You would think, since the king died in 1598, we've had time to discover everything, but this just isn't so.
14:24I would say there's thousands of documents still out there which have not been identified.
14:28This is what comes as spending most of your days reading papers and annotating them.
14:32You leave a very long and wide paper trail.
14:35Highness, if I may, your cough is getting worse.
14:44There's one document where he says, it's the documents that give me cough.
14:49Every time I pick up a document, I start coughing.
14:51What do you expect with all these papers?
14:55One startling new discovery has revealed over 3,000 handwritten papers, shedding light on a man who was intent on keeping his world in order by micromanaging every detail himself.
15:23This is absolutely typical.
15:29It's the letter from his private secretary, Mateo Vasquez, saying, you know, I need a decision on something.
15:34The king launches into a four-page tirade about how much work he has to do.
15:39I don't know how I put up with it.
15:40I don't have time to do everything.
15:42On and on and on.
15:43This is just pages two and three of a four-page response.
15:47And the brunt of it is, I don't have time to take the decisions.
15:50Well, this took him 15 minutes.
15:53But in the summer of 1588, Philip was preoccupied with the problem of England.
16:01The armada was his solution.
16:09To finally deal with a heretic queen.
16:15A woman who, surprisingly, he had once asked to be his wife.
16:24Philip and Elizabeth had first met here at Hampton Court, near London, more than 30 years earlier.
16:39Elizabeth was then a 20-year-old princess.
16:44Philip, a Spanish prince, sent to forge an alliance with England by marrying Elizabeth's older, Catholic half-sister, Queen Mary.
16:56So we've got a really interesting coin here.
17:02It's an image of Philip and Mary.
17:04But above them is a floating crown.
17:07And what this suggests is a kind of dual monarchy.
17:11The idea, this isn't a crown that's on the top of Mary's head.
17:14It's both above Mary and Philip.
17:17It shouldn't be, but it's a kind of little-known fact that Philip was, for a time, king of England.
17:22But just four years later, Mary had died, and Elizabeth, a Protestant, had been crowned queen.
17:32We have this coin, and if we compare the coin to the one we saw of Mary and Philip, a dual monarchy,
17:39here we have Elizabeth as sole queen.
17:42And, of course, this is a situation that was to continue through her life.
17:47Even though, for the very early years of her reign, Elizabeth was relentlessly petitioned to marry.
17:55First in the queue had been Philip himself.
18:01Historians still debate whether his proposal was driven by royal politics, religion, or even love.
18:09Philip proposes to Elizabeth soon after she becomes queen because he doesn't want to give up being king of England.
18:19It was a duel in his crown, and he isn't going to give it up without a fight.
18:23Also, I think he had this sort of obligation to God, in a way.
18:27He said that he wasn't attracted to Elizabeth, but it was the fact or the hope of saving Catholic souls
18:34that made him reluctantly propose to her.
18:37I think there was an attraction on Philip's part towards Elizabeth.
18:42Certainly, she was a stark contrast in those days from her sister,
18:46and I think, actually, that Philip was drawn to Elizabeth.
18:50Philip did not love Elizabeth.
18:52There's no evidence of this at all.
18:54This was a dynastic match.
18:57This was for religious reasons.
18:59Whether or not Philip's alleged love was genuine, it certainly wasn't requited.
19:04Elizabeth made him wait.
19:06Manana, manana.
19:08So Philip waited.
19:09He waited for several weeks, and then she turned him down.
19:14Now, three decades later, Philip wanted Elizabeth dead, and England for himself.
19:23Years of religious differences had bred an increasingly bitter animosity.
19:28Philip certainly wasn't pleased with the Protestant direction that Elizabeth was taking her country in.
19:34He saw the mass being bad.
19:35He saw priests being outlawed.
19:37Torture was used, and almost 200 men and women were executed in her reign for essentially religious reasons.
19:44In addition to this, England has not been out and found its own wealth,
19:52but instead is attacking the Spanish treasure fleet as it's making its way back from the Indies.
20:00And this is state-sponsored piracy.
20:03The final straw for Philip was when Francis Drake made his famous raid on Cadiz,
20:09the singeing of the King of Spain's beard, as it was called.
20:12It was one thing to try and intercept the treasure fleet.
20:14It was another thing to raid the coast of Spain itself.
20:17And if Philip could not respond to this, then his hold on his provinces was under threat.
20:21The time had come to stop this, dead in its tracks.
20:28He decided after two months' rumination,
20:31the only way he could do that was to set up an armada and invade Protestant England.
20:42The Cold War was over.
20:46Philip's great armada had finally set sail from Spain
20:50on the 21st of July, 1588.
20:55Intent on annihilating the English navy, Elizabeth, and all they stood for.
21:10Some weeks earlier, Elizabeth had cancelled all her public engagements.
21:15Her entire court had moved to Richmond Palace.
21:20Her country retreat outside London.
21:24It's the place she always feels safest.
21:27She calls it her warm box.
21:29And we can trace throughout her reign that she tends to go to Richmond
21:32when she's feeling particularly under threat.
21:36I'm as happy here as anywhere.
21:40Always so peaceful.
21:42As Elizabeth hid in Richmond, she surrounded herself with her menagerie of pets,
21:49her ladies-in-waiting, and the only person she could fully confide in.
21:55Her oldest companion, Blanche Parry.
21:58Elizabeth had lost her own mother, Anne Boleyn, when she was just two years and eight months old.
22:06Blanche had entered her household very soon afterwards.
22:10I think there's no doubt that she was almost a replacement mother figure for Elizabeth.
22:13She's somebody that Elizabeth trusts.
22:17And, of course, at this point, when Elizabeth is very, very fearful and apprehensive,
22:22it's trust and people that have been with her for years that she's going to increasingly rely on.
22:29As her navy prepared for battle, Elizabeth's ladies whiled away the hours.
22:34We can conjecture about how she might have felt.
22:51She's a woman.
22:53She's unmarried.
22:55She's childless, so there is no heir.
22:57And she is also governing a country where Catholicism is still present.
23:06The threat to Elizabeth wasn't just from without, it was from within.
23:10The great dread was that there was this huge fifth column of Catholics
23:14who were just ready to march under the papal banner.
23:19Even in her favourite palace, Elizabeth's life was still at risk.
23:23Just for an hour, Blanche, to breathe the air.
23:33No-one need know.
23:36It's safer within the embrace of these walls.
23:42Elizabeth has been constantly under threat of assassination.
23:47And then, of course, the Pope excommunicates her.
23:49He doesn't just sanction her death.
23:52He encourages it.
23:53He encourages her subjects to kill the Queen of England.
23:58Sometimes at night, I see such terrible things.
24:04Women.
24:06Children.
24:09Maids.
24:11Sucking babes.
24:14Murdered.
24:17Cast into the river.
24:20Turned red with blood.
24:22Meanwhile, at four o'clock that same afternoon,
24:36a small boat dropped anchor in Plymouth Harbour.
24:40It carried the news that England and Elizabeth had been dreading.
24:46The boat's captain, Thomas Fleming, had been patrolling in the western approaches of the Channel.
24:52At dawn that day, just off the Silly Isles, he'd seen the Spanish ships and he sailed back here to let the Navy know.
24:59The English fleet was caught off guard.
25:06Still not ready, it had to set sail to meet the Spanish threat.
25:11Back in 1588, you couldn't just turn a ship's engine on and go wherever you wanted to go, whenever you wanted to go.
25:28You were at the mercy of the conditions.
25:30Wind and tide had to be favourable.
25:31Today's a great example.
25:33There's now a howling gale blowing me back towards Plymouth and I'm fighting the tide too, which is flowing in.
25:39And those are similar conditions to the ones that Drake and the fleet faced that afternoon of 1588.
25:45This explains one of the most famous stories about Drake's actions that day.
25:52The old story goes that Sir Francis Drake was right up there on Plymouth Ho playing bowls when the news arrived that the Spanish armada had been sighted.
26:01The legend has it that he calmly said, well, we have time to finish the game and beat the Spaniards too.
26:08Sadly, that certainly is a legend.
26:10It was invented decades later, but if Sir Francis Drake had been playing bowls up there on that afternoon in 1588,
26:17he would have known as a consummate sailor full well that he might as well finish the game because there's nothing else he could do.
26:24The English fleet were effectively trapped by wind and tide right there in Plymouth Harbour.
26:30There was no way they could go anywhere very quickly.
26:32With the English fleet stuck in harbour, Elizabeth's kingdom lay undefended.
26:42For the armada, it was an incredible opportunity to move in early and deal a decisive, killer blow.
26:49For centuries, we had little idea what the Spanish commanders were thinking at this key moment until Professor Geoffrey Parker began to explore some boxes of old papers in Madrid.
27:04It was one of those amazing pieces of luck.
27:07There were four boxes in a series called Military Orders, which just didn't seem to fit.
27:14I was able to open them, undid the tape, wondering what I was going to find, and I opened them up, and they said, curious papers.
27:26And I thought, oh, this is going to be interesting.
27:31As Geoffrey painstakingly deciphered the near illegible handwriting, he realised he'd stumbled across a treasure trove that took him to the very heart of the armada.
27:44It took me a little while to figure out that this was the series of exchanges between the Duke of Medina Sidonia, the commander of the armada,
27:52and his second-in-command, the man called Juan MartÃnez de Recalde, and, in fact, it was Recalde's papers.
27:59It's very unusual, I later discovered unique, to find correspondence between two unit commanders during a naval battle,
28:06and it tells us why certain decisions were taken, why there was a disagreement on tactics, and it's not just any battle.
28:13This is the Spanish armada.
28:17Recalde.
28:18Sorry.
28:19This unique window into the Spanish command allows us, for the very first time, to recreate just what was going on as Philip's battle fleet approached Plymouth.
28:30With God's blessing, we will crush the heretics.
28:35There is no time to be wasted.
28:36Like his English counterpart, Lord High Admiral Howard, Medina Sidonia was a landed aristocrat,
28:43whose high social standing had put him in charge.
28:49Astonishingly, Medina Sidonia had never actually commanded a fleet at sea before.
28:55The landlubber was actually quite uncomfortable afloat.
28:58He wrote to King Philip saying,
29:00I don't do well at sea, and he begged Philip to give command of the armada to someone else,
29:04but the king was having none of it.
29:07Luckily, for the Spanish, like Howard,
29:10Medina Sidonia would be surrounded by his own group of experienced sea dogs.
29:13He even had his own drake, Recalde.
29:16Like Drake, Recalde had worked his way up through the ranks of the navy,
29:24and was an expert sailor, the most experienced commander of the entire armada.
29:29There is no time to be wasted.
29:31It is better to destroy the serpent in its egg.
29:36One letter reveals a startling plan.
29:39Recalde proposed to direct an immediate attack on the English navy
29:44while it lay tide-bound in Plymouth harbour.
29:49Recalde makes it clear in his rather accusatory letter to Medina Sidonia
29:53that there had been a council meeting the previous day.
29:55I propose we attack Plymouth.
29:59We have no idea of the enemy's strength.
30:02What we know is that the harbour is narrow and treacherous.
30:05A first strike would be decisive.
30:08You know the sea is better than I.
30:11What we need is success for the king.
30:16I'll drink to that.
30:17But despite Recalde's entreaty, the Spanish did not attack.
30:22Instead, they sailed on.
30:24Recalde clearly thinks that it's been agreed
30:27that they will indeed attack Plymouth,
30:29and he feels betrayed when they did not.
30:32He says, I don't know why we failed to enter Plymouth harbour.
30:38I feel downhearted, he writes.
30:40There are some very experienced people out there, meaning the English,
30:43and we behaved like novices and we made the wrong call.
30:51Surely, Sam, here's a great opportunity, isn't it?
30:53Because if the Spanish had attacked Plymouth, either blockaded it,
30:57or even, bolder still, come in and attacked the British ships at anchor,
31:01have they not got an opportunity to destroy the defence of England in a single blow?
31:05Absolutely. It is a clear opportunity.
31:07And if they'd changed course and headed for Plymouth, that great port in the West Country,
31:12then they certainly could have done something.
31:13It's not necessarily clear-cut if they could have removed the English fleet from the equation,
31:18because attacking a fleet at anchor is actually very difficult.
31:21But they could have certainly done something here in the south-west,
31:24perhaps attack Plymouth, perhaps land in Falmouth or Torbay.
31:27So we're agreed, then.
31:29It's a missed opportunity, and if it had been taken,
31:31it could have been the end of Tudor England.
31:33The experienced sailor, Recalde, resented Medina-Sidonia dismissing his advice.
31:43He believed that decisive action could have handed Spain a swift victory.
31:51And he might well have been right.
31:53The fact was, Medina-Sidonia had absolutely no intention
31:58of diverting from the plans given to him by Philip.
32:02If he had done so, the life of Queen Elizabeth and this story might virtually have been at an end.
32:09Far to the south, the architect of the Grand Invasion Plan continued to work.
32:27Unaware of exactly where his armada was.
32:33War of the developing tensions between his two top commanders.
32:37Philip's orders had left no room for opportunistic attacks.
32:57Carefully considered, he expected his plans to be carried out to the letter.
33:04Philip had a choice of two plans that he could adopt.
33:07The army came up with the idea of a quick incursion from the Spanish Netherlands,
33:12where the Duke of Parma, his main military commander, was based,
33:15with a large army to shoot across the Channel
33:17and stage a smash-and-grab raid, if you like, on England,
33:21and depose the Queen that way.
33:23His navy, naturally, as navies do,
33:25wanted a seaborne force, an armada,
33:27to set off from Spain and conquer England that way.
33:30Philip had been given two choices, but he'd taken neither.
33:36Instead, he'd combined them into one seemingly invincible master plan.
33:44Philip's master plan was for his ships to sail up the Channel as quickly as possible.
33:51Now, they would go the whole length of the Channel,
33:54and the idea was for them to land here, at Margate,
33:58where they would join forces, in his words,
34:00join hands with the Duke of Parma,
34:02who had a vast army in the Spanish-controlled Netherlands.
34:05Now, the Duke of Parma was Philip's nephew,
34:07and he was one of the greatest soldiers of his generation.
34:10The armada would then cover that army,
34:13marching up the Thames to London.
34:16It's a hugely ambitious and complex plan, isn't it, Sam?
34:19But one thing is not in any doubt,
34:21if that veteran Spanish army gets over to England,
34:24we've pretty much got nothing left to oppose them with.
34:27And it would do three major things for Philip.
34:29It would consolidate his empire,
34:31he could realise his dreams of a Catholic Europe,
34:33and he could free the seas of irritating English piracy.
34:37On the evening of July the 29th,
34:44the armada sailed on.
34:46Its mission clear.
34:49To join hands in the Channel
34:51with a battle-hardened Spanish army.
34:55And invade.
34:57Army and navy together.
35:00Their might would be unstoppable.
35:07Another day passes.
35:16With no news.
35:18Take confidence from that.
35:21In Madrid, and in Richmond,
35:24Philip and Elizabeth prepared for bed.
35:28Your bed is safe, Your Majesty.
35:31I would hope so.
35:37Both monarchs prayed for the blessing of an even greater power.
35:43Philip was intensely religious.
35:45He had a cell-like bedroom, surrounded by pictures of the saints.
35:53And the Escorial wasn't just a palace,
35:56it was a monastery, and a church, and a mausoleum.
35:59And it seemed for him like it was an extra weapon
36:02in his crusade against Elizabeth.
36:04Philip believed fervently that God was on his side.
36:12How could he fail?
36:13How could he fail?
36:16And he believed that it was his own personal duty
36:20to try and save those English Catholics
36:23and revenge all those Catholic martyrs
36:26who had been slaughtered not only by Elizabeth,
36:29but by her father as well, Henry VIII.
36:32In these last and worst days of the world,
36:37when wars and seditions with grievous persecutions...
36:41Elizabeth was by inclination moderate,
36:43she didn't want her forced consciences,
36:45but she did expect obedience from her subjects,
36:48and she was devout.
36:51The love of my people has appeared firm,
36:54and the devices of mine enemies frustrate.
36:58Elizabeth made much of the fact that God was on her side.
37:03Philip was on the side of the devil,
37:06and that's how the contest was going to be played out.
37:09World without end.
37:12Amen.
37:13Amen.
37:14Dawn.
37:42As morning prayers were sung,
37:43the Armada continued its journey into the Channel.
37:53All was calm,
37:55but the Spanish were wary of their easy progress.
38:00There was no sight of the English Navy
38:02and no way of knowing if it was still anchored in Plymouth
38:06or preparing to attack at any moment.
38:10In fact, the English fleet had left port.
38:20Overnight, the tide had turned, the wind had changed,
38:22they sailed down here out of Plymouth South.
38:25But they had no intention of taking on the Spanish head-on.
38:29Instead, they were going to try something far more cunning.
38:32The English realised that the Armada was too big to take on directly.
38:37So their plan was to stop the Spanish from taking any harbour deep enough to use as a base,
38:46without getting themselves blown to pieces in the process.
38:51You think that the Armada wants to take a deep-water port on the south coast of England, maybe Plymouth,
39:00but their plan is to keep moving up, constantly driving up towards Palmer's army.
39:05You're absolutely right.
39:06The English are preoccupied with the possibility the Spanish are going to take a deep-water port.
39:11They must prevent it.
39:12First of all, get them away from Plymouth Sound.
39:14But once they're out into the open,
39:16they're then going to put their master plan into operation,
39:18which is to get behind the Armada,
39:20drive it up the channel, hopefully out the other end,
39:23and harry them like a terrier.
39:25With the quality of our seamanship and the compactness of our formation,
39:28that's actually all you can do.
39:30The English fleet's first caught sight of the Spanish Armada
39:39on Saturday the 30th of July at 3 p.m.
39:42The weather had turned foul, and so one of the lookouts was on Howard's ship.
39:45He was up in the crow's nest, high up in the mast.
39:47He was peering through the mist and the rain,
39:50and he finally caught sight of the Spanish ships.
39:53Just out there.
40:00It was now time to turn plans into action
40:04and let the harrying begin.
40:09But would it be enough?
40:10Or would Philip's great Armada manage to successfully join hands
40:14with the vast Spanish army and invade?
40:18Riders' dispatch from Plymouth the previous day
40:27reached Richmond Palace 24 hours later.
40:37The news was delivered first
40:39to Elizabeth's most trusted ministers,
40:43Sir Francis Walsingham
40:44and Lord Burley.
40:48The two dominant figures in Elizabeth's court,
41:03the Tweedledum and Tweedledee, if you like,
41:06were Burley and Walsingham.
41:08They sailed with more than 120 ships.
41:12A might and malice to match.
41:18Burley was the most powerful man in England.
41:22He'd known Elizabeth since she was a princess,
41:24and they'd had tough times together.
41:26She trusted him, and she relied on him
41:28to speak truth to power.
41:31She called him her spirit.
41:33He wanted to avoid a confrontation,
41:35because it was incredibly expensive.
41:36He was Lord High Treasurer.
41:37He wanted to keep his hands on that purse.
41:42Walsingham was Elizabeth's spymaster.
41:44He'd set up this incredibly sophisticated intelligence network.
41:49And because of his experiences,
41:50he'd seen at first hand the terror
41:53that Catholic Europe could contain.
41:56He was always advising Elizabeth
41:57towards an aggressive foreign policy.
42:00Elizabeth's biggest problem was,
42:02I think, that she listened to both opinions,
42:04for action and for inaction,
42:05and dithered between the two of them.
42:09Elizabeth vacillated.
42:13Let's remember she is a woman in a man's world.
42:17When she makes up her mind,
42:18she's stuck with the results of that decision.
42:21So she looked at a decision from lots of different ways
42:25and frequently changed her mind once she'd made one.
42:29Gentlemen.
42:30We sued for peace, but to no avail.
42:34I pray you, speak plainly.
42:38The time has come.
42:40A holy war.
42:43I did not desire this.
42:47But I did expect it.
42:50Elizabeth naturally was very cautious.
42:53She did not like spending money.
42:55She naturally favoured Burleigh's very conservative foreign policy.
43:01But equally, she was justifiably aware
43:05of the threat posed to her safety
43:07by the powers of Catholic Europe.
43:10What is clear is that we cannot afford to stand idle.
43:14We must strike.
43:16And strike hard.
43:17And if that fails,
43:18when we have nothing left to strike with...
43:20With the Armada looming,
43:23Elizabeth knew the time for Havering was over.
43:27She really had nowhere else to go.
43:29She knew she'd have to fight.
43:31And those ships,
43:33those wooden walls defending England,
43:36were the only thing between her and oblivion.
43:40Your Majesty, you must meet this battle
43:43for the sake of England.
43:46For you.
43:47Then we shall prevail.
43:52For God's favour is with me.
43:55Then God will help us all.
44:00Let all of England
44:02taste victory.
44:05Out in the Channel,
44:19both sides were preparing for battle.
44:22Many, no doubt, were praying.
44:24Some were checking weapons and ammunition.
44:27The ships on both sides were bristling with cannon.
44:30Most ships had between 20 to 50 cannon.
44:33And they would be firing cannonballs.
44:36Some light up six pounds,
44:38others up to 60 pounds of iron,
44:41waiting to crash through wooden hulls and rigging.
44:49Despite the sheer might of the Armada,
44:52the English did have some reason for hope.
44:54superior weapons created by new English technology.
45:03The Great Revolution in the 16th century
45:06was an amazing technological advance.
45:08It led to the Industrial Revolution,
45:10and this was the introduction
45:11of the blast furnace for cast iron.
45:17Traditionally, cannons had been hand-made,
45:20the metal crafted into shape.
45:23Cannonballs had been hand-carved from stone.
45:29Blast furnace enables you to melt large quantities of cast iron.
45:34It flows like water, so you can pour it into moulds.
45:39You can make repeated items exactly the same.
45:43It was cannonballs first.
45:45It was then used to make the first cannon in England.
45:50These iron guns were much cheaper.
45:53They could be made fairly consistently,
45:55and they could be issued with large quantities
45:58of consistent, standardised cannonballs.
46:03England was ahead of the rest of Europe.
46:08New technology furnished the English navy with cannon
46:11that were more accurate and more powerful
46:14than those of the Spanish.
46:17But would that be enough
46:19to even break the tight formation of the Armada,
46:22let alone defeat it?
46:25First light.
46:38And a Spanish lookout finally spotted the English navy.
46:43But it wasn't where the Spanish were expecting it to be.
46:50The Spanish were expecting the English to appear in front of them
46:53to contest their march up the channel.
46:56But instead, the English did something quite different.
46:58They split into two groups, came round behind the Spanish,
47:02and prepared to launch a pincer attack.
47:06Medina-Sidonia ordered the Spanish royal standard to be raised,
47:11the signal for the Armada to get into battle formation,
47:15a crescent of ships stretching for over two miles.
47:18Then at 9am, in a piece of old-fashioned chivalry,
47:22Howard decided to officially throw down the gauntlet to the Spanish.
47:25He sent ahead a small ship, appropriately called the Disdain,
47:28which fired one shot into the midst of the Armada,
47:31and then quickly turned round and headed back to rejoin the English fleet.
47:36With that, the first battle against the Spanish Armada had begun.
47:40Now, we surprise you by our position, Sam,
47:50but the English have also got another trick up their sleeve,
47:53the way they're going to fight.
47:54Oh, yeah.
47:55Their tactics are to use new and more effective guns,
47:59but also the way they're going to use them.
48:01This is going to surprise the Spaniards.
48:03Traditionally, what the Spaniards are expecting
48:05is to have boarding actions
48:07where the ships will come up close alongside,
48:09the soldiers will pile in with grappling hooks,
48:11there'll be lots of stabbing and fighting and slashing,
48:13and they'll settle the matter in hand-to-hand combat.
48:16That's exactly what they expect,
48:18and they want the English to do.
48:20Now, that's exactly what the English didn't want to do.
48:22They didn't want to close with the Spanish ships,
48:24which were bigger, and they were packed with more men.
48:27Instead, they wanted to stand off,
48:29keep their distance, and blast them with cannon fire.
48:32Now, to us today, that seems entirely logical.
48:35But the Spanish,
48:36it's pretty much the first time they've ever seen this.
48:43Come on!
48:45The Spanish soldiers were stuck on their decks
48:48and could only taunt an enemy
48:51who refused to come close.
48:56Now, the one problem you're going to have
48:58is that if there's one thing that the Spanish are good at,
49:00it's maintaining close formation under hostile attack.
49:04It's how the Spanish Empire works.
49:05They usually protect their silver convoys
49:07going across to the New World.
49:09This time, they're protecting their vulnerable troop ships
49:12in the centre of this crescent formation.
49:14And they're very good at seamanship.
49:16They're good at maintaining their position
49:18in this tight crescent formation.
49:19It's absolutely true.
49:21It's a formidable formation,
49:22but it has a couple of weaknesses,
49:24and I'll show you where they are.
49:25These two arms of the crescent,
49:27if we can use our ships to close up pretty effectively,
49:30and then we can fire our guns at a distance
49:33in a continual rolling fire.
49:35And if you have enough of these ships
49:36sailing one after the other after the other
49:39using their broadsides,
49:40you've almost got a primitive machine gun.
49:42Drake and Howard lined up their squadrons
49:59and launched a relentless barrage into the armada.
50:03This is one of the first times this had ever happened
50:16on this scale in European naval history.
50:19Over the next couple of hours,
50:20the English managed to fire up around 2,000 shots.
50:23The Spanish only got in 750 in reply.
50:30What people were witnessing here
50:31was a revolution in military tactics.
50:42The English called off the attack after two hours,
50:46having driven the armada beyond Plymouth.
50:49But the reality was the armada
50:51had never been planning to enter Plymouth.
50:54And for all their rapid cannon fire,
50:57the English hadn't actually inflicted that much damage.
51:01So often, the details of historic battles are lost.
51:09But because of Professor Geoffrey Parker's discoveries,
51:12we know that the armada's second-in-command,
51:15Ricalde, immediately understood the English tactics.
51:21One of the things I most admire about Ricalde,
51:24he sees instantly what the English are up to,
51:26and he writes to Medina Sidonia, saying,
51:29you know, we're not doing well here.
51:31And he says, in future, we need to make sure
51:34that our enemies don't consume as little by little,
51:37poco a poco,
51:39and without risk to themselves.
51:41We should rather put all our eggs in one basket,
51:44and the sooner the better
51:45for this fleet and for the army.
51:47So Ricalde's strategy is turn the fleet around
51:52and hit the English hard now.
51:55But once again,
51:57Medina Sidonia ignored Ricalde's advice
52:00and dutifully sailed on
52:02following Philip's master plan.
52:04After the Battle of Plymouth,
52:14for all the smoke and noise,
52:16neither side had lost a single ship.
52:20But that was about to change.
52:25All that day,
52:27local people lined these cliffs around Plymouth,
52:30watching the great battle out at sea
52:32for the fate of England.
52:32For those who've never heard anything louder
52:35than a church bell or a clap of thunder,
52:38the noise of these several hundred cannon
52:40reverberating off these hills
52:42must have been almost deafening.
52:44But the loudest explosion of all
52:46would come that afternoon at four o'clock.
52:53One Spanish ship, the San Salvador, blew up.
52:57Now, we don't know why or how,
52:58but there are some accounts
52:59that there was a disgruntled Dutch or German sailor on board
53:02who set fire to the powder store
53:04and then legged it overboard.
53:05In any case, 200 Spanish sailors drowned.
53:08It was a massive own goal.
53:10And it's not the only disaster that day
53:11because that same afternoon,
53:13a second ship, the Rosario,
53:15another of your most powerful fighting ships,
53:18bumps into first one ship,
53:19then another.
53:20The foremast comes down into the main mast
53:22and completely disables the steering.
53:25Medina Stonia would love to have gone back
53:27to rescue the Rosario,
53:29but he didn't feel he could deviate just one little bit
53:31from the master plan given to him by King Philip.
53:34So reluctantly, he led the Armada on up the channel.
53:38The Rosario was left to its fate.
53:47Raquel Day was appalled
53:49and vented his feelings in a hastily written letter
53:52discovered by Professor Geoffrey Parker
53:54over 400 years later.
54:00He's absolutely furious.
54:02I can't begin to tell Your Excellency
54:04how grievously I felt the loss of the ship.
54:07And then he goes on to say,
54:09if we'd laid two, if we'd drawn in sail,
54:12the situation could have been remedied
54:14in the position we were in.
54:15We could have done it.
54:18I think this is the point where perhaps
54:20Raquel Day is beginning to think
54:21Medina Stonia is not the right man for the job.
54:25As the Armada sailed on,
54:27shadowed by the English fleet,
54:29the commanders took stock of the day's events.
54:32Medina Stonia hadn't been able
54:36to get close to the English navy
54:38and he'd already lost two great ships.
54:47Meanwhile, Howard and Drake
54:49were no happier,
54:52all too aware of the formidable strength
54:54of their enemy.
54:56Two ships down.
54:59Better we dealt the deadly blows.
55:02We'll pluck their feathers little by little.
55:07That's a lot of plucking.
55:11And they were already concerned
55:12by a serious problem
55:14caused by their rapid-firing tactics.
55:22Quite simply, the English were lacking
55:24crucial ammunition,
55:26powder and shot for their cannon.
55:27So much so that that very night
55:29Howard wrote to London.
55:31He wrote to Walsingham
55:32asking for more supplies.
55:35But he knew that in all likelihood
55:36that request would fall on deaf ears.
55:44Elizabeth's finances
55:45are in a parlous state.
55:47The coffers are bare
55:49and Elizabeth doesn't want to go
55:50to Parliament to ask for more tax revenue.
55:53In a sense, she doesn't want to be in hot
55:55to Parliament.
56:01Brazen-faced jack and ape.
56:03Please remove the monkey, Bess.
56:07Majesty.
56:08He takes what is mine
56:09without fear nor favour.
56:11She had spent quite a lot of money
56:14on building up
56:15brand-new ships for her navy,
56:17but now she didn't really want
56:18to spend money
56:19on ammunition
56:21or indeed food
56:22that had to feed her sailors
56:24because her cupboard was bare.
56:27To the tower
56:28with the impertinent ape.
56:29A jest, that was all.
56:41Even at this time of great crisis,
56:43Elizabeth was failing
56:45to properly provide for her navy.
56:48She was clearly hoping
56:49that it would defeat
56:49the Spanish Armada
56:50without any further
56:51financial assistance.
56:53She was basically sending it
56:54into battle
56:55with one arm tied
56:56behind its back.
56:59Being short of ammunition
57:01was bad,
57:02but things were about
57:04to get much worse.
57:06That evening,
57:08Howard ordered Drake
57:08to lead the English navy
57:10during the night
57:11with a light
57:12on the stern of his ship.
57:14The Revenge.
57:16But,
57:16ever the Maverick,
57:18Drake had other plans.
57:21And he extinguished the flame.
57:26He knew exactly where
57:28the Rosario lay stricken.
57:30And for such a seasoned pirate,
57:32the fully stocked Spanish ship
57:34was simply too much
57:36of a temptation.
57:39It was an extraordinary
57:40dereliction of duty,
57:41but Drake,
57:42in typical fashion,
57:43was about to stumble
57:44across a great treasure trove.
57:46Gold and ammunition,
57:47but something even more
57:48important than that.
57:49Intelligence.
57:50Intelligence that was
57:51to give the English
57:52a hope
57:53that they could,
57:54in fact,
57:54defeat this,
57:55the greatest naval force
57:57on the planet.
57:57keep their country
57:59independent and Protestant
58:00and their Queen Elizabeth
58:01alive.
58:08Next time,
58:09the Armada
58:11sails ever closer.
58:14Remember,
58:15speed!
58:15Drake tries out
58:18new tactics
58:19and the battles
58:21for England
58:21grow ever more
58:23intense.
58:23cisgender need to be
58:33high compared to the
58:37Aber awakened
58:37twenty love
58:38to corpses
58:40ever
58:40and
58:41the
58:41Jesus
58:42who
58:42got
58:45me
58:46here
58:46in the
58:47seven years.
58:48agre
58:48around the
58:49sea,
58:49me
58:50even
58:50Let me
58:50go to the
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59:01
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