Great siege of Gibraltar 1779: The British Refuse to Surrender their Sliver of the Mediterranean
Jumping all the way up to the American Revolutionary War (American War of Independence) we have one of the last great sieges of the early modern period before the 1800’s and Napoleon stole the show. All the above sieges were indeed sieges operations, taking days or months, but this is the longest, by far, at over three years.
Gibraltar is a beautiful peninsula on South of Spain that guards the entrance to the Mediterranean. It features the “Rock of Gibraltar” a massive cliff formation that gives tremendous views of the sea and the narrow land approach. The British had owned the small, isolated patch of land for 75 years when the American Revolution was at its height.
The British were deeply invested in the Americas so Spain figured that they could take the chance and take back Gibraltar as it was seen to rightfully belong to Spain. Gibraltar was a near unassailable rock, so the Spaniards set in for a long siege in 1779. About 5,000 British, Corsican and Hanoverian combined troops manned the defenses as the population gathered what food they could. The Spanish, supported by the French, had about 14,000 men and several dozen ships.
Though the Spaniards attempted several probing assaults throughout the year, the Brit’s real enemy was hunger, specifically scurvy. In the spring of 1780, the first supply fleet snuck through the Spanish blockade with food, produce, and men.
The next spring’s food fleet again slipped past the Spanish fleet and the Spanish retaliated by launching endless salvos at the unloading docks. The British fleet left, taking most of the civilians with them. The British could now hold for upwards of another year without resupply. Massive networks of tunnels painstakingly carved into the cliffs gave the British multiple firing lanes on the land side. The cannon bays were protected by solid rock and too high for the Spaniards to retaliate effectively. These cave networks are still a breathtaking site today.
As the Spaniards realized the futility of starvation tactics, they decided to inch their lines forward. The night before a major planned assault the British decided to take the initiative and rushed from the rock in the dead of night in a surprise attack.
The attack sent many of the Spaniards fleeing, leaving dozens of pristine artillery pieces for the Brits. With an impending counterattack, the British couldn’t take these guns, so they spiked them before running back to the rock. Spiking a gun meant hammering a thin nail into the hole used to light the powder. A simple tactic, but it was nearly impossible to remove without destroying the cannon.
The grand assault was delayed by this attack, but was restarted a few days later. On September 13th, 1782, the Spaniards and French attacked from the sea. They had constructed several gunboats, floating artillery platforms, to breach some of the sea walls.
Seeing these massive and easy targets, the British used red-hot cannonballs and fired them at these ships. This caused several fires and many of the ships sank. The British were greatly aided by an invention developed during the first years of the siege, a cannon mount that would allow a cannon to be aimed downwards for the first time in history.
The great assault failed horribly and soon after another supply fleet arrived. The Spanish would keep up the siege for a few more months before finally giving up. Facing American rebels in a war that became bigger than the British could imagine, Gibraltar finally seemed ripe for the taking. All of Spain sits in Gibraltar’s backyard, but it could not be conquered.
Gibraltar would be immensely important in the next centuries of British warfare. During WWII, Gibraltar was essential to the Allied war effort. Countless bombings, assaults, and covert options failed to capture or weaken the tiny but mighty British base, and it was a common naval rally point during the war.