Battle of Almansa 25th April 1707

The Battle of Almansa was fought during the War of the Spanish Succession. It took place on 25 April 1707 between the forces of Philip V of Spain, the Bourbon claimant to the Spanish throne, and his Habsburg rival, Archduke Charles of Austria.

The Bourbon army was commanded by the Duke of Berwick, the natural son of James II of England, while Habsburg forces were led by Henri de Massue, Earl of Galway, an exiled French Huguenot.

Campaigning in Spain and size of the armies involved were limited by logistics to a greater extent than Flanders or Italy. Reliance on local sources for forage and other supplies limited operations in arid areas like Northern Spain.  Control of the seas allowed the Allies to successfully conduct short-term offensives outside the coastal areas but lack of popular support meant they could not hold territory.

The Grand Alliance secured an operations base in Lisbon when Peter II of Portugal changed sides in May 1703, and the following March, Archduke Charles arrived to head a land campaign. The Bourbons won a series of minor victories along the Spanish/Portugese border, offset by the British capture of Gibraltar.

As a result of the ‘Pact of Genoa’ between Catalan representatives and England in 1705 a second front was opened in the north-east Spain.  With the Allied capture of Barcelona and Valencia, Toulon as the only major port available to the Bourbons in the Western Mediterranean.  Philip’s attempt to retake Barcelona in May 1706 failed, while his absence allowed an Allied force to take Madrid and Zaragossa, but they could not be resupplied so far from their bases and were forced to withdraw.

Allied victories at Ramillies in May 1706 and Turin in September forced the French onto the defensive and Galway sought to take advantage by launching a new offensive in 1707. However, the Earl of Peterborough, Allied commander in Spain, ordered his forces in Catalonia to consolidate their position, rather than combine; when Berwick began his advance on the city of Valencia, Galway moved to intercept him but was badly outnumbered.

The Bourbon army of about 25,000 contained roughly equal numbers of Spanish and French troops.  The bulk of Galway’s army of about 16,000 were Portuguese or English including Lieut. Colonel Thomas Alnutt’s Regiment of Foot (later the 36^th Foot) with Dutch, German, and French Huguenot elements.

The Allies broke camp early on 25 April and after a long and tiring march reached the town of Almansa. Berwick had drawn up his army in two lines, just in front of the town, his infantry in the centre and the French and Spanish cavalry on the wings. Although heavily outnumbered, Galway commenced his attack in mid-afternoon after a short artillery exchange.

His British infantry successfully drove back the Bourbon centre but a gap opened between them and Portuguese troops on the right, under the Marquess of Minas. Seeing this, the Franco-Spanish cavalry attacked.  The Portuguese fought bravely for some time but eventually collapsed and fled. Their retreat was covered by a few squadrons under Das Minas’ personal command.

The Allied centre was now attacked on three sides.  Alnutt’s Regiment behaved with great gallantry but were nearly annihilated. The Colonel was wounded and taken prisoner with twelve other officers.  Using his remaining cavalry, Galway successfully extracted some of his infantry, but 13 battalions lost contact with the rest of the army. Pursued by the Spanish cavalry, these took up a defensive position some 8 miles from the battlefield, but surrendered the next morning.

The Franco-Spanish losses were in the region of 3,000 killed, with the same number wounded, while the Allies suffered 4,000 casualties and 5,000 prisoners.