Background
The town of Fuengirola has been an important trade town since the Middle Ages. To defend it against invasion from the sea, the Moors had built a stone castle on a hill between the Mediterranean and the Fuengirola River. During the Peninsular War the area of Costa del Sol was considered of secondary importance and it was seized by the French forces with little opposition and until 1810 the partisan activity in the region was close to none. That is why, after suffering losses in the fights in the interior, some Polish units of the Duchy of Warsaw were sent there in October 1810 to serve as a garrison and to rest.
Sohail Castle was manned by more than one hundred Polish soldiers from the 4th Infantry Regiment. The unit was commanded by Captain Franciszek Młokosiewicz. Similar small garrisons were placed in the nearby towns of Mijas (60 infantrymen under Lieutenant Eustachy Chełmicki) and Alhaurin (200 infantrymen and 40 dragoons under Major Bronisz). All of these forces formed part of the French Corps of General Horace Sébastiani stationed at Málaga. The corps numbered some 10,000 men located in southern Andalusia to prevent the Spanish partisans from receiving arms from Gibraltar.
In the autumn of 1810, the British Major General Lord Blayney decided to lead an expeditionary force from Gibraltar towards the port of Málaga and seize it by surprise. The beaches near the small fortress of Fuengirola seemed a perfect landing place for his forces. The Spanish partisans informed the British about the weakness of the defenders and lack of reserves. In October 1810 Blayney gathered a field force of 2/89th Regiment of Foot, a battalion of international deserters from the French army, an artillery unit, naval gun crews and a Spanish Toledo Regiment. The initial British-Spanish expedition numbered some 1700 men, excluding naval staff and crew. They boarded a small fleet consisting of two frigates, (HMS Topaze and HMS Sparrowhawk), five gunboats, several brigs, and transport sloops.
Read more about this topic: Battle Of Fuengirola
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