Francisco de Cuellar - Spanish Armada

Spanish Armada

The Spanish Armada in Ireland suffered heavy losses during an extraordinary season of storms in the autumn of 1588. Cuellar had been captain of the San Pedro when the small ship broke the Armada formation in the North Sea. For this disobedience he was sentenced to death by hanging by the Major General of the fleet, Francisco de Bobadilla. Cuellar was sent to the galleon, San Juan de Sicilia, for execution of the sentence by the Auditor General Martin de Aranda.

Sentence was not executed, and Cuellar remained on board until the galleon, a member of the Levant squadron, which suffered heavy losses on the return voyage (less than 400 survivors returned out of 4,000 who set sail), anchored along the Irish coast, a mile off Streedagh Strand in modern County Sligo, in the company of two other galleons. On the fifth day at anchor all three ships were driven onto the strand and broken in pieces. Out of the 1,000 men crewing the ships, 300 survived.

Local inhabitants beat, robbed and stripped those who came ashore. But Cuellar, having clung to a loose hatch, floated to shore unobserved and concealed himself amongst rushes. He was in poor shape, and was soon joined by a naked fellow survivor who was dumbstruck and soon died. Cuellar kept drifting in and out of consciousness: at one point he and his fellow survivor were discovered by two armed men, who covered them with rushes before going to the shore to loot. At another point, he saw 200 horsemen riding across the strand.

When Cuellar crawled out he saw 800 corpses littered on the sand, with ravens and wild dogs feeding on them. He moved on to the Abbey of Staad, a small church which had been torched by the English after its friars had fled. He saw twelve of his countrymen hanging from nooses tied to iron bars of the windows within the church ruins. A local woman who was driving cattle into hiding in the woods warned him to stay out of the road, and he then met two naked Spanish soldiers, who informed him that English soldiers had killed 100 captive survivors.

The Spaniards saw 400 corpses on another strand. When they stopped to bury the bodies of two officers they were confronted by four locals who demanded the remainder of de Cuellar's clothes. Another local ordered them to leave him alone and directed the Spaniards to his own village. They made their way there barefoot in cold weather, through a wood where they met two young men travelling with an old man and a young woman: the young men attacked de Cuellar, and he received a leg wound from a knife-thrust, before the old man intervened.

De Cuellar was stripped of his clothing, and a gold chain worth 1,000 ducats and 45 gold crowns were taken from him. The young woman ensured his clothes were returned, and took a locket containing relics, which she hung about her neck, before departing. Then a boy came to treat his wounds with a poultice and brought food of milk, butter and oaten bread.

Heeding the boy's warning not to approach the village, de Cuellar limped past and went on his way alone, living off berries and watercress. He was set upon by a group of men who beat him hard and stripped him of his clothes; he covered himself with a skirt of plaited ferns and rushes. He came to a deserted settlement at the edge of a lake, where he was surprised to find three other Spaniards. Having stayed some time at the settlement, the group met a young man who spoke Latin and directed them to the territory of Sir Brian O'Rourke in Leitrim.