Pensacola, Battle of

Battle of Pensacola, part of the conflict between the Spanish and the British over West Florida in 1781. Bernardo de Gálvez reached Pensacola, the British capital of West Florida, with 3,155 troops on 9 March and quickly captured the British battery on Santa Rosa Island. Reinforcements from Mobile and New Orleans soon arrived. After successfully leading the Spanish ships into the bay, Gálvez set up his main encampment on Sutton's Lagoon (Bayou Chico). The British attempted unsuccessfully to stop the Spanish advance. The Spaniards dug entrenchments from their main camp toward the British redoubts and Fort George. Again, the British troops and their indigenous allies failed to stop them. Some 4,700 or more Spanish reinforcements from Cuba, including French troops, reached Pensacola on 19 April, bringing the total to a possible 8,000 on land and about 6,800 on the ships. The Spaniards completed their advanced battery by dawn on 8 May. Then followed a heavy bombardment of the Queen's Redoubt during which the powder magazine exploded, killing many of the British soldiers. The Spaniards quickly occupied the redoubt and bombarded the Prince of Wales Redoubt and Fort George. That afternoon the British proposed a truce. John Campbell formally surrendered on 10 May. Gálvez's three successful campaigns in British West Florida—Baton Rouge (1779), Mobile (1780) and Pensacola (1781)—materially aided the Americans during the Revolution and played an important role in the return of the Floridas to Spain at the end of the war in 1783.

See alsoGálvez, Bernardo de .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

John Walton Caughey, Bernardo de Gálvez in Louisiana, 1776–1783 (1934; repr. 1972), pp. 187-214.

Joseph Barton Starr, Tories, Dons, and Rebels: The American Revolution in West Florida (1976), pp. 175-215; YO SOLO: The Battle Journal of Bernardo de Gálvez During the American Revolution, translated by A. E. Montemayor (1978).

William S. Coker and Hazel P. Coker, The Siege of Pensacola, 1781, in Maps (1981).

Additional Bibliography

Beerman, Eric. España y la independencia de los Estados Unidos. Madrid: Editorial MAPFRE, 1992.

Chavez, Thomas E. Spain and the Independence of the United States: An Intrinsic Gift. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2002.

LaFarelle, Lorenzo G. Bernardo de Gálvez: Hero of the American Revolution. Austin, TX: Eakin Press, 1992.

Reparaz, Carmen de. I Alone: Bernardo de Gálvez and the Taking of Pensacola in 1781: A Spanish Contribution to the Independence of the United States. Madrid: Ediciones de Cultura Hispánica, 1993.

Valery S, Rafael. Miranda en Pensacola: Génesis de la independencia hispanoamericana. Miranda: Biblioteca de Autores y Temas Mirandinos, 1991.

                                     William S. Coker