Battle at The Village
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Battle at The Village | |||||||
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Part of the Gulf Coast campaign of the American Revolutionary War | |||||||
Detail from a 1776 map showing West Florida | |||||||
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Spain | |||||||
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Strength | |||||||
190 troops | |||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
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The Battle at The Village, also known as the Second Battle of Mobile, fought on January 7, 1781, was a failed British attempt to recapture a Spanish fortification at "The Village," during the American Revolutionary War. The attack was led by Waldecker Colonel Johann von Hanxleden who was killed in the attempt.
Background
After Spain declared war on Great Britain in 1779, Bernardo de Gálvez, the governor of Louisiana, immediately began offensive operations to gain control of neighboring West Florida, which included parts of today's Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. In September 1779 he gained complete control over the lower Mississippi River by capturing Fort Bute and shortly afterwards obtaining the surrender of the remaining enemy forces in the region following the Battle of Baton Rouge. He followed up these successes with the capture of Mobile on March 14, 1780, following a brief siege. (In the spring of 1781, Gálvez would go on to capture Pensacola, West Florida's administrative capital.)
After the victory in Mobile, the Spanish built an entrenched outpost on the east side of Mobile Bay. This outpost was designed to defend "The Village," a settlement that occupied the eastern ferry terminus on Mobile Bay for the main road between Mobile and Pensacola. When the British troops arrived on January 7, the outpost was manned by about 200 men of the Principe Regiment, under Ramón de Castro y Gutiérrez.
Prelude
The British garrison nearest to Mobile was in West Florida's capital, Pensacola. The commander, General
Emboldened by the destruction of a Gálvez-led expedition against Pensacola by a
Battle
Hanxleden's force arrived near the outpost late on January 6, and made a dawn attack the next morning. Forty of the Spaniards made a dash for a boat anchored nearby, but the British cut many of them down with a musket volley. Indians from the expedition then followed the Spaniards into the water to collect scalps. The remaining Spanish coolly opened fire on the British, killing Johann von Hanxleden and nineteen others. Ramón de Castro y Gutiérrez led a successful bayonet charge against 3 to 1 odds. The British troops then disengaged and retreated.[2]
Aftermath
The British retreated back to Pensacola, and made no further attempts against Mobile. Spanish authorities in
Legacy
The battlefield and the settlement of "The Village" have, in many ways, been lost to history. Though located near Village Point in Daphne, Alabama, the surrounding area has seen a heavy amount of residential development that has long since leveled the battlefield or any historical structures related to the settlement.
See also
References
- ISBN 978-0-8061-3916-6. Retrieved March 25, 2011.
- ^ a b Nester (2004), p. 291
- ^ Hamilton (1897), p. 256
Bibliography
- Caughey, John Walton (1972). Bernardo de Gálvez in Louisiana, 1776-1783. Gretna, LA: Pelican. OCLC 539028.
- Marley, David (1998). Wars of the Americas: a chronology of armed conflict in the New World, 1492 to the present. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO. OCLC 39024726.
- Hamilton, Peter Joseph (1897). Colonial Mobile: An Historical Study, Largely from Original Sources, of the Alabama-Tombigbee Basin from the Discovery of Mobile Bay in 1519 Until the Demolition of Fort Charlotte in 1821. New York: Houghton Mifflin. OCLC 9296191.
- Nester, William R (2004). The frontier war for American independence. Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books. OCLC 52963301.
- Holmes, Jack D.L. (July 1976). "Alabama's Bloodiest Day of the American Revolution Counterattack at the Village, January 7, 1781" (PDF). Alabama Review. 29 (3): 207–219. Retrieved December 30, 2020.