Battle of Cape St. Vincent (1797)
The Battle of Cape St. Vincent was one of the opening battles of the Anglo-Spanish War (1796–1808), as part of the French Revolutionary Wars, where a British fleet under Admiral Sir John Jervis defeated a greatly superior Spanish fleet under Admiral Don José de Córdoba y Ramos near Cape St. Vincent, Portugal.
The Battle of Cape St. Vincent, 14 February 1797 by Robert Cleveley
Admiral Sir John Jervis
José de Córdoba
Battle off Cape St. Vincent, 1797 by William Adolphus Knell
John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent
Admiral of the Fleet John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent was an admiral in the Royal Navy and Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom. Jervis served throughout the latter half of the 18th century and into the 19th, and was an active commander during the Seven Years' War, American War of Independence, French Revolutionary War and the Napoleonic Wars. He is best known for his victory at the 1797 Battle of Cape Saint Vincent, from which he earned his titles, and as a patron of Horatio Nelson.
The Earl of St Vincent, by Lemuel Francis Abbott, 1795, courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery
A View of the taking of Quebec 13 Sep 1759 by Captain Hervey Smith
Captain John Jervis by Francis Cotes, 1769
Howe's Relief of Gibraltar 1782 by Richard Paton