Battle of the Îles Saint-Marcouf

Battle of the Îles Saint-Marcouf
Part of the French Revolutionary Wars
Attack of St Marcou, I. Scatcherd
Date 7 May 1798 Location Îles Saint-Marcouf, Normandy coast Result British victory
Belligerents
Great Britain	France
Commanders and leaders
Lieutenant Charles Papps Price	Captain Muskein
Strength
500 marines & sailors, 17 guns	5,000 soldiers, sailors & marines. Over 50 armed landing craft and 6 gunboats
Casualties and losses
1 killed 4 wounded	900 killed 300 wounded 500 captured 7 boats destroyed

The Battle of the Îles Saint-Marcouf was an engagement fought off the Îles Saint-Marcouf near the Cotentin peninsula on the Normandy coast of France in May 1798 during the French Revolutionary Wars. In 1795 a British garrison was placed on the islands, which operated as a resupply base for Royal Navy ships cruising off the coast of Northern France. Seeking to eliminate the British presence on the islands and simultaneously test the equipment and tactics then being developed in France for a projected invasion of Britain, the French launched a massed amphibious assault on the southern island using over 50 landing ships and thousands of troops on 7 May 1798. Although significant Royal Navy forces were in the area, a combination of wind and tide prevented them from intervening and the island's 500-strong garrison was left to resist the attack alone.

Despite the overwhelming French majority in numbers, the attack was a disaster: nearly 1,000 French soldiers were killed as the boats were caught in open water under the island's gun batteries: several were sunk with all hands. Heavy fire from batteries and Royal Marines prevented a single French soldier from landing and the retreating fleet was subject to heavy fire from the smaller island to the north, inflicting further losses. British casualties were negligible. Although this operation indicated the probable result of a full-scale invasion of Britain, the threat remained and British forces began a close blockade of the surviving landing craft that were anchored in the Cotentin ports. A month after the battle this strategy resulted in a secondary success when a French frigate and corvette passing along the coast were intercepted and defeated by the blockade squadron.

Throughout the French Revolutionary Wars, British warships patrolled the French coast, intercepting and destroying French maritime traffic and blockading French ports. In 1795 Captain Sir Sidney Smith, a prominent Royal Navy officer, recognised that if resupply points could be established on islands off the French coast then cruising warships could extend their time at sea. To this purpose, Smith seized the uninhabited Îles Saint-Marcouf, which lie 3.5 nautical miles (6.5 km) off Ravenoville on the Cotentin peninsula in Normandy. Smith constructed barracks and gun batteries and manned the islands with 500 sailors and Royal Marines, including a large proportion of men unfit for ship-board service, described as "invalids". The Glengarry Fencibles offered to provide a garrison, but after the French captured Smith this fell through.

...
Wikipedia