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This year marks the 25th anniversary of the recovery of Henry VIII's flagship Mary Rose from the seabed of the Soient. David Childs examines how her long career was influenced by the threat of French naval galleys and how these may have contributed to her loss.
SINCE BECOMING KING Henry VIII (r. 1509-47) had wanted to lock horns with France as a means of asserting his monarchical qualities against the traditional enemy. War was declared in 1512 and by March 1513 he had experienced the realities of conflict for one complete campaign season. There was much to reflect upon. The English army in Spain, which had been ineffectually supporting Ferdinand of Aragon, England's ally against France, had returned home in disgrace with nothing accomplished, but, more positively, at sea Admiral Sir Edward Howard (1476/7-1513) had terrorized French coastal shipping in his flagship Mary Rose, which had been in service since 1511. On August 10th, 1512, he had caught the French/Breton fleet carousing at anchor, and driven it back into Brest after severely damaging with gunfire the French flagship, Grand Louise, in the first engagement between ships. Unfortunately, the English warship Regent was destroyed alongside the Breton flagship, Cordelière, when the latter's magazine exploded causing the loss of over 1,500 French and English lives. Nevertheless, Henry, well pleased with Howard's achievements, appointed him Lord Admiral of England, and ordered him to sail again to blockade the French fleet at Brest, thus enabling the King to cross the Channel unchallenged to lead his army into France.
The French had other ideas. In the late autumn of 1512, Louis XII ordered an experienced, professional galley commander, Prégent de Bidoux, to sail with a squadron of six galleys from the Mediterranean to reinforce his navy at Brest. His arrival altered the balance of power in the Channel for these modern galleys, the favoured weapon of war among the nations that bordered the Mediterranean, were deadly vessels. Fifty metres long, with 150 oarsmen manning some twenty-five oars on either side, each were armed with a large calibre, ship-sinking cannon, or basilisk, which was flanked by four lesser, but still significant guns. At a time when English naval tactics and weaponry were based on the discharge of weapons of 'shock...