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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. ==Background== 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 off Ravenoville on the Cotentin peninsula in Normandy.〔Woodman, p. 102〕 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".〔James (1827), pp.113-7.〕 The Glengarry Fencibles offered to provide a garrison, but after the French captured Smith this fell through.〔Macdonell (1890), p.8.〕 The Royal Navy regularly supplied the islandswith food from Britain, and visiting vessels brought bags of earth that allowed the development of a vegetable garden. Smith supported the islands with several gunvessels, including the converted hoys , , and , the fireship , and the ''Musquito''-class floating battery , which he had had purpose-built for the defence of the islands. Lieutenant Charles Papps Price, captain of ''Badger'' and an unpopular officer who had repeatedly been passed over for promotion, commanded the British occupation; Price spent most of his time on the islands with a prostitute he had brought from Portsmouth.〔Woodman (2001), p. 103.〕 Since the 1796 French victory in Italy over the Austrians, pressure had been growing in France for direct action against Britain. Command of an army deployed in Northern France and named the ''Armée d'Angleterre'' was initially given to General Napoleon Bonaparte, but later passed to General Kilmaine. Bonaparte, and then Kilmaine, prepared for an invasion of Britain and Captain Muskein, a naval administrator from Antwerp, was instructed to develop a suitable fleet of landing craft to convoy the troops across the English Channel.〔 The French Directory commissioned a Swedish naval architect Fredrik Henrik af Chapman to design the invasion barges and by 1797 ships of his design were under construction along the Northern French coast under Muskein's supervision: the boats were known to the French soldiers as "''bateaux à la Muskein''" (Muskein-type boats).〔Gardiner, p. 105〕 In April 1798, Muskein was ordered to prepare a squadron of his barges for an attack on the Saint Marcouf Islands. The operation was intended simultaneously to eradicate the British garrison and restore French control of the raiding base, test the effectiveness of the barges in a military amphibious operation, and focus British naval attention on the English Channel and away from Bonaparte's preparations at Toulon for the invasion of Egypt.〔 On 7 April 1978, Muskein sailed from Le Havre with 33 barges under the command of General Point, but on 8 April he found his passage blocked by the British frigates HMS ''Diamond'' under Captain Sir Richard Strachan and HMS ''Hydra'' under Captain Sir Francis Laforey. At 16:00 the frigates cornered the barges in the mouth of the River Orne and opened fire, but ''Diamond'' grounded soon afterwards and although the frigate was brought off after darkness, neither side was able to inflict serious damage.〔Clowes (1900), pp.340-3.〕 On 9 April the French flotilla was able to leave the Orne River and anchor in the harbour of Bernières-sur-Mer, but the arrival of the fourth rate HMS ''Adamant'' under Captain William Hotham persuaded Muskein to return to the more sheltered anchorage at the mouth of the Orne.〔 As he returned eastward, he again came under fire from ''Diamond'' and ''Hydra''. The French flotilla then sheltered under the batteries at Sallenelles until the damage was repaired. Over the next two weeks, however, the situation changed – Rear-Admiral Jean Lacrosse at Cherbourg had been informed of Muskein's difficulties and sent reinforcements of 40 barges and armed fishing ships to Sallenelles.〔Gardiner, p. 106〕 Late in April, Muskein had an opportunity to escape without interception by the British force offshore and sailed as far as Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue, to the west of the islands. There he waited for the right combination of wind and tide to allow the attack to go ahead uninterrupted by the British squadron that had followed his flotilla westwards.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Battle of the Îles Saint-Marcouf」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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