You're listening to an Airwave Media Podcast. Hello and thank you for joining the American Revolution.

This week episode 305, the Siege of Menorca.

Now this week we're stepping away from North America to look at the battle raging over in Europe.

By 1781, the British were so short-handed in America because of the war with France and Spain.

Both countries were taking real estate back from Britain, believing that their traditional

enemy was spread too thin due to the American rebellion and that other colonies and territories around the world were vulnerable to attack.

The main reason Spain did get involved in the war was over the hope of retaking Gibraltar, part of the Spanish mainland that had been under British control for over 70 years by that time.

A combined British and Dutch force captured the region in 1704 during the War of Spanish

succession and the island remained a British possession in the treaty that ended that war. In the decades following the capture, Britain viewed its control of Gibraltar as more of a bargaining ship to use against Spain.

There were several proposals to return Gibraltar to Spain over the years, but the two countries could never come to terms.

Spain had attempted to retake Gibraltar militarily multiple times since then but without any luck. So almost as soon as

Spain declared war on Britain in 1779 it began a siege of Gibraltar but after two years that siege seemed to be going nowhere.

Spanish officials decided they might want to focus on some other British possessions in the

area that might be vulnerable, and attention quickly turned to Menorca.

The island of Menorca sits in the Mediterranean.

It's about 130 miles southwest of Barcelona. It's the second largest of a chain of islands that had for centuries

been controlled by Spain or other Spanish kingdoms before Spain became a unified nation.

Britain had taken control of Menorca and the same peace treaty that gave it control of Gibraltar. Menorca became an important naval base for British ships in the Mediterranean. The British moved the capital to Port Mahon and established a naval base there.

The British also built up a Spanish fort there, which had been known as the Castillo-D.

San Felipe, and which the British called Fort St. Philip.

During the seven years war, a French fleet took back Menorca from the British. At the outset of the war France deployed a

16,000-man army and 17 ships on the line to dislodge the British. French

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