Since the Napoleonic War started, British fleets launched numerous attacks on French fleets, ports, or colonies and British and French navies continued their fighting in 1809. Britain overwhelmed France in the Atlantic after the French defeat at Trafalgar Campaign and Atlantic campaign of 1806, and remnants of French fleet was stationed at bases in Bay of Biscay. French colonies on the Caribbean and the Atlantic provided shelters and could be major threats to the British fleet. The French Atlantic Fleet was blockaded in Brest by a British force under James Gambier but the French were keen to intervene in the Caribbean following the British invasion of Martinique in January 1809. A storm in February scattered Gambier's fleet and allowed the French, under Jean-Baptiste Philibert Willaumez, to put to sea and move to anchor in the Basque Roads. On 23 February three French frigates attempting to join the main fleet were damaged in the Battle of Les Sables-d'Olonne. A stalemate ensued with the French anchored under the guns of coastal batteries but blockaded by the British. Willaumez was replaced by Zacharie Allemand on 16 March, who consolidated the anchorage defences. The British Admiralty sent Captain Lord Cochrane to lead an attack on the French. Cochrane's 11 April assault with fireships caused panic in the French fleet and many vessels ran aground. Gambier failed to capitalise on the situation by sending in the main British fleet, though Cochrane's smaller force destroyed a number of vessels over the following days. The action confined the French fleet to its anchorage and allowed the British and Spanish to displace the French from Haiti that year and an invasion of Guadeloupe in early 1810.