Conquest of the Azores The Conquest of the Azores or the Spanish conquest of the Azores " ( principally Terceira Island ) " , took place on 2 August 1583 , at Terceira Island , in the Azores Islands , Portugal , between the Portuguese forces loyal to the claimant Dom António , Prior of Crato , supported by the French and English , and the Spanish and Portuguese forces loyal to King Philip II of Spain , commanded by the Admiral Don Álvaro de Bazán , Marquis of Santa Cruz , during the War of the Portuguese Succession . The victory of the Marquis of Santa Cruz resulted in the rapid Spanish conquest of the Azores Islands , completing the incorporation of the Kingdom of Portugal and its colonial possessions into the Spanish Empire . After only one day ' s fighting Terceira fell and the Spain ' s Tercios won an easy victory thanks to the strategy and the good command of Don Álvaro de Bazán . A fey days later , the Spanish - Portuguese force landed in Faial , where they defeated and captured a garrison of five French and one English companies , 700 men all told . At the end of the campaign , about 9 , 000 Portuguese , French , Italian and English were captured by the Spanish army . The French , English and Italian soldiers on the islands were allowed to retire unharmed , but 16 supporters of Dom António who had tried to flee on the night of the attack , were executed . Dom António and a handful of his supporters were lucky to escape with their lives . Background . After the great victory at the Battle of Ponta Delgada , the Marquis of Santa Cruz , secure within his Lisbon base , prepared an amphibious invasion of overwhelming force : 15 , 372 men and 98 ships , including 31 big merchantmen converted as troop transports , small vessels and landing craft , fighting galleons , 12 galleys and 2 galleasses . This time his aim was not to fight a fleet but to land an army : the task force could certainly defend itself if necessary , but its primary role was to put troops , together with their supporting equipment and supplies , on a selected beach - head and then to back them up until the military objectives had been gained . Philip II ordered Bazán by letter to hang those French and English subjects on the island caught in arms against his forces . The Terceirans expected the Spaniards to land at the harbours of Angra and Peggia , and had disposed their forces – under Charles de Bordeaux and Battista Scrichi – accordingly . However , Santa Cruz decided to deliver his main thrust at Mole , a beach 10 miles from Angra defended only by light earthworks occupied by infantry with some artillery support . António himself was on Terceira , where he supervised the raising of levies for defense , but left in November to persuade the French to furnish another 1 , 500 men , who arrived in June 1583 . The Queen Mother of France , Catherine de ' Medici , sent 1 , 200 French and 400 English soldiers organized in 9 companies under Aymar de Chatte , governor of Dieppe , who took the command of the islands . De Chatte increased the fortifications of Terceira by building , on its southern and most exposed coast , up to 31 stone forts and 13 fascine outposts , connected altogether by trenches and furnished with a total of 293 cannons . The quality of the defending troops was diverse : the French and English were veteran soldiers , while the local militia under the command of the governor Manuel da Silva was unreliable for the battle . On the other hand , most the Spanish troops , which included 3 tercios , 1 German regiment of 4 companies , 3 Italian companies and one Portuguese company , were well - disciplined veterans of the Dutch Revolt . Landing . The Spanish army landed on Calheta das Mós , next to Angra , the early hours of 26 July . The date for the landing was selected because it was the first anniversary of Bazán ' s victory over the French fleet at Ponta Delgada . At 3 AM the Spanish galleys headed to the beach with the landing crafts on tow carrying 4 , 500 soldiers aboard . Bazán in person commanded the operation . The beach was guarded by the fort of Santa Catarina , garrisoned by a French captain – Bourguignon – with 50 Frenchmen and 2 Portuguese companies . As the Spanish ships were sighted at dawn , Bourguignon opened fire over them with Santa Catarina ' s artillery . Within arquebus shot , Bazán ' s flagship , opening the way , received a heavy gunfire and lost its coxswain . Seconded by 9 other galleys , however , he silenced the fort . The landing craft sailed to the beach and put the infantry on land . One of the first men the reach the shores was Rodrigo de Cervantes , brother of Miguel de Cervantes . They were met by an arquebus fire directed from the trenches and ramparts which caused 35 fatalities and many wounded . The fort was then carried by assault with scales , and Bourguignon and 35 of his men slayed . The capture of Santa Catarina allowed the Spanish to land what remained of the infantry , supplies and 6 cannons , and to easily took the control of the heights surrounding . Then , Bazán ordered the advance of the force towards Vila da Praia to met the French army . De Chatte also gathered his troops and went to the encounter of the Spanish with 8 cannons . Battle . Bazán formed his army into three lines , the Germans on the right wing and the Spanish on the left . The vanguard was formed by sleeves of arquebusiers which met a heavy resistance in the hedges and fences of the ground . From there , De Chatte launched fierce counterattacks and managed to break the Spanish first line several times . However , Bazán reinforced his arquebusiers with German pikemen and hold the ground . By the afternoon , Manuel da Silva arrived to the battlefield with 1 , 000 Portuguese soldiers and a heard of cows to launch over the Spanish battalions . De Chatte feel himself strong enough to renew the attack . However , the nightfall prevented this . After 16 hours of fighting , the Spanish army had lost 70 men killed and 300 wounded , against 70 French and Portuguese deaths and over 400 wounded or prisoner . The morning after the battle De Chatte was abandoned by his Portuguese allies , who fled to the mountains inside the island . The Spanish took the initiative soon and advanced upon São Sebastião . De Chatte retired with his French troops to the mountain of Nossa Senhora da Guadalupe , allowing Bazán to capture Angra unmolested . There , 13 French , 16 Portuguese and 2 English ships were seized by the Spanish galleys . 30 Spaniards and 21 Portuguese partisans of Philip II were freed from the jail . The French meantime , began to dug trenches on the slopes of Nossa Senhora da Guadalupe , but the soldiers mutinied and opened negotiations with the Spanish to surrender . De Chatte managed to suppress the mutiny , but as the Portuguese militia subdued to Bazán , he realized that the victory was not possible and continued the talks . De Chatte , owing his friendship with the Spanish Maestre de Campo Pedro de Padilla , whom he served in the Great Siege of Malta against the Ottomans , expected to obtain good terms . In the end , however , only the officers were allowed to keep their weapons . The English and Italian soldiers were included in the negotiations , but not the Portuguese rebels . Faial . On 30 July , Pedro de Toledo sailed from Angra with 12 galleys , 4 patache s ans 16 pinnaces , with 2 , 500 soldiers aboard , to seize the island of Faial , where 400 or 500 French and English soldiers still held out supported by the locals . Toledo sent an emissary to negotiate with the foreign troops , but the Portuguese commander , António Guedes de Sousa , murdered him . Toledo landed his troops and took the Fort of Santa Cruz . The French and English soldiers were given the same pacts than De Chatte ' s men on Terceira , but Guedes de Sousa had his hands cut off and was hanged in retaliation for the emissary ' s death . On 8 August the Portuguese governor , Manuel da Silva , was beheaded in Angra by the executioner of the German regiment . Consequences . With the conquest of the Terceira Island , the Azores Islands were completely controlled by the Habsburg King , Philip II of Spain ( Philip I of Portugal ) , and the war ended with the complete incorporation of the Kingdom of Portugal and its colonial possessions into the Spanish Empire . Dom António returned to France and lived for a time in Ruel , near Paris . In 1589 , the year after the Spanish Armada , he accompanied an English expedition , supported by the United Provinces of the Netherlands , under the command of Sir Robert Devereux , Earl of Essex , Sir Francis Drake and Sir John Norreys , to the coast of Spain and Portugal , where the English Armada was forced to withdraw . Fear of spies , employed by Philip II of Spain , drove Dom António from one refuge to another until he finally went to England . Elizabeth I of England and her advisers viewed with trepidation the rising tide of Spanish victories ( the conquest of the Azores Islands in the south and of the Flemish coast in the north ) in 1583 .