BLAKE, Robert, a famous English admiral, born in August 1589, at Bridgewater, in Somersetshire, where he was educated at the grammar-school. In 1615 he went from thence to Oxford, where he was entered at St Alban’s Hall; he subsequently removed to Wadham College; and, on the 10th of February 1617, he took the degree of bachelor of arts. In 1623 he wrote a copy of verses on the death of Mr Camden, and soon after left the university. He was pretty early tinctured with republican, principles, and disliking that severity with which Laud, then bishop of Bath and Wells, pressed uniformity in his diocese, he began to fall into the puritanical opinions. His natural bluntness causing his principles to be well known, the puritan party returned him member for Bridgewater in 1640; and he served in the parliament army with great courage during the civil war. But when the king was brought to trial, he highly disapproved the measure as illegal, and was frequently heard to say that “he would as freely venture his life to save the king, as ever he did to serve the parliament.” But this is thought to have been chiefly owing to the humanity of his temper, since after the death of the king he fell in wholly with the republican party, and, next to Cromwell, was the ablest officer of whom the parliament could boast.

In 1648-9 he was appointed, in conjunction with Colonel Dean and Colonel Popham, to command the fleet; and soon after blockaded Prince Maurice and Prince Rupert in Kinsale harbour. But the latter getting out, Blake followed them from port to port, and at last attacked them in that of Malaga, where he burnt and destroyed their whole fleet excepting two ships; the Reformation, in which Prince Rupert himself was, and the Swallow, commanded by his brother Prince Maurice. In 1652 he was constituted sole admiral, and defeated the Dutch fleet commanded by Van Tromp, Ruyter, and de Witt in three several engagements, in which the Dutch lost eleven men of war, thirty merchant ships, and, according to their own account, had 1500 men slain. Soon after, Blake and Ins colleagues, with a fleet of a hundred sail, stood over to the Dutch coast, and forced the enemy’s fleet to fly for shelter into the Texel, where they were blockaded for some time by Monk and Dean, while Blake sailed northward. At last, however, Van Tromp got out, and drew together a fleet of a hundred and twenty men of war. On the 3d of June the generals Dean and Monk came to an engagement with the enemy off the North Foreland, with indifleren success; but the next day Blake coming to their assistance with eighteen ships, gained so complete a victory, that ι the Dutch had not saved themselves on Calais sands, their whole fleet would have been taken or destroyed.
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In April 1653 Cromwell turned the long parliament out of doors, and shortly afterwards assumed the supreme power. The states hoped great advantages from this, but they were disappointed. Blake observed to his officers on the occasion, “It is not for us to mind state affairs, but to keep foreigners from fooling us.” In November 1654, Cromwell sent him with a strong fleet into the Mediterranean, with orders to support the honour of the English flag, and to obtain satisfaction for certain injuries which had been done to our merchants. In the beginning of December, Blake entered the road of Cadiz, where he was treated with all imaginable respect; the Dutch admiral durst not hoist his flag while he was there; and his name had now become so formidable, that a French squadron having stopped one of his tenders, which had separated in a storm, the admiral, as soon as he knew to whom it belonged, sent for the captain on board, and drank Blake’s health with great ceremony, under a discharge of five guns, and then dismissed him. The Algerines were so much afraid of him, that, stopping the Sallee rovers, they obliged the latter to deliver up such English prisoners as they had on board, and then sent them freely to Blake, in order to purchase his favour. This, however, did not prevent his appearing on the 10th of March before Algiers, and sending an officer on shore to the dey to demand satisfaction for the piracies committed on the English, and the release of all the English captives. The dey, in his answer, alleged that the ships and captives belonged to private persons, and therefore he could not restore them without offending all his subjects, but that the English admiral might easily redeem them; and if he thought it proper, they would conclude a peace with him, and for the future commit no acts of hostility against the English. This answer was accompanied with a large present of fresh provisions; on receiving which Blake left Algiers, and sailed on the same errand to Tunis. The dey of the latter place, however, not only refused to comply with his request, but denied him the liberty of taking in fresh water. “Here,” said he, “are our castles of Goletto and Porto Ferino; do your worst.” On hearing this, Blake began, as his custom was when highly excited, to curl his whiskers; and, after a short consultation with his officers, resolved to bear into the bay of Porto Ferino with his great ships and their seconds. On coming within musketshot of the castle and the line, he fired on both so warmly, that in two hours the castle was rendered defenceless, and the guns on the works along the shore were dismounted, although sixty of them played at once on the English. Observing nine ships in the road, Blake ordered every captain to man his long boat with choice men, to enter the harbour and fire the Tunisians; a service which they happily effected, with the loss of only 25 men killed and 48 wounded, while the admiral covered the operation and took off the fire of the castle by playing continually on it with his great guns. This daring action spread the terror of his name throughout all Africa. From Tunis he sailed to Tripoli; caused the English slaves to be set at liberty; and concluded a peace with that government. He then returned to Tunis, upon which the Tunisians implored mercy, and begged him to grant them peace, which he did on terms highly advantageous to England. He next sailed to Malta, and obliged the knights to restore the effects taken by their privateers from the English. And by these, as well as other great exploits, he raised the glory of the English name to such a pitch, that most of the princes and states in Italy thought fit to pay their compliments to the protector, by sending solemn embassies to him.

Blake passed the next winter either lying before Cadiz or cruizing up and down the straits. He was at his old station, at the mouth of the harbour, when he received information that the Spanish plate fleet had put into the bay of Santa Cruz, in the island of Teneriffe. Upon this he weighed anchor, with twenty-five men of war, on the 13th of April 1657; and on the 20th came to anchor with his ships off the bay of Santa Cruz, where he saw sixteen Spanish ships moored in the form of a half-moon. Near the mouth of the harbour stood a castle furnished with heavy ordnance; besides which there were seven forts round the bay, with six, four, and three guns on each, and connected by a line of communication manned with musketeers. To make all safe, the commander of the Spanish fleet caused all the smaller ships to be moored close in shore; while the six large galleons stood farther out at anchor, with their broadsides towards the sea. Blake having prepared for the fight, a squadron of ships was drawn out to make the first onset, commanded by Captain Stayner in the Speaker frigate; who, on receiving orders, sailed into the bay and fell upon the Spanish fleet, without the least regard to the forts, which kept up a heavy cannonade. As soon as these had entered the bay, Blake followed, and stationed several ships to pour their broadsides into the castle and forts; and these kept up so heavy and well-directed a fire, that, after some time, the Spaniards found their forts too hot to hold them. In the meanwhile Blake joined Stayner, and bravely fought the Spanish ships, out of which the crews were beaten by two o’clock in the afternoon; when Blake, finding it impossible to carry them away, ordered his men to set them on fire; and this was done so effectually, that they were all reduced to ashes except two, which sunk downright, nothing remaining above the water but part of the masts. The English having now obtained a complete victory, were reduced to another difficulty by the wind, which blew so strong into the bay that they despaired of getting out, and for a time lay under the fire of the castle and of all the forts, which must soon have torn them to pieces. But the wind suddenly shifting, they were enabled to work out of the bay, and left the Spaniards in astonishment at the fortunate temerity of their assailants. This action does honour to Blake; and although fortune favoured him in the opportune shifting of the wind, and his situation was, upon the whole, less trying than that of the gallant men under Lord Nelson, who, in our time, made an attempt on this place, his conduct throughout appears to have been distinguished for the most adventurous daring, and the most consummate nautical skill. “It was so miraculous,” says the Earl of Clarendon, “that all men who knew the place wondered that any sober man, with what courage soever endowed, would ever have undertaken it; and they could hardly persuade themselves to believe what they had done; whilst the Spaniards comforted themselves with the belief that they were devils, and not men, who had destroyed them in such a manner.”

This was the last and greatest action of the gallant Blake. Consuming with dropsy and scurvy, he hastened home that he might yield up his last breath in the country which he had so much adorned by his valour; and just as he came within sight of land, he expired. Never man, zealous for the interest of a party, was so much respected and esteemed by his opponents. Disinterested, generous, liberal; ambitious of nothing but true glory, and dreadful only to his avowed enemies; he formed one of the prominent characters of an age fertile in great men, and remained untainted with those errors and violences which were then so predominant. The protector ordered him a pompous funeral at the public charge; but the tears of his countrymen were the most honourable panegyric on his memory. Lord Clarendon observes, “that he was the first man who brought ships to contemn castles on shore, which had ever been thought very formidable, and [7:4:674] were discovered by him to make a noise only, and to fright those who could be rarely hurt by them. He was the first that infused that degree of courage into seamen, by making them see by experience what mighty things they could do if they were resolved; and the first that taught them to fight in fire as well as in water.”