tionary of Wars (Glasgow, Scotland: HarperCollins Pub-
lishers, 1995), 94–95.
Blake, Robert (1599–1657) English general and
admiral
Noted for his services to the Parliamentarian forces dur-
ing the English Civil Wars and the best English naval
commander of his day, Robert Blake was born in Bridg-
water, Somersetshire, the son of Humphrey Blake, a
well-to-do merchant. He began his studies at St. Alban
Hall, Oxford, in 1615, and moved to Wadham Hall
(now Wadham College) two years later. He abandoned
his studies in 1625, when his father died, and returned
to Somerset to run the family business.
In 1640, Blake was elected as a member of Parlia-
ment (MP) for Bridgwater. This parliamentary session is
known in history as the Short Parliament, cut short due
to arguments over policy with King Charles I, which
would eventually force a civil war. Blake lost his seat in
the next election in 1641; some historians speculate that
he may have foreseen the coming of civil war and went
to the Netherlands to get military training.
When the first English Civil War broke out in
1642, Blake, who sided with the Parliamentary forces,
was made a general and placed in command of troops.
On 26 July 1643, he and his army, with Colonel Na-
thaniel Fiennes, moved to Bristol to defend it from
Prince Rupert, a Royalist general, but Blake and Fiennes
were defeated. Blake then went to Lyme Regis, Dorset,
to which Prince Maurice, Prince Rupert’s brother, laid
siege in March and April 1644. Blake was able to hold
Lyme Regis until the garrison could be relieved by Rob-
ert Devereux, third earl of essex, in June. In July, Blake
and his forces marched from Lyme to Taunton, a critical
center of operations for the Royalist army. The parlia-
mentarians took Taunton easily and, though attacked by
Royalists three times, held the city for a year until troops
led by General Sir Thomas fairfax arrived to relieve
them in May 1645.
Blake was a popular commander amongst the par-
liamentary forces, and in 1645 he was elected to Par-
liament as a member from Bridgwater, suspending his
military service. He returned to active duty in 1648,
when, in the Second Civil War, he organized forces in
the Somerset region. In February 1649, he was named
with two other so-called generals at sea, Richard Deane
and Edward Popham, as “commissioner to command
the fleet” of Parliament. His first battle in this capac-
ity was at Kinsale (April 1649). Facing Prince Rupert’s
fleet off the southern coast of Ireland, Blake was able
to blockade them for a period of six months. On 20
October, after Blake had been forced to lift the blockade
due to bad weather, Rupert sailed with seven warships to
Lisbon, Portugal. Blake pursued the prince, but the king
of Portugal, John IV, refused him entry into the Tagus
River to attack Rupert. A fleet under the command of
Edward Popham sailed from England to join Blake, and
both men warned John that if Rupert were protected,
Portuguese trade would be attacked. The king, however,
held firm.
Rupert twice tried to escape, but Blake contained
him. On 14 September, Blake attacked a Portuguese
fleet returning from Brazil loaded with treasure; he sank
one ship, emptied 13 others of their booty, and returned
to England with the treasure. He then returned to fight
Rupert, whom he trailed to the coast of Spain and de-
feated him at Cartagena (6 November 1650), destroying
the royalist fleet. For this action, Blake was thanked by
Parliament and given a prize of £1,000. His next service
was in conjunction with Sir George Ayscue in 1651,
when the two men captured and destroyed a Royalist
base in the Scilly Islands as well as a similar one in the
Channel Islands. He spent the remainder of 1651 pa-
trolling the English Channel for any naval challenges to
Parliamentary rule.
When the Anglo-Dutch War broke out in 1652,
Blake was placed in command of the fleet in the En-
glish Channel. Even before war had been declared, he
moved with 20 warships on a fleet of 42 Dutch war-
ships commanded by Admiral Maarten Harpertszoon
tromP that was sailing near the coast of Dover. Be-
cause their countries were technically at peace, Blake
demanded that Tromp salute the English fleet; when
Tromp refused, Blake, though woefully outgunned,
fired on the Dutch, sank two of their ships, and forced
them to retreat. When war was declared that July,
Blake set out to capture the Dutch fleet or destroy it.
On 28 September, he and William Penn (father of the
William Penn who founded the Pennsylvania colony
in America), pitted their 68 warships against a Dutch
fleet of 59 ships commanded by Michael de Ruyter and
Witte Corneliszoon De Witt off the Kentish Knock in
the North Sea. After a furious three-hour fight, Blake’s
forces captured two Dutch ships and wrecked several
others.0 blAke, RobeRt