In this new order the rear guard was increased to forty-three vessels, and placed under the command of Don Alphonso de Leyva, who had orders to avoid skirmishing as much as possible, but to lose no opportunity of bringing on a general engagement, or decisive battle.
On the 2d of August, at daylight, the wind shifted to the northeast, whereupon the Spanish, being to windward, bore down upon the English under full sail. But the latter also squared away, and having the advantage of greater speed, refused, as before, to allow their enemy to close with them; so the engagement was without result, there being little loss on the part of the Spaniards, while the only Englishman killed was a Mr. Cock, who was bravely fighting the enemy in a small vessel of his own.
Towards evening the wind backed to the west again, and the Armada once more continued its course toward Calais.
On the 3d of August there was a suspension of hostilities, and the Lord High Admiral received a supply of powder and ball, and a reinforcement of ships, and intended to attack the enemy in the middle of the night, but was prevented by a calm.
On the 4th, however, a straggler from the Spanish fleet was made prize of by the English.
This brought on a sharp engagement between the Spanish rear guard and the English advance, under Frobisher, which would have resulted in Frobisher’s capture had not Howard himself gone to the rescue, in the “Ark-Royal, followed by the Lion, the Bear, the Bull, the Elizabeth, and a great number of smaller vessels.” The fighting was for some time severe, but as soon as Frobisher was relieved, Howard, observing that the Duke was approaching, with the main body of the Spanish fleet, prudently gave the order to retire. It was, indeed, high time, for the Ark-Royal was so badly crippled that she had to be towed out of action.
The Lord High Admiral afterwards knighted Lord Thomas Howard, Lord Sheffield, Townsend, Hawkins and Frobisher, for their gallantry on this occasion; but a convincing proof that the English had the worst of it in the encounter is the determination of a council of war “not to make any further attempt upon the enemy until they should be arrived in the Straits of Dover, where the Lord Henry Seymour and Sir William Winter were lying in wait for them.”
So the Armada kept on its way, unmolested, and with a fair wind, past Hastings and Dungeness, until it got to the north of the Varne, an extensive shoal in the Channel.
Then it left the English coast, and hauled up for Calais Road, where it anchored on the afternoon of Saturday, August 6th, close in to shore, with the Castle bearing from the centre of the fleet due east.
The English followed, and anchored two miles outside. Strengthened by the accession of Seymour’s and Winter’s squadron, they now numbered one hundred and forty sail—many of them large ships, but the majority small.