Nothing to see here - move along.

 Once I presented a thing on our village’s History. It was notable that, being a distance from where the local paper was printed and, what with one thing and another, the only time the working classes arrived in the headlines was when they were committing, usually petty, crimes. History is full of unrecorded people because History is what we record. The past is lousy with them.

All of this is by way of an introduction to the fact we are leaving Medina Sidonia. We have an empty road ahead. True Born English peoples of all persuasions will have heard of the Duke, if they know anything of the Great Armada. He really just gets a cameo - on in the 2nd Act of ‘Elizabeth: Why I’m Fab’ and then forgotten.  Let us not forget him.

Alonso Pérez de Guzmán el Bueno, 7th Duke of Medina Sidonia, was born 10th September 1550. He got the gig as Duke in 1558, when his grandfather died.  The family are a bit interesting.  His paternal grandmother was the illegitimate daughter of the Bishop of Zaragoza, who was the illegitimate son of King Ferdinand II of Arago [yes, that one.]  Grannie Ana married the 5th Duke - the marriage was childless. The 5th Duke was then declared insane and the marriage invalid. She then married the 5th Duke’s brother, the 6th Duke. 

Sources suggest our Duke, the 7th, was a competent military administrator, organising naval resources, overseeing trade and the defence of Southern Spain.  Apparently he was keen on frigates. He was appointed Captain General of Lombardy, but got out of the gig on the grounds of poverty and bad health.


In 1565 [English Wiki] 1569 [Spanish Wiki] the duke became betrothed to Ana de Silva y Mendoza, the four year old daughter of the Prince and Princess of Eboli.  When Ana was ten the pope granted a dispensation for the marriage to be consummated. The heir, Juan Manuel, was born in 1579.

Duke Alonso played the harp and harpsichord. He was a patron of the arts and, to quote Spanish wiki ‘He surrounded himself with jesters, slave musicians, and a select musical chapel in which musicians such as Alexandro de la Serna, Cipriano de Soto, and Andrés de Villalar served’.


In 1588 the Great Armada was due to sail under the Marquis of Santa Cruz, when the admiral died. Philip II insisted Duke Alonso become Captain General of the Ocean Sea - his lack of experience and constant seasickness not being barriers to this promotion. Let us just say, it didn’t end well.

Did Duke Alonso bounce back to prove Philip II had been right all along. No, no he didn’t. He was mocked for his slow reaction to the Anglo-Dutch fleet that arrived at Cadiz in 1596, the brave protestant boys capturing the place and doing bad things to it.  Apparently he was also responsible, ten years later, for the loss of a squadron near Gibraltar.

In 1615 the duke died, bringing his life, and this walk, to an end.

Alright, a PS. His son, 8th Duke Manuel, managed to repulse the Anglo-Dutch Fleet that tried to take Cadiz in 1625.


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