Battle of Groix 1795
Recorded location from Wikidata; battle sites are often approximate.
Key facts
| Date | 23 June 1795 | Wikidata |
|---|---|---|
| Year | 1795 | Wikidata P585 (point in time) |
| Era | Early modern (1500–1799) | derived from year |
| Nearest landmass | At sea (nearest continent: Europe) | Natural Earth (modern borders) |
| Continent | Europe | Natural Earth |
| War / conflict | French Revolutionary Wars | Wikidata P361 |
| Participants | France, Kingdom of Great Britain | Wikidata P710 |
| Coordinates | 47.6000, -3.6000 | Wikidata P625 |
About the battle
The Battle of Groix ([ɡʁwa]) took place on 23 June 1795 off the island of Groix in the Bay of Biscay during the War of the First Coalition. It was fought between elements of the British Channel Fleet and the French Atlantic Fleet, which were cruising in the region on separate missions. The British fleet, commanded by Admiral Lord Bridport, was covering an invasion convoy carrying a French Royalist army tasked with invading Quiberon, while the French fleet under Vice-admiral Villaret de Joyeuse had sailed a week earlier to rescue a convoy from being attacked by a British squadron. The French fleet had driven off the British squadron in a battle on 17 June known as Cornwallis's Retreat, and were attempting to return to their base at Brest when Bridport's force of 14 ships of the line appeared on 22 June.
Villaret, believing that the stronger British fleet would destroy his own 12 ships of the line, ordered his force to fall back to the inshore anchorage off Groix, hoping to take shelter in protected coastal waters. Several of his ships were too slow, falling behind so that early in the morning of 23 June the rearmost ships of his fleet were caught by the British vanguard, overhauled one by one and brought to battle.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Battle of Groix (revision 1370111050), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; shortened by selecting paragraphs and trimming at a sentence boundary; formatting and citations removed. No text added.
Nearby battles
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- Invasion of France (1795) 1795 · 37 km
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Other battles of the French Revolutionary Wars
- Battle of Villers-en-Cauchies 1794
- First Battle of Dego 1794
- Frigate action of 29 May 1794 1794
- Glorious First of June 1794
- Siege of Luxembourg (1794–1795) 1794
- Action of 10 April 1795 1795
- Action of 22 August 1795 1795
- Action of 24 June 1795 1795
- Battle of Genoa (1795) 1795
- Battle of the Hyères Islands 1795
All 81 battles of the French Revolutionary Wars →
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