Capture of La Mámora

The Capture of La Mámora was a successful Spanish raid, commanded by Admiral Luis Fajardo y Chacón, on the town of La Mamora, south of El Araich in August 1614 as part of a campaign against privateering at the Moroccan coast. The fortress remained part of the Spanish Kingdom until 1681 when Muley Ismail Ibn Sharif, the Sultan of Morocco took the city from the Spaniards.

Background
By the year 1604, after the first Anglo-Spanish War, pirates had established a pirate haven at La Mamora, it became the main retreat of Atlantic pirates under the command of Henry Mainwaring. Philip III of Spain had started a campaign against privateering that led to the Cession of Larache in 1610.

By the summer of 1614, both the Dutch and the Spanish, had ambitions to seize the town. The Dutch Admiral, Jan Evertsen had arrived in Morocco in June 1614 with a fleet of Dutch warships with the brief of entering La Mamora, defeating the pirates and building a fort which would be a Dutch stronghold. While negotiations were taking place between the Dutch and Muley Zaydan, the Spaniards raided the town in August, despite the validity of the Twelve Years' Truce, taking it with hardly any conflict.

Operation
In August 1614, an expeditionary force of 20 warships was sent across the Straits under the command of Luis Fajardo. With most of the corsairs absent, only a few remained to defend the city, they sank two ships at the harbor to prevent the Spanish invaders from swooping in. Spanish guns started decimating the spars and yards that blocked the entrance, and the corsairs found themselves forced to torch their ships and flee. Once they were gone, the Spaniards seized control of the pirate haven.

Aftermath
Renamed San Miguel de Ultramar, it would remain under Spanish rule for 67 years, until 1681, when the Alawite Sultan Ismaíl of Morocco recaptures it.

Literature

 * Fernández Duro, Cesáreo (1895). Armada Española desde la unión de los reinos de Castilla y Aragón, vol. III, Madrid, pp. 331-3.
 * Henry de Castries (1907). Les sources inédites de l'histoire du Maroc, vol. II, Paris.