Episode 7 of 8
French defeat and the capture of de Grasse
- When
- 12 April 1782
- Where
- Saintes Passage
- Part of
- Battle of the Saintes
Four French ships of the line were captured and one destroyed; de Grasse became the first French admiral taken by an enemy.
De Grasse's fleet suffered up to 15,000 casualties, de Grasse himself among them, taken prisoner. Four French ships of the line, including his flagship, were captured and another destroyed, while the British lost no ships and suffered just over 1,000 casualties. The Marquis de Vaudreuil, seeing de Grasse's fate through his telescope, took command of the remaining scattered fleet. De Grasse was sent to England and paroled.
Sources
- Battle of the Saintes Wikipedia, revision of 2026-08-22
Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.