Fernando Villaamil

Fernando Villaamil Fernández-Cueto (November 23, 1845 – July 3, 1898) was a Spanish Navy officer best known being the inventor of the modern destroyer concept and for his death in action during the Battle of Santiago de Cuba during the Spanish–American War. He was the highest-ranking Spanish officer to die in the conflict.

The origins Fernando Villaamil was born in Serantes, near Castropol (Asturias), in the north of Spain, less than a mile from the Cantabrian Sea coastline. He descended from a family of respected noblemen and landowners, but his father found himself almost completely ruined, and had to sell all his property, including the family ancestral home. It seems that this event produced a strong mixed feeling of both affection and anger about his native region in Fernando, which would last for the rest of his life.

In 1861 he entered the Spanish Navy Colegio Naval de San Fernando, and one year later he went, as midshipman, aboard the frigate Esperanza, the first of the long series of warships on which he would serve his nation until the final Furor.

He then served in the Philippines and Cuba, the last remains of the Spanish Empire, and in 1873 he was back in Spain and was nominated as a teacher in the Naval School that the Spanish Navy held aboard a frigate anchored in the naval base of Ferrol. Along the following years Villaamil took advantage of the studying and writing opportunities presented by his new job, becoming one of the best known and respected Spanish Navy officers.

The Destructor

In 1884, Villaamil was appointed Second Officer in the Ministry of the Navy. As such, he took the initiative of studying and designing a new class of warship intended to fight the then-new torpedo boats.

Once he reached his conclusions on the subject, he obtained the agreement of the Minister of the Navy, Manuel Pezuela, and requested several British shipyards to make proposals that would fulfill his specifications. He selected the design submitted by James & George Thompson, in Clydebank. Work on the new vessel began in late 1885.

Villaamil was assigned to Great Britain to supervise the work and study the operating procedures of the British naval dockyards, as well as the new Engineers corps. On January 19, 1887, the Destructor, the first torpedo boat destroyer, was formally handed over to the Spanish Navy, with great expectations from the European naval community.

In one day the doubts about the ship's seaworthiness were answered forever, and her designer and commander had every reason to feel proud. As a consequence of the success of the Destructor, Villaamil's professional reputation grew, both in Spain and abroad.

The Spanish–American War During the following years, Villaamil and some other forward-thinking colleagues tried to make the Spanish public aware of the critical deficiencies of the Navy.

Then, events rushed ahead: tension with the United States was rising quickly, and on February 16, 1898—the day following the explosion of the USS Maine in Havana—Villaamil was appointed Chief of the First Division of torpedo boats and destroyers.

Meanwhile, a totally unrealistic feeling of unbeatable naval power spread over Spain, and the Government decided that a whole fleet, commanded by Admiral Pascual Cervera, should be sent across the Atlantic, contrary to Cervera's and the Spanish Navy's own advice.

Villaamil and his First Division left Cádiz on March 13, and on April 18 they gathered with Admiral Cervera's fleet in the Cape Verde islands.

A month later, on April 24, the United States declared war on Spain, and Cervera received the order to go to the Antilles. Villaamil's Division was split, its destroyers integrated in Cervera's fleet, and the torpedo boats sent back to Spain.

Thus, Villaamil was left with no very specific responsibilities. He could have returned to Spain, but he chose to go forward with his fellows, even though he was totally aware of the disaster the ill-prepared fleet was headed for.

He was always in disagreement with both the Spanish Government's shaky war direction and Cervera's rather passive strategy. Instead, he advocated trying to offset the superiority of the American forces by scattering the fleet and taking the initiative through quick and dispersed daring actions; and he even volunteered to lead an audacious diversionary attack to New York with his destroyers, but his proposals were not accepted.

Therefore, Villaamil had to resign himself unwillingly to be shut with all the fleet in the bay of Santiago de Cuba.

In the end, on July 3 the whole Spanish fleet came out through the narrow mouth of the bay, ship by ship, with no chances of surviving the incoming battle with the US fleet.

The end Villaamil was killed on board one of his destroyers, the Furor. Francisco Arderius, officer in the ship, reported Fernando Villaamil's end:

Commemoration The Spanish Navy destroyer was named for Villaamil. She was in commission from 1916 to 1932.