The 1710 Battle of Rio de Janeiro was a failed raid by a French privateering fleet on the Portuguese colonial city of Rio de Janeiro in August 1710, during the War of the Spanish Succession. The raid was a complete failure; its commander, Jean-François Duclerc, and more than 600 men were captured. French anger over the Portuguese failure to properly hold, release, or exchange the prisoners contributed to a second, successful raid, the following year.
Duclerc was assassinated while in captivity in March 1711; his killers (and their reason for killing him) are unknown.[1]
References
- ^ Boxer, p. 91
- Boxer, Charles Ralph. The golden age of Brazil, 1695-1750: growing pains of a colonial society