Sir Charles Wogan and the Oran Campaign

Sir Charles Wogan (1684–1754) was rewarded for engineering the rescue of Clementina Sobieska in 1719 with a colonelcy in the Spanish Army and spent most of his active career as a soldier in garrisons in Northern Spain. So far as is known, his only experience of combat and, more particularly, experience in command in an action, was in 1732 during the Spanish Oran campaign. The purpose of this article is to explore that part of Wogan’s military career, focusing upon one incident in the Oran campaign in which Wogan played a leading role but which led to the termination of his active involvement in the campaign because of a wound that he received during the incident and, ultimately, led to his decision to cease active service until his military career revived in 1745, when he was promoted to brigadier-general and put in command of a contingent of Irish officers sent to France to join Prince Charles Edward Stuart.