[Illustration: A VERY EARLY CAST-IRON BREECH-LOADING GUN FOUND NEAR DOVER. (_In the Artillery Museum, Woolwich._)] Something was done to retaliate by raids on France, but with little success. In 1380 the main Franco-Spanish fleet endeavoured to raid Ireland, but was severely defeated by the ships of Devon and Bristol at Kinsale. Yet in the same year Winchelsea was again destroyed. It never recovered, and its once splendid church was reduced to the fragment which still survives. In 1385 De Vienne sailed to the Forth, and helped the Scots to invade England. A great effort, however, in 1386, to equip a vast fleet for the invasion of England failed utterly, and the English port squadrons made lucrative raids upon the French ships as they lay rotting on the coasts. This failure practically put an end to active French operations, but they still retained to a great extent the command of the sea. In 1403 a French squadron sacked Plymouth, and landed a few men to assist the great Welsh rebel, Owen Glendower. Another squadron raided the Isle of Wight, but was repulsed by the men of Hampshire. In August, 1405, a large French fleet appeared in Milford Haven, and landed 800 horsemen and 1,800 infantry, under the Maréchal Jean de Rieux and Jean de Hangest, Master of the Crossbows. Glendower joined them with 10,000 men. The allies took Tenby, Haverfordwest, and Caermarthen, and brought Henry IV. westward with a large army. Glendower starved him into a retreat, and captured much of the royal baggage, including Henry’s crown and robes. But the French fleet was defeated by Lord Berkeley, and the French soldiers worked as ill with the Welsh as with the Scots (see Chapter XI.). They drifted home in detachments during 1405 and 1406, and Glendower was left to maintain alone his gallant but hopeless contest with England. For over a hundred years France made no further attempt. She interfered at different times in the English dynastic broils, but not until 1545 was there any attempt at a great invasion. During this period, despite civil and foreign war, the idea of a true royal navy had never been really lost sight of. Henry VII. had given the question serious attention, and his vigorous son took a strong personal interest in naval matters. The consequence was that by 1543, when war threatened with France, he had a really formidable naval force.