At 10 o’clock the next morning, 6 December, Leveson’s fleet arrived off Castlehaven. Zubiaur however was ready for them with an eight-gun battery at the mouth of the harbour. A Captain Fleming commanding the 10-gun Merlin rowed through Spanish fire to make a channel for the 518-ton Warspite to follow. A heavy pounding from the Spanish shore batteries and the vessels ensued which Leveson said ‘much annoyed’ him. From then until four o’clock that afternoon the two sides battled. Zubiaur's flagship galleon Maria Francesca was sunk with most hands. Another 200-ton vessel Cisno Camello was holed below the waterline and soon began to sink, and settled in shallow water. A French hire ship used for supplies was according to Leveson reduced to matchwood. Two more Spanish vessels were pounded until their crews forced them onto the rocks after sustaining continuous fire particularly from the big galleons Defiance and Warspite. Finally a Spanish merchant was boarded and captured and was found to have wheat and biscuits before being abandoned and it too being driven aground.
