"The heart and stomach of a king"

In the summer of 1588, Philip II of Spain sent the Armada — a fleet of around 130 ships — to escort an invasion army from the Netherlands across the Channel to England.

English fireships and gunfire scattered the fleet off Gravelines in early August. But no one in England yet knew the danger was over. An invasion force under the Duke of Parma might still cross.

Elizabeth went to the army camp at Tilbury, on the Thames estuary. Against the advice of those who feared for her safety, she rode among the soldiers. Later accounts describe her wearing a silver breastplate.

Her speech, as it was later recorded, included the line: "I know I have the body of a weak and feeble woman; but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too." She promised to live or die among them.

The invasion never came; storms wrecked much of the Armada as it fled around Scotland and Ireland. But the speech outlived the danger. It turned a moment of fear into a lasting image of a ruler who led from the front.