Siege of Arras

Jun 13, 1640 - Aug 9, 1640

The Siege of Arras took place from 22 June to 9 August 1640, during the 1635 to 1659 Franco-Spanish War, a connected conflict of the Thirty Years' War. A French army besieged the Spanish-held town of Arras, capital of the province of Artois, then part of the Spanish Netherlands, which surrendered after holding out for 48 days.
Arras was held by a garrison of 2,000, commanded by Owen Roe O'Neill, an Irish exile in Spanish service. Despite a counter-blockade by a Spanish field army under Charles of Lorraine, which brought the French to near starvation, they were eventually resupplied, and the garrison surrendered on 9 August.
Ceded to France in the 1659 Treaty of the Pyrenees, Arras has remained part of France ever since. The siege is also notable for the participation of French poet and playwright Cyrano de Bergerac, who was wounded on 8 August in a Spanish attack.
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