 However, it soon became clear the Bourbon candidate Philip V was far more popular in Castile than the Austrian Archduke Charles.The Allies were forced to evacuate Madrid in 1706 and soundly beaten at the Battle of Almanza in 1707.In 1708 the new British commander James Stanhope took the island of Minorca, a possession of more use to the British than Charles' prospects of becoming King of Spain.