On April 17, 1655, English forces landed on Hispaniola, and marched 30 miles overland to Santo Domingo, the main Spanish stronghold on the island, where they laid siege to to it. Spanish lancers attacked the English forces, sending them careening back toward the beach in confusion. The English commander hid behind a tree where, in the words of one of his soldiers, he was "so much possessed with terror that he could hardly speak". The Spanish defenders who had secured victory were rewarded with titles from the Spanish Crown. French forces attacked Santiago in 1667, and this was followed by a devastating hurricane the next year, and a smallpox epidemic that killed about 1,500 in 1669. In 1687, the Spaniards captured the fort at Petit-Goave, but the French fought back and hanged their leaders. Two years later, in the Nine Years' War, the French sacked Santiago. In 1691, the Spaniards attacked the north and sacked Cap-François. Island tensions subsided once peace was restored, and Spain's last Habsburg monarch — the deformed invalid Charles II — died on November 1, 1700, being succeeded by the sixteen-year-old French Bourbon princeling Philip of Anjou.