1797 in Spain

Incumbents

• Monarch – Charles IV

  Events

• Guantánamo was founded in 1797.

  February

• Battle of Cape St. Vincent, one of the opening battles of the Anglo-Spanish War, resulting in a British victory under Sir John Jervis.
• 1797 Riobamba earthquake, a deadly earthquake causing between 6,000-40,000 casualties in the Riomba and surrounding Interandean valley. The epicenter reached at least XI on the Mercalli intensity scale. This is the most powerful historical event in Ecuador.

  June

• Mission San José, the fourteenth historic Spanish mission located in the present-day city of Fremont, California by the Franciscan order on June 11, 1797.

  July

• Battle of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, an amphibious assault by the Royal Navy on the Spanish port city of Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the Canary Islands launched by Rear-Admiral Horatio Nelson. The result was a Spanish victory by truce after Nelson's party had lost several hundred men.

  Births

• Juan José Guzmán was the first president of El Salvador.
• Ramón Castilla was a president of Peru

• Deaths

• Francesco Sabatini died in Madrid after completing important architecture projects in Spain.