back to the Spanish King. By the time Don John assumed command, most of Catalonia had been recovered and he had not much more to do than to preside over the final siege of Barcelona and the convention which terminated the revolt in October 1652. On both occasions, he played the peacemaker, and this sympathetic part, combined with his own pleasant manners, engaging personality, and a handsome person with bright eyes made him a popular royal favourite. In 1656, he was sent to command in Flanders, then in revolt against his own sovereign. At the storming of the French camp at Battle of Valenciennes (1656) in 1656, Don Juan Jose displayed great personal courage at the head of a brilliantly executed cavalry charge that caught the French totally by surprise. When, however, he took a part in the leadership of the army at the battle of the Dunes, fought against the French under Turenne and the British forces sent by Cromwell, he was decisively defeated and failed to raise the siege of Dunkirk, in spite of the efforts of Condé, whose invaluable advice he neglected, and the stubborn fight put up by his own troops. During 1661 and 1662, he fought against the Portuguese in Extremadura. The Spanish troops were ill-supplied and irregularly paid and in a rugged, hostile country. Morale was poor and they were untrustworthy but they were superior in numbers and some successes were gained. If Don John had not suffered from the indolence which Clarendon considered his chief defect, the Portuguese might have been hard-pressed. John's forces overran the greater part of southern Portugal, but in 1663, with the Portuguese forces reinforced by a body of English troops, and put under the command of the Huguenot Schomberg, Don John was completely beaten at Ameixial. Even so, he might not have lost the confidence of his father, if Queen Mariana, mother of the sickly Infante Charles, the only surviving legitimate son of the king, had not regarded him with distrust and dislike. Don John was removed from command and sent to his command at Consuegra. Opposition to Queen Mariana of Spain After the death of Philip IV in 1665, Don John became the recognized leader of the opposition to the government of Philip's widow, the regent. She and her favourite, the German Jesuit Juan Everardo Nithard, seized and put to death one of his most trusted servants,