Drake Francis (circa 1540-1596), English navigator.
Born in Teivistock (Devonshire) into a farmer's family. In his youth, he sailed on coasters that entered the Thames. After the first voyage across the Atlantic Ocean, Drake got a job as captain of a ship in J. Gaukins' squadron. In 1567 he took part in Gaukins' naval expedition to seize the ships of Spanish slave traders and plunder the Spanish possessions in the West Indies.
Since 1570, Drake has made pirate raids every summer in the Caribbean Sea, which Spain considered to be its own. He captured Nombre de Dios in Mexico, plundered caravans transporting silver from Peru to Panama.
In December 1577 Drake embarked on his most famous expedition. It was equipped with the money of private investors, which Drake was able to obtain thanks to the patronage of the Earl of Essex, the favorite of Elizabeth I. Later, the navigator mentioned that the queen herself invested 1000 crowns. Drake was instructed to sail through the Strait of Magellan, find suitable places for colonies and return back the same way. It was also assumed that he would carry out raids on the Spanish possessions in America.
Drake sailed from Plymouth on December 13, 1577. He commanded the Pelican (later renamed the Golden Hind) with a displacement of 100 tons; the squadron had four more small ships. Having reached the coast of Africa, the flotilla captured more than ten Spanish and Portuguese ships. Through the Strait of Magellan, the Drake entered the Pacific Ocean; there a strong storm drove the ships south for 50 days. Between Tierra del Fuego and Antarctica, Drake discovered the strait, which was later named after him. The storm damaged the ships. One of them returned to England, others drowned. The captain had only the Golden Hind left. Moving along the coast of South America, Drake plundered ships and harbors off the coast of Chile and Peru. On March 1, 1579, he captured the ship "Kakafuego", loaded with gold and silver bars. In July of the same year, Drake's ship crossed the Pacific Ocean. In 1580 he returned to Plymouth. Thus, the navigator made a round-the-world trip (the second after F. Magellan), which brought him not only fame, but also wealth.
Having received his share of the booty (at least 10 thousand pounds sterling), Drake bought an estate near Plymouth. Queen Elizabeth in 1581 bestowed upon him the title of knight. In 1585 Drake was appointed commander-in-chief of the British fleet bound for the West Indies. This marked the beginning of the war with Spain.
In March 1587, Drake unexpectedly seized the port city of Cadiz in southern Spain, destroyed it and captured about 30 Spanish ships. And again, in addition to military glory, the "pirate of Queen Elizabeth" received a lot of money - his personal share of the seized wealth amounted to more than 17 thousand pounds.
The pirates of the Atlantic and the Caribbean managed not only to remain in the memory of their descendants as dashing bandits, but also to give rise to an independent cultural phenomenon. Soon after rumors spread throughout the Old World about treasures being transported from America to Spain, the Atlantic was filled with pirates. For more than two centuries they tormented the "merchants" in the Atlantic, and then - through the efforts of the navies of the great powers - disappeared from the seas.
From the seas, but not from the pages. Thanks to the efforts of fiction writers, the classic image of a pirate was formed. If you rely on fiction, the sea robbers look almost invincible. The Spanish "golden galleons" are captured en masse, and when landing on the shore, the soldiers are unable to offer serious resistance. However, such a picture is inevitably incomplete. First of all, the stories about the invincible filibusters were composed mainly from the recollections of the participants in the pirate raids themselves, that is, people who were at least lucky enough not to end their careers on the gallows or in the jungle. In addition, the authors who wrote about the adventures of filibusters abused - and continue to abuse - the phrase "Spanish soldiers", without specifying what is hidden behind this phrase is applicable to Latin America.
As a result, a phantasmagoric picture is drawn: infantrymen in recognizable morion helmets, under the command of arrogant hidalgo, hide in whole regiments in every village lost in the wilderness of Mexico or Cuba, but when they see the enemy they quickly begin to celebrate the coward. In reality, everything was much more complicated.
The settlements of Spanish America were usually protected from looting by local colonists-militias under the command of their own governors, as well as armed Negroes and Indians. For example, in 1555, 40 soldiers of the regular troops, 100 blacks (mostly armed slaves) and another hundred Indians protected Havana from a raid by French corsairs.
Although they had little warm feelings for the Spaniards, the robbers from the outside seemed more terrible. However, the soldiers of them were frankly unimportant. So, in reality, the Spanish colonies had much less strength for self-defense than one might think. Meanwhile, the decisive governor, not neglecting his duties, and the defenders, confident in their strength, were often able to defend even a small colony from pirate raids. This episode will be discussed.
Her Majesty's Pirate
Among the sea robbers of the "golden age", the first among equals, of course, was Francis Drake. He began his career in the slave trade, but soon turned his attention to a much more profitable business. The corsairs first attacked Cartagena, a town on the South American coast, back in 1543, and since then the Spanish settlements have not known peace. Drake already had sufficient experience and some funds to take part in the hunt for galleons.
He enthusiastically began to "get the Spaniard", and Queen Elizabeth I personally invested in the expedition. Several years later, the terror against Spanish trade brought Drake a knighthood, royal favor and, finally, wealth. The queen, having thousands of percent of the profit from each campaign, simply ignored the notes of the Spanish ambassador, which poured in one after another.
We must pay tribute to the pirate: Drake not only robbed and killed. In a round-the-world robber expedition, he managed to make several important geographical discoveries. However, the key occupation and the main source of wealth was, of course, robbery. England and Spain were not at war, but who cares. In the ocean, all peace treaties lost their force.
Drake's peak of fame came in 1588, when, with his participation, the Spanish "Invincible Armada" - the fleet sent to land troops in Britain, was defeated. Drake bathed in the rays of glory, possessed a huge fortune - a rich man, a national hero, a man enjoying the great confidence of the empress. No one could have guessed that the greatest pirate was on the verge of collapse.
After the collapse of Spain's plans, the British decided to move the war to the Pyrenees. The goal of the campaign was Lisbon, the capital of Portugal and at that time the key base of the Spanish fleet. An important nuance: it was a private project. Queen Elizabeth was just one of the "investors" and invested personal money, although her share was the largest. The fleet was also not a centrally equipped squadron, but a collection of a variety of ships: from powerful warships to armed "merchants". After the victory over the Spanish Armada, a great mood reigned in the ranks of the British.
All the more bitter was the disappointment. The attempt to break into Lisbon ended in a grand fiasco. The Spaniards exhausted the British landing force with skirmishes, continuously fired at it from the sea and eventually forced the hapless destroyers to retreat. Moreover, on the way back, the British fleet stopped because of the calm. The Spaniards were just waiting for that: they had a powerful galley fleet that did not depend on the wind. And when boarding, the Spanish marines then had no equal.
Drake himself, only thanks to great luck, escaped captivity: the Spaniards took turns capturing English ships, and soon his turn could come, but, luckily for the pirate, the wind finally blew out, so that the squadron managed to escape. The leaders of the campaign lost control of the fleet, the Spaniards caught and captured the stragglers.
Upon his return, a huge scandal erupted. At least a third of the ships and people died or fell into the hands of the Spaniards, the decommissioned Spanish fleet celebrated victory, and most importantly: in a commercial sense, the campaign brought one ruin. Elizabeth's personal losses ranged from 50 to 100 thousand pounds - just insane figures for those times.
The enraged queen turned out to be only one of the shareholders, who believed that they were simply dumped, in modern terms. In addition, the sailors rebelled, who, on the occasion of the failure of the campaign, were not paid their salaries, but this problem was solved simply: the most active troublemakers were hanged. Drake received a real slap in the face: the empress, who had grown cold to him, appointed the pirate commander of the coastal defense of Plymouth with a ban on going to sea. There was no more humiliation for the old sea wolf. The once brilliant corsair could restore a thoroughly tarnished (or rather, on the contrary, dried up!) Reputation in only one way: to achieve truly grandiose success.
Panama hike
England, of course, has not completely forgotten its admiral. Over the course of several years, the impression of the failure near Lisbon faded, and in 1595 the corsairs received a new task: to arrange an expedition across the Atlantic with the ultimate goal of capturing and ravaging Panama. America was for Spain what Siberia is for Russia now — the main source of national wealth. Silver was continuously mined in the West Indies, transported to the Iberian Peninsula in grand convoys, and Panama was one of the key Spanish colonies in America. Bonanza: the capture of this city made it possible to recoup any expenses and made it possible to fill the treasury of England, which had been pretty impoverished from protracted wars.
The shadow of Lisbon still hung over the expedition: another famous pirate, John Hawkins, as well as General Baskerville, were assigned to Drake. The corsair himself intended not only to conduct a good raid, but to restore the reputation of the first among the "sea dogs" of Elizabeth.
This desire by all means to achieve some out of the ordinary result affected the course and outcome of the expedition. In total, Drake received for his campaign six royal warships, two dozen private ships and more than forty transport, landing, messengers - in a word, auxiliary ships. More than four thousand sailors and soldiers took part in the expedition.
Is it a lot or a little? Many years later, Henry Morgan would conquer Panama with more than half the number of men and ships. True, Morgan's base would be in Jamaica, while Drake had to cross the Atlantic Ocean. Be that as it may, with a good organization of the campaign and a minimum of luck, the task of the expedition looked quite solvable. However, Sir Francis Drake has already exhausted the stock of luck ...
The prisoners from the accidentally captured Spanish ship showed that the galleon of the "silver fleet" is being repaired in the harbor of Puerto Rico. The information was completely true: the ship was indeed being repaired in the harbor, the repair was delayed, and the cargo - silver and gold - was stored in the local cathedral. However, on the way to Puerto Rico, the pirate fleet had something to do. On September 24, the ships approached the Canary Islands.
The problem is that Don Alonso de Alvarado, a hardened veteran of the wars with the Turks and a harsh professional, was recently appointed governor of these regions. At the head of 300 soldiers and 1200 militias, he took battle on the island of Gran Canaria. The Spaniards had nowhere to retreat, besides, Alvarado knew the possible landing sites like the back of his hand and guessed exactly where to expect the landing.
The ships of the corsairs stumbled upon powerful and accurate fire from the guns pumped out to the beaches, one of the ships broke the binnacle, and the other was rescued by force with a hole at the waterline. An attempt even to collect fresh water on the islands failed. The hike for precious moisture had simply disastrous consequences: the British were ambushed and two sailors, including the ship's doctor, were captured.
The captured pirates turned out to be frank and even chatty people: messengers from Gran Canaria rushed westward with a message about the approach of the pirates, their goals and the approximate composition of the squadron. The hooligan raid on the Canary Islands failed, but the coveted galleon, still hiding in Puerto Rico, loomed ahead.
Meanwhile, the "exposure" of the squadron in the Canary Islands stirred up a hornet's nest. Captain-General Pedro de Guzman came out to intercept the corsairs. Guzman, like his Canary counterpart, was an old warrior who, moreover, had five brand new light frigates of the original design under his command and was now eager to try them out. Not far from Guadeloupe, the Spaniard found two barques that had fought off Hawkins' detachment. One of the "Englishmen" left, but the other the Spaniards captured, shook the British route out of the prisoners and themselves rushed to Puerto Rico to save the precious galleon.
While the "British" were advancing towards Puerto Rico, the faster frigates of the Spaniards reached the harbor. Guzman developed a vigorous activity to prepare the fort for defense. The frigate guns were used to strengthen the forts. The galleon itself, already without gold on it, was flooded in the fairway of the bay of the city of San Juan. Batteries were hastily erected on the shore and immediately camouflaged. Finally Don Pedro prepared a stunning surprise for the pirates ...
On November 22, English ships approach San Juan. It can be seen that the Spaniards took care of the defense, but fortunately, there are no guns in their forts. No one is firing at the invaders. You can come close to the fortifications and calmly, watching the Spaniards on the shore, decide how to take them. Drake ordered to drop anchors some hundred meters from the shore and the powerlessly silent fort, and summoned the commanders to his ship - to consult and dine at the same time.
The meal was interrupted in the most rude way. There were cannons in the forts, but Don Guzman, with great composure, lured the British under fire. The embrasures come to life and the fort begins to spew cannonballs! The English squadron just asked for a shot: wherever you hit, you will still get there.
A chair was knocked out from under Drake, several captains in his cabin were killed or wounded at once. About the fate of Hawkins, a relative and an old comrade-in-arms of Drake in the slave trade at the dawn of his youth, English and Spanish historians are still arguing. The British believe that the old pirate died of dysentery a little earlier, the Spaniards - that he, along with others, was killed on the deck. Many small ships accompanying the squadron sank opposite the Spanish fortifications, the corsair's fleet in panic withdrew to a safe distance.
Drake tried to enter the harbor in the dark. At night, two dozen landing boats, with 50-60 people in each, entered the bay, but were discovered. There was no sudden raid. The British approached a short distance to one of the frigates and finally burned one of them - "Santa Magdalena". However, it would have been better if they had not done this: the fire of the Magdalena lit up the entire harbor. Cannons and muskets were often and accurately hit from the shore, since with such illumination it was not difficult to hit the target.
The flames of the Magdalena burned Drake's hopes of capturing Puerto Rico and the jeweled galleon. Guzman waited for the British to go to sea, and soon, on a routine basis, transported silver and gold to Spain. The Spanish commander had every reason to be content with himself and his people.
Last chance
Drake, however, was in complete disarray. The expedition has already suffered heavy losses, several captains at once, including the living legend of piracy, John Hawkins, no longer need any treasures, and the holds are still empty. What to do next? Return to England and become a laughing stock? In London, they know how to count money and the second failure will not be forgiven. So, you need to swim forward. Drake had the great goal of the entire campaign - to conquer Panama.
On December 27, 1595, the ships anchored at the town and fort of Nombre de Dios, in the northern part of the isthmus. The inhabitants and the garrison fled to the forests. There was no booty in the city, and the pirates made the obvious decision: to take Panama, for which it was required to go through the isthmus. Thomas Baskerville was responsible for the overland part of the expedition, and he led the march of 750 corsairs to the Pacific Ocean.
However, among the seasoned Spanish commanders who met Drake and his team, there was also a third fighter - Alonso de Sotomayor. The Governor of Chile was about to sail to Spain when he learned of the pirate raid. Now he erected redoubts on the way of filibusters. While the British, in the pouring rains, made their way through the jungle, driving away snakes and crocodiles, the Spaniards erected a wooden fort on their way and laid blockages.
Sir Baskerville tried to take these fortifications on the move. For the British, however, the jungle war was new. Walking through the mud to a small fortress from which arquebusses and crossbows are beating is a dubious pleasure. In addition, the Spaniards, who have lived here for years, fired at pirates directly from the forest in loose formation. Baskerville himself was wounded and eventually ordered a withdrawal. In the jungle, he left more than half of the detachment, and not all fell victims to the fire of the Spaniards. People were sick, got into the teeth of crocodiles, any wound in these parts was rapidly beginning to fester.
But the main problem was water. In the jungle, this is a real broth of microorganisms, but there was nowhere to get the Alpine springs. The pirates sail away from Nombre de Dios and still try to find some prey, but further searches sometimes require reaching the shore and stocking up on water. At one fine moment, something that could have happened a long time ago happened on the surviving ships - dysentery began.
One of the cases was Drake. In mid-January, he went to bed and never left the cabin. On January 28, the admiral and pirate died quietly aboard the ship. Baskerville betrayed his remains to the sea in a lead coffin, and he himself decided to curtail the campaign that had ended so badly.
Only eight large ships returned to Plymouth from the entire flotilla, 3 thousand people died, including two corsairs of the first rank - admirals Hawkins and Drake. This is how the greatest pirate of his time found his end. And just at the moment when the remnants of the squadron appeared in the roadstead of Plymouth, another silver fleet was entering the Spanish harbor with precious cargo on board.
Literature on the corsairs of the Caribbean and the Atlantic usually tells of the successes of the pirates. The history of the devastation of Maracaibo, the seizure of Puerto Bello, the raids on Veracruz and Cartagena, or the adventures of the "Golden Hind" of the same Drake are really bright, bloody and dramatic stories of the history of world piracy.
However, the Spaniards exposed to these raids were not whipping boys at all. Drake's latest expedition perfectly demonstrates what could happen if the colony could not be caught by surprise and there were quite decisive soldiers with a sensible commander at the head.
The "Maxims Maksimychi" from the distant outskirts of the Spanish Empire, perhaps, were not as colorful personalities as the robbers of the seas. Corsairs like Drake are remembered by anyone who, at least as a child, was interested in the history of piracy. John Hawkins was somehow immortalized by Stevenson, who gave his hero almost the same name. The fictional Captain Blood uses Henry Morgan's recognizable tactics.
Their opponents did not get even a tenth of that glory. Meanwhile, Alvarado or Guzman appear as much more worthy people: competent and cold-blooded commanders, they stubbornly and successfully defended their villages. Although the towns of Spanish America were at that time microscopic villages, lost in the jungle, the Spanish commanders and soldiers had something to defend, and they often managed to brutally take revenge on their tormentors.
Francis Drake was born in 1540 in the town of Tavistock, Devonshire, in the family of a poor village priest Edmund Drake. Some sources claim that his father was a sailor in his youth. Francis's grandfather was a farmer who owned 180 acres of land. Francis's mother was from the Milway line, but I could not find her name. In total, the Drake family had twelve children, Francis was the eldest.
Francis left his parents' house early (presumably in 1550), joining a small merchant ship as a cabin boy, where he quickly mastered the art of navigation. Hardworking, persistent and calculating, he liked the old captain, who did not have a family and who fell in love with Francis as his own son and bequeathed his ship to Francis. As a merchant captain, Drake undertook several long voyages to the Bay of Biscay and Guinea, where he was profitably engaged in the slave trade, supplying blacks to Haiti.
In 1567, Drake commanded a ship in the squadron of the then famous John Hawkins, who plundered the coast of Mexico with the blessing of Queen Elizabeth I. The British were out of luck. When, after a terrible storm, they defended in San Juan, they were attacked by a Spanish squadron. Only one ship out of six escaped from the trap and, after a difficult voyage, reached his homeland. It was Drake's ship ...
In 1569 he married a girl named Mary Newman, about whom I could not find out anything. It is only known that the marriage was childless. Mary died twelve years later.
The Pelican is Francis Drake's flagship
Soon after, Drake made two exploratory voyages across the ocean, and in 1572 he organized an independent expedition and made a very successful foray into the Isthmus of Panama.
Soon, among the far from good-natured pirates and slavers, young Drake began to stand out as the most cruel and most successful. According to the testimony of his contemporaries, "he was a domineering and irritable man with a mad character," greedy, vengeful and extremely superstitious. At the same time, many historians argue that not only for the sake of gold and honors, he undertook risky voyages, that he was attracted by the very opportunity to visit where none of the English had ever been. In any case, geographers and sailors of the epoch of the great geographical discoveries owe to this person many important refinements of the world map.
After Drake distinguished himself in crushing the Irish uprising, he was introduced to Queen Elizabeth and laid out his plan to raid and devastate the western shores of South America. Together with the rank of Rear Admiral, Drake received five ships with a crew of one hundred and sixty selected sailors. The Queen set one condition: that the names of all those noble gentlemen who, like her, gave money for the equipment of the expedition, should remain secret.
Drake managed to hide the true goals of the expedition from Spanish spies, spreading the rumor that he was heading for Alexandria. As a result of this misinformation, the Spanish ambassador in London, Don Bernandino Mendoza, took no action to block the pirate's path to the Western Hemisphere.
On December 13, 1577, the flotilla - the flagship Pelican with a displacement of 100 tons, Elizabeth (80 tons), Sea Gold (30 tons), Swan (50 tons) and the Christopher galley - left Plymouth ...
At the time of Queen Elizabeth I, there were no official rules for measuring ships, and therefore the dimensions of the Drake ship do not coincide in different sources. By comparing the information, R. Hockel gives the following data: the length between the stems is 20.2 meters, the maximum width is 5.6 meters, the depth of the hold is 3.03 meters, the depth of the board is 4.8 meters amidships, in the aft 9.22 meters, in the bow - 6.47 meters; draft - 2.2 meters, mainmast height 19.95 meters. Armament - 18 cannons, of which seven cannons on each side and two on the tank and stern. By the shape of the hull, the Pelican was of a transitional type from a karakka to a galleon and was well adapted for long sea voyages.
Drake's stateroom was finished and furnished with great luxury. The dishes he used were pure silver. While eating, the musicians delighted his ears with their playing, and a page stood behind Drake's chair. The queen sent him as a gift incense, sweets, an embroidered navy hat and a green silk scarf with the words embroidered in gold: "May God always keep and guide you."
Drake's assault on Cartagena (old engraving)
In the second half of January, the ships reached Mogadar, a port city in Morocco. Taking hostages, the pirates exchanged them for a caravan of all kinds of goods. This was followed by a throw across the Atlantic Ocean. Having plundered the Spanish harbors at the mouth of La Plata on the way, the flotilla on June 3, 1578 anchored in the bay of San Julian, in which Magellan dealt with the rioters. A cancer of some kind prevailed over this harbor, for Drake also had to suppress the rebellion that broke out, as a result of which Captain Doughty was executed. By the way, at the same time "Pelican" was renamed into "Golden Hind".
Reconstruction of the alleged appearance of the "Golden Doe"
On August 2, abandoning two ships that had become completely unusable, the flotilla ("Golden Doe", "Elizabeth" and "Sea Gold") entered the Strait of Magellan and passed it in 20 days. After leaving the strait, the ships fell into a fierce storm, which swept them in different directions. "Sea Gold" died, "Elizabeth" was thrown back to the Strait of Magellan and, having passed it, he returned to England, and "Golden Hind", on which Drake was, skidded far to the south. At the same time, Drake made an involuntary discovery that Tierra del Fuego was not a protrusion of the southern continent, as was believed at that time, but an archipelago, beyond which the open sea stretches. In honor of the discoverer, the strait between Tierra del Fuego and Antarctica was named after Drake.
As soon as the storm subsided, Drake headed north and broke into the harbor of Valparaiso on December 5. Capturing a ship standing in the harbor, loaded with wines and gold bars worth 37 thousand ducats, the pirates disembarked and plundered the city, taking a cargo of golden sand worth 25 thousand pesos.
In addition, they found secret Spanish maps on the ship, and now Drake did not move forward blindly. I must say that before Drake's pirate raid, the Spaniards felt completely safe on the west coast of America - after all, not a single English ship passed the Strait of Magellan, and therefore the Spanish ships in this area had no protection, and the cities were not prepared to repel pirates. Walking along the coast of America, Drake captured and plundered many Spanish cities and settlements, including Callao, Santo, Trujillo, Mantu. In Panamanian waters, he overtook the ship "Carafuego", on which a cargo of fabulous value was taken - gold and silver in bars and coins worth 363 thousand pesos (about 1600 kg of gold). In the Mexican harbor of Acapulco, Drake captured a galleon loaded with spices and Chinese silk.
Then Drake, having deceived all the hopes of his enemies, did not turn back south, but crossed the Pacific Ocean and went to the Mariana Islands. Having repaired the ship in the Celebes area, he headed for the Cape of Good Hope and on September 26, 1580, dropped anchor in Plymouth, making the second round the world voyage after Magellan.
It was the most lucrative of all the travels ever made - it gave an income of 4,700% profit, about 500 thousand pounds! To imagine the enormity of this amount, it is enough to cite two figures for comparison: the hostilities to defeat the Spanish "Invincible Armada" in 1588 cost England "only" 160 thousand pounds, and the annual income of the British treasury at that time was 300 thousand pounds. Queen Elizabeth visited Drake's ship and knighted him right on deck, which was a great reward - in England there were only 300 people who had this title!
Knighting Francis Drake
The Spanish king Philip II demanded the punishment of the pirate Drake, compensation for damage and an apology. Elizabeth's Royal Council limited itself to a vague answer that the Spanish king has no moral right to "prevent the British from visiting India, and therefore the latter can travel there, risking being captured there, but if they return without prejudice to themselves, His Majesty cannot ask Her Majesty to punish them ... "
In 1585 Drake remarried. This time it was a girl of a rather rich and noble family - Elizabeth Sydenham. The couple moved to Drake's recently purchased Buckland Abbey estate. Today there is a large memorial in honor of Drake. But, as in his first marriage, Drake had no children.
In 1585-1586, Sir Francis Drake again commanded an armed English fleet directed against the Spanish colonies of the West Indies, and, just like last time, returned with rich booty. This was the first time Drake commanded such a large unit: he had 21 ships under his command with 2,300 soldiers and sailors.
It was thanks to Drake's energetic actions that the launch of the "Invincible Armada" was delayed for a year, which allowed England to better prepare for military action. Not bad for one person! And it was like this: April 19, 1587 Drake, commanding a squadron of 13 small ships, entered the harbor of Cadiz, where the ships of the "Armada" were preparing to sail. He destroyed 30 out of 60 ships in the roadstead, and captured some of the rest and took with him, including a huge galleon with a displacement of 1200 tons.
In 1588 Sir Francis put his heavy hand to the complete defeat of the "Invincible Armada". Unfortunately, this was the zenith of his fame. An expedition to Lisbon in 1589 ended in failure and cost him the Queen's favor and favor. He could not take the city, and out of 16 thousand people only 6 thousand survived. In addition, the royal treasury suffered losses, and the queen treated such issues very badly. It seems that happiness has left Drake, and the next expedition to the shores of America for new treasures has already cost him his life.
Sir Francis Drake
Everything in this last voyage was unsuccessful: at the landing sites it turned out that the Spaniards were warned and ready to repulse, there were no treasures, and the British suffered constant losses in people, not only in battles, but also from diseases. The admiral also fell ill with tropical fever. Feeling the approach of death, Drake got out of bed, dressed with great difficulty, asked his servant to help him put on armor in order to die like a warrior. At dawn on January 28, 1596, he was gone. A few hours later the squadron approached Nombre de Dios. The new commander Thomas Baskerville ordered the body of Sir Francis Drake to be placed in a lead coffin and lowered into the sea with military honors.
Since Sir Francis Drake had no children to inherit his title, it was passed on to his nephew, also named Francis. Then it seemed like a curiosity of fate, but later became the cause of many incidents and misunderstandings.
Sir Francis Drake (English Francis Drake; c. 1540 - January 28, 1596) - an English navigator, slave trader, a prominent politician of the era of Elizabeth I, a successful pirate, the second after having made a round-the-world trip, vice admiral, reputed to be a thunderstorm of the seas.
The first Englishman to sail around the world (1577-1580).
Childhood and youth
The future "Iron Pirate" of Queen Elizabeth, the first English round-the-world navigator was born presumably in 1540 in the English town of Crowndale, Devonshire.
Francis became the firstborn in a farmer's family. When 11 more children were born one after another, the father, Edmund Drake, became a village preacher to support a large family. In 1549, the family, having leased their land, moved to the south-east of England, to the county of Kent (English Kent). This move had a huge impact on the fate of the boy. At the age of 13, Francis, who since childhood dreamed of long sea voyages, fame and wealth, became a cabin boy on a merchant ship (barque) of his uncle, who fell in love with the hardworking, persistent and calculating young man so much that he bequeathed the ship to his nephew after death. Thus, after the death of his uncle at the age of 16, Francis became the full captain of his own ship.
A life of adventure
In 1567, Drake set out on his first serious voyage to the West Indies, commanding a ship as part of a slave trade expedition of his relative, Sir John Hawkins. During this expedition, near the Gulf of Mexico, the British ships were attacked by the Spaniards, and most of the ships were sunk. Only two sailboats survived - Drake and Hawkins. The British demanded that the Spanish king pay them for the destroyed ships. The king, naturally, refused, then Drake "declared war" on the Spanish crown.
In 1572, the sailor set off on his own second campaign to the Spanish possessions in the West Indies, as a result of which he captured the city of Nombre de Dios (Spanish Nombre de Dios) on, then several ships near the harbor near the Venezuelan city (Spanish. Cartagena).
During this expedition, the English corsair attacked in the Isthmus of Panama on a Spanish squadron, called the "Silver Caravan", heading from Panama to Nombre de Dios, in whose holds were approx. 30 tons of silver. On August 9, 1573, Drake returned to Plymouth as a rich man, fanned by the glory of a successful corsair, "the storm of the seas."
On November 15, 1577, Queen Elizabeth I of England ordered her faithful privateer to set off on an expedition to the Pacific coast of America. December 13, 1577 Francis Drake on the flagship "Pelican" (Pelican) with a displacement of 100 tons left Plymouth on his most famous campaign at the head of a flotilla, consisting of 4 large ("Elizabeth", "Sea gold", "Swan", "Christopher") ships and 2 small auxiliary vessels. By that time, he was already surrounded by the glory of the "iron pirate", an experienced navigator and a talented naval tactician.
The official purpose of the voyage was to discover new lands, however, in fact, Drake had to rob Spanish ships, replenishing the treasury of England with Spanish gold.
Francis went south to (Spanish Estrecho de Magallanes), which the squadron was successful, but on the way out it got into a fierce storm that scattered the ships of the squadron. One ship crashed on the rocks, the other was thrown back into the strait, and its captain decided to return to England.
The flagship "Pelican", the only one of all the ships "made its way" to the Pacific Ocean, where for excellent seaworthiness it was renamed into "Golden Hind". After the storm, he anchored among the previously unknown islands, calling them "Elizabethan".
Unwittingly, Drake made an important geographical discovery: it turned out that (Spanish Tierra del Fuego) is not part of the unknown southern continent, but just a large island, beyond which the open sea continues. Subsequently, the wide between Antarctica and Tierra del Fuego was named after him.
His further journey consisted of robberies off the coast and, for which the Viceroy of Peru sent 2 ships to capture the pirate. He escaped the pursuit to the northwest, robbing ships with jewels along the way and taking prisoners. It is impossible to establish the exact number of ships that became victims of the pirate today, but it is known that the loot was fabulous. An especially large jackpot awaited the "sea wolf" in (Spanish Valparaiso) - pirates seized a ship standing in the harbor loaded with gold and expensive goods, and a large stock of golden sand was stored in the city. But the main thing is that the Spanish ship ended up with secret nautical charts with a detailed description of the western coast of South America.
Spanish cities and settlements on the coast did not anticipate an attack by the British and were not ready for defense. Moving along the coast, the pirates captured city after city, filling the holds with gold. Not far from the Isthmus of Panama, they managed to board the large Spanish ship Carafuego, which contained more than 1.6 tons of gold and a huge amount of silver bars. In the Mexican harbor of Acapulco, Drake captured a galleon laden with spices and Chinese silk.
The privateer traveled along the South American Pacific coast to the north, and then explored the coast well north of the Spanish colonies, approximately to modern Vancouver (English Vancouver; city on the west coast of Canada). On June 17, 1579, the ship moored to an unknown shore, presumably in the San Francisco area, and according to another version, in modern Oregon. The pirate declared these lands to be English possession, calling them "New Albion" (eng. New Albion).
Drake Fleet Movement Map (1572-1580)
Then he crossed the Pacific Ocean and went out to Mariana Islands (eng. Mariana Islands). After repairing the ship and replenishing provisions, he headed for the Cape of Good Hope, then, bypassing Africa from the south, on September 26, 1580, moored to Plymouth, making the 2nd round the world voyage after Magellan in 2 years 10 months and 11 days. At home, the pirate was greeted as a national hero, he was awarded an honorary knighthood by the Queen.
From his circumnavigation of the world, Drake brought to England not only treasures for a huge sum of 600 thousand pounds sterling (this was 2 times the size of the kingdom's annual income), but also potato tubers - for which descendants are especially grateful to him.
It should be mentioned that his campaign caused a major international scandal, since there was no official state of war between Spain and England during this period. The Spanish king even demanded that the Queen of England punish Drake for piracy, pay damages and apologize. Of course, Elizabeth was not going to punish anyone or compensate for the damage; on the contrary, from now on, Francis Drake rested on his laurels. He was awarded the post of mayor of Plymouth, became an inspector of the Royal Naval Commission, which controlled the state of the fleet, and in 1584 was elected a member of the House of Commons of the British Parliament. Since the knighthood was obliged to have a castle, Sir Francis bought the estate in Buckland (English Buckland Abbey, Devon).
However, the famous adventurer was clearly burdened by land life. When in the mid-80s. relations between the two countries strained, Drake offered his services to the Queen and was ordered to form a fleet to attack Spain.
Soon, having received the rank of vice admiral, he prepared 21 ships for the campaign. In 1585, an impressive squadron went to sea, but the captain did not dare to go to the shores of Spain, heading for the Spanish possessions in America, which he thoroughly plundered, capturing a number of large cities, including Santo Domingo (Spanish: Santo Domingo), Cartagena (Spanish Cartagena) and San Augustin (Spanish San Augustine).
In 1587 Drake launched his extraordinary daring attack on the most important Spanish port of Cadiz (Spanish Cadiz): with 4 warships, he broke into the port, sank and burned more than 30 Spanish ships. As Francis himself put it, he deftly "set the Spanish King's beard on fire." And on the way back, the corsair off the Portuguese coast destroyed about 100 enemy ships. However, the richest booty was delivered to the corsair by a Portuguese ship sailing from India with a cargo of spices, which was of such value that every sailor of the flotilla already considered his fate "arranged".
In 1588, Sir Francis, along with other English admirals, defeated the Spanish "Invincible Armada". In 1589, he commanded the combined forces of the fleet ("English Armada"), under his command were over 150 warships.
Drake's English Armada
The corsair tried to capture Portuguese Lisbon, but due to the lack of siege weapons, he suffered a crushing defeat. It seems that this time Drake's luck left, he could not take the city, and out of 16 thousand people only 6 thousand survived. In addition, his military campaign cost the British treasury 50 thousand pounds, which the stingy Queen could not tolerate and the Iron Pirate had lost her favor.
The next expedition to the shores of America for new treasures was the last for the corsair (1595-1596). Failures pursued the squadron, in addition, the weather was disgusting and diseases spread in the crews. Drake brought the ships to an unfavorable place near the island of Escudo le Veragua (Spanish Escudo de Veraguas). Food was running out, people were dying of dysentery and tropical fever. Soon Sir Francis himself fell ill, and on January 28, 1596, at the age of 56, he died of dysentery near Puerto Bello (present-day Portobelo in Panama). According to tradition, the famous navigator was buried under the salvo of ship's guns in the ocean, placing his body in a lead coffin. The remnants of the squadron under the command of Thomas Baskerville returned to Plymouth without their admiral.
Personal life
In 1569, Francis Drake married a girl named Mary Newman, it is known that the first marriage was childless, and Mary died 12 years later.
In 1585 he married a second time to a girl from a wealthy and noble family, Elizabeth Sydenham (eng. Elizabeth Sydenham). The couple moved to their new estate "Buckland Abbey", today there is a large monument in honor of the "royal pirate". As in his first marriage, the famous navigator did not have children; all his fortune subsequently passed to his nephew, whose name was also Francis.
Francis Drake: Memory
Curious facts
Queen Elizabeth I's "Iron Pirate" Drake Francis was England's most famous corsair and first circumnavigator of the world. He defeated the Spanish Invincible Armada, and the widest strait on Earth between Antarctica and South America is named after him.
Childhood
The exact date when Drake Francis was born is unknown. He was born around 1540 in Devon, near the town of Teivistock. The father of the future navigator was a yeoman (farmer), who later became a priest. Francis was the eldest of 12 children in the family.
At the age of 9, the child and his parents moved to the port of Kent. There he became interested in ships. Three years later, Francis set out on his maiden voyage on a merchant barge. His distant relative was the owner of his own ship. Dying, he bequeathed this ship to young Drake. So, at just 18 years old, the future pirate first became a captain.
First expeditions
In 1567, Drake Francis began commanding the ship Judith on an expedition to Guinea and the West Indies. Near Mexico, the ships were attacked by the Spanish. Only two of the British ships managed to get out. One was commanded by the navigator Francis Drake, and the other was commanded by his relative, slave trader and merchant John Hawkins. After that episode, the pirate began to consider the Spaniards the main enemies of his whole life. It was then that the rivalry between the two sea powers reached its peak. The old colonial Spanish Empire did not want to give up its dominant position in the Atlantic to England, which was gaining momentum.
Francis Drake's new journey began in 1572, when he went to the Spanish possessions in the West Indies. In Panama, he captured the fortress of Nombre de Dios. The British intercepted a silver caravan, which contained 30 tons of the precious metal. The successful expedition of Francis Drake brought him not only fame throughout the country, but also rare wealth. In 1575, Drake served in Ireland, where he participated in the suppression of a local uprising in Ulster.
Discovery of an unknown strait
As a navigator and explorer, Drake Francis is best known for his voyages to the Pacific Ocean. The expedition began in 1577. The importance of the enterprise was highlighted by the fact that it was initiated by Queen Elizabeth herself. The authorities announced that the flotilla was heading west to discover new lands. In fact, the main goal of the six-ship expedition was to plunder Spanish ships.
Francis Drake's route passed through the Strait of Magellan between South America and Tierra del Fuego. On the way, the British were caught in a storm and were thrown far south of their intended trajectory. The whim of the weather helped Drake find out that Tierra del Fuego is not a part of an unknown continent (as was previously thought), but a separate archipelago. This is how the main geographical discovery of the pirate took place. Later, the strait between Tierra del Fuego and Antarctica was named after him. What Francis Drake discovered became another piece of the mosaic assembled by Europeans who discovered the world unknown to them.
On the way to California
The only vessel to break through the stormy waters into the Pacific Ocean was the flagship Pelican, commanded by Francis Drake. The pirate's biography was full of episodes when he found himself in the balance of death or failure of another trip. However, as before, the captain overcame all difficulties. Once in the Pacific Ocean, "Pelican" became known as the "Golden Hind", which went north along the western coast of South America.
English pirates attacked one Spanish port after another. Then the "Golden Hand" ended up in a region where Europeans had not yet been. Drake landed in present-day California and Oregon, declaring these lands the dominion of the Queen. It is believed that the extreme northern point of his route was where the Canadian city of Vancouver is today.
Return home and knighthood
After repairing and restocking supplies, the famous English pirate Francis Drake assembled a team to decide which way to return home. Sailing back to the Strait of Magellan was dangerous, as the British were almost certainly waiting for a Spanish ambush there. Drake also did not dare to look for a northern route to the Atlantic and eventually went into the depths of the Pacific Ocean. He reached the Moluccas, and from them followed to Africa.
In 1580, the captain of the Golden Doe returned to his homeland. He brought an incredible amount of treasures and exotic goods to England, including American potatoes, which were not yet known in Foggy Albion. The blow to the Spanish and what Francis Drake discovered made his name immortal. On April 4, 1581, Queen Elizabeth visited the Golden Hind galleon and declared the national hero a knight. A few months later, Drake was elected mayor of the Port of Plymouth. In January 1583, his first wife Mary died, and in July the pirate married a second time to twenty-year-old Elizabeth Seidenham.
Having reached the pinnacle of fame, Sir Francis Drake did not stop his pirate expeditions. He attacked the Spanish possessions in the West Indies several times. It destroyed the ports of Santo Domingo, Vigo, Cartagena and San Augustin.
In 1587, the Cadiz expedition began, during which Drake burned the Spanish fleet in the bay of Cadiz and made several successful cruising operations off the Portuguese coast. The pirate even captured the royal carrack San Felipe, which transported treasures from the East Indies.
Against the Invincible Armada
In 1588, Spain sent a flotilla to the shores of England, which became known as the Invincible Armada. Francis Drake, whose biography was associated with each war of that time, was one of the admirals who managed to defeat the enemy squadron. The decisive event of the confrontation was the battle of Gravelin on August 8, 1588. Drake, as vice admiral, found himself on the right flank of the English fleet.
The British were the first to capture the previously damaged galeas "San Lorenzo". This ship tried to take refuge in the harbor of Calais, but Drake could not resist the temptation to seize the enemy ship filled with gold. During the battle, many Spanish sailors were killed, and Captain Hugo de Moncada was completely shot in the head.
Then Drake, who was in command of the ship "Rivenge", rushed in pursuit of the flagship of the Spaniards, on which was the leader of the Invincible Armada, the Duke of Medina Sidonia. Hawkins also joined the battle on Victory. Meanwhile, the ships of the armada, until then at a distance from the flagship, turned around and began to approach the epicenter of events. The Spanish flotilla lined up like a crescent. The flagship San Martin was in the center with four other ships. On the flanks were strong galleases.
Graveline battle
Francis Drake spent the years of his life trying to create new tactics of sea battles. The pirate was indeed a military reformer. He was the first to rely not on the firepower of ships, but on their speed and maneuverability. This Drake style developed during the many battles off the coast of America. However, this tactic brought the main success in the battle at Gravelin. All attempts by the Spaniards to board the nimble English ships failed.
The first phase of the battle began with the British cutting off the rest of the ships and surrounding the San Felipe. Then the "San Mateo" was attacked, trying to come to the rescue of the galleon. Both ships were riddled with cannonballs. Their rigging and sails were badly damaged. The ships were barely afloat. The British musketeers and artillery effectively shot any targets that came under their sight.
Drake's ships rained down volleys of onboard guns on opponents and swiftly retreated to the side, not allowing the Spaniards to board them. The vice admiral's cabin was shot through twice, but he continued the fight without even getting a scratch. In the battle, the British lost about a hundred men, while the Spaniards lost six hundred. 107 shells were fired at the flagship San Martin.
In the midst of the Gravelino battle, the weather suddenly turned bad. A storm began, which sunk many of the already badly damaged Spanish ships. The Duke of Medina Sidonia escaped, but after the defeat he no longer represented the former threat to England. The fiasco of Spain marked a turning point in the history of rivalry in the Atlantic. Since then, England has consistently increased its influence, and the old colonial empire with its capital in Madrid, on the contrary, entered a period of decline.
Lisbon expedition
Drake, as one of the main creators of the victory over Spain, again became a national hero. In 1593 he was elected to Parliament as a member of the House of Commons from Plymouth. The navigator did a lot for the development of the key English port. For example, Drake organized and funded the construction of a new water conduit in Plymouth.
After the defeat of the Invincible Armada, Queen Elizabeth was eager to humiliate Spain even more. This is how the plan of an expedition to the Iberian Peninsula arose. The British decided to reclaim the Portuguese throne for Antonio, Prior of Crato, who was a descendant of the Portuguese king Manuel I and had a negative attitude towards Spain.
In 1589, the Drake and Norris expedition set off to the shores of the Iberian Peninsula, also known as the Counterarmada or the English Armada. The first operation of the fleet was an attack on the port of A Coruña in the province of Galicia. After bloody battles, the siege ended. It was not possible to occupy the city, and Drake decided to move towards the main goal - Lisbon.
Portugal was then in union with Spain. The garrison stubbornly resisted the British. Drake hoped for an anti-Spanish uprising by the local Portuguese population, but it never happened. The British destroyed the Lisbon granaries and disrupted the city's naval communications. However, without the support of the local population and powerful artillery, the capital could not be taken. Drake stepped back. This was followed by several cruising operations off the Portuguese coast. As a result, the city of Vigo was burned. On the whole, however, the English armada failed. Neither of the two equal powers managed to achieve a full victory on foreign soil.
The last journey
The next expedition of the "Iron Pirate" began in 1595. Together with John Hawkins, Drake again went to the West Indies. The British were going to capture the Spanish fortress of San Juan on the island of Puerto Rico. However, at the last moment, Drake abandoned this plan, deciding that his strength was not enough to take possession of the port.
The Vice Admiral's fleet is stationed at San Herman Bay in western Puerto Rico. Here began the cleaning of ships, the search for fresh water and provisions. In November 1595, the squadron sailed to Panama. On Christmas Day, the ships entered the bay in front of the town of Nombre de Dios. The Spanish inhabitants left this fortress. From there, the English detachment set out on a campaign to Panama by land. By order of Drake, Nombre de Dios was put on fire. A few days later, the detachment he sent to Panama returned with nothing, as on the way to the fortress he was ambushed by a Spanish. This failure meant the failure of the entire expedition. For Drake, this fiasco was a painful blow.
Sickness and death
Without giving up, the admiral decided to sail north on ships and land in Honduras. After five days of travel due to inconvenient winds, the ships were forced to anchor on the island of Escudo de Veraguas. Here Drake was going to wait out the bad weather. The choice of the bay was unsuccessful. The humid tropical island was characterized by an unhealthy climate that was conducive to the emergence of diseases in the crew of sailors. The expedition was struck by an epidemic of dysentery. Drake ordered to separate sick people from healthy people, but this measure did not bring the expected result. All the new members of the team were thrown off their feet.
On January 23, 1596, already sick Drake, without waiting for a change in the wind, ordered to set the sails and set off again. The fleet moved towards the Puerto Belo fortress in Panama. Captains of several ships died on the way. The expedition doctors could do nothing about the epidemic. Drake, losing strength, drew up and signed a will. With him was his brother Thomas and senior officers. Then attacks of delirium began. The death of Francis Drake occurred on January 28, 1596 in his cabin aboard the Defiance.
Thomas Baskerville took command. The flotilla entered the harbor of Puerto Bello, and the sailors took the city without much difficulty. The next day, the new captain ordered the body of the admiral to be placed in a lead coffin. Under an artillery salute, he was lowered to the bottom of the bay. The expedition returned to Foggy Albion in April 1596. The news of the death of the pirate Drake shook first the West Indies and then Europe. In England, there was mourning, and in Spain, festive fireworks were staged. Drake was one of the main corsairs of the piracy era.