Born to a puritan preacher around 1540, Francis Drake began his sailing career as navigator on a small merchant vessel. Later he became an officer on a West African slave ship.

In 1567, whilst sailing from the Caribbean to Mexico, Drake and his cousin, John Hawkins, were defeated in battle by a Spanish Armada. They lost all of their vessels and from that time forward Francis Drake had a deep hatred towards all Spaniards.

Over the next few years Drake befriended escaped African slaves around the Caribbean. He vollected them together and they went with him into battle against the Spanish around the region.

In 1572 John Hawkins gave Drake 73 sailors and 2 ships. With these, and a privateers commission from Queen Elizabeth I, he sailed to America in under 3 weeks. After a failed attack on Nombre de Dios (present day Nicaragua), Drake succeeded in attacking a Spanish caravel carrying gold. This brough him some small fame and fortune.

When he returned to England with these spoils Queen Elizabeth was impressed and set Drake the challenge of sailing around the world. Drake departed on December 13th 1577 with two supply ships. His friend, Thomas Doughty, who was a courtesan to the Queen, sailed with him.

poor weather and worsening conditions prompted Doughty into mutiny. He convinced the sailors to revolt but Drake quelled the uprising. Upon reaching South America he tried and then executed Doughty. After the beheading of his friend he renamed his flagship the “Golden Hind”.

Sailing towards Callo, the Golden Hind encountered fierce storms which caused a lot of superficial damage. Drake used this to his advantage though as it meant the Golden Hind was not easily identifiable as a privateer.

After defeating a Spanish warship, Drake learned of the route for a Spanish treasure galleon, the “Cacafuego” (”Fireball”).  He set a pursuit course and caught the Cacafuego on 3rd March 1579. He quickly forced her to surrender after a short cannon fight.

The Cacafuego was laden with so much treasure that it took Drake’s men four days to transfer it all to the Golden Hind. The haul included 20 tons of silver and 80 pounds of gold.

In September of 1580 The Golden Hind returned to England with the treasure, docking at the port of Plymouth. Drake was knighted on deck by Queen Elizabeth who also made him mayoe of Plymouth. The Queen must have been delighted as the treasure haul was worth almost 50 times as much as the cost of funding Drake’s expedition.

Sir Francis Drake was not very popular at Court and so the Queen sent him out adventuring again, this time with a fleet of ships. After inflicting much damage upon Spanish shipping around the West Indies Drake died on January 28th 1596.

Write a comment

You need tologin.