Francis Drake Embarks on a Voyage around the World

Francis Drake Embarks on a Voyage around the World

Francis Drake embarked on his circumnavigation of the world on December 13, 1577. He served England as a privateer and seaman and also played an important role in England's fight against the Spanish Armada.

Drake was born around the year 1540 in Devonshire, England, although the exact date is uncertain. His father was a tenant farmer on Lord Francis Russell's estate and a Protestant lay preacher at a time when Protestants were being persecuted under the reign of the Catholic Queen Mary. In 1549 the family was forced to flee to Kent due to a Catholic uprising and reduced to living in an old ship hulk moored near Chatham on the Thames Estuary. This not only played a role in Drake's hatred for Catholicism but led him to seek a life on the sea while still a boy.

When he was about 13, Drake was apprenticed to a vessel that traveled between North Sea ports. During this time he learned how to handle a small ship in difficult circumstances, a skill that would serve him well in later years. Drake inherited the ship upon the death of its captain, but when he was in his early twenties Drake sold the ship and enlisted in a fleet that belonged to the Hawkins family, to whom he was related. In 1567 he accompanied his kinsman Sir John Hawkins, a navigator, on a slave trading mission in the Gulf of Mexico.

The trip was a disaster. The fleet was attacked by the Spanish off the coast of Mexico and many crew members were killed. Drake and his ship, the Judith, survived, as did Hawkins. Drake's prowess as a seaman during the expedition brought him to the attention of Queen Elizabeth, who granted him a privateering commission in 1572, giving him royal license to plunder lands and ships belonging to the Spanish. Drake headed for the New World in two ships, the Pasha and the Swan, and raided the Spanish town of Nombre de Dios in Panama. He crossed the isthmus on foot to capture more plunder and thus first glimpsed the Pacific Ocean, which had been barred to the English by the Spanish.

In 1577 the queen chose Drake to head a secret expedition to pass through the Straits of Magellan around the tip of South America and explore the coast beyond it. The queen hoped that Drake would be able to negotiate trade treaties with those peoples south of Spain's sphere of influence and also discover an unknown continent thought to lie in the South Pacific.

The fleet of five ships set off on December 13, 1577. Drake's flagship was the Pelican, which he renamed the Golden Hind. Once the small fleet arrived in South America, two of the five ships were abandoned and the remaining three entered the Straits of Magellan. It took the fleet 16 days to traverse the straits, and once they emerged into the Pacific they were caught in a tremendous storm. One ship sank while another returned to England, since its captain was mistakenly convinced that Drake's ship was lost. Drake went on alone and proceeded to plunder Spanish settlements, acquiring a huge amount of gold, silver, coins, precious stones, and pearls. Because the Golden Hind was not marked as a pirate ship, Drake was able to surprise the Spaniards, and over a five-and-a-half-month period, he raided towns such as Valparaiso, Lima, and Arica while leaving mass confusion but few casualties in his wake. Among the Spanish galleons he overtook during this spree was the man-of-war Nuestra Señora de la Concepción, also known as Cacafuego (Fireball), its hull laden with treasure.

To avoid the Spaniards whom he had just victimized, Drake set off for England by heading west and north, anchoring just north of present-day San Francisco. He claimed the area for England and named it New Albion. There, he and his crew repaired their leaking ship and were taken for sea gods by the native tribe, the Miwok. Drake continued west and reached Asia in 68 days. In Indonesia, he made contacts and alliances that were both commercially and politically beneficial before the Gold Hind set sail again. After crossing the Indian Ocean, rounding the Cape of Good Hope, and Sailing up the African coast, Drake finally anchored in Plymouth, England, on September 26, 1580, becoming the first captain to sail his ship around the world. For his achievement, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth I.

Drake continued to serve the queen in England's conflicts with Spain and distinguished himself as one of the most feared of the English pirates when he attacked and plundered the Spanish city of Cadiz. For his exploits he earned the nickname El Draque (the dragon) from the Spanish people. In 1588 he became a national hero when he helped to defeat the famed Spanish Armada.

In 1595 Drake and his kinsman Hawkins were commissioned by the queen to travel to the West Indies to work against Spanish forces there. Both men contracted a tropical disease, possibly dysentery, during the voyage. Drake died on January 28, 1596, off the coast of Puerto Bello, Panama, and was buried at sea.