by
L. C.
Adv. Eng. 3/4
11/12/96
Ms. M.
Sea dogs of the 1500 and 1600s worked for queen
Elizabeth, robbing
and pillaging the
Spaniards. Over this period of 200 years
many shipments of
gold and treasure
were stolen from Spanish ships while they were sailing
from port to port
on the Spanish main. In one attack the
infamous Francis
Drake,
...surprised and attacked a heavily laden string of 200 mules. The
booty that Drake
captured in this attack included 30 tons of heavy silver
ingots (Cochran
28).
There were many different and obscure English
privateers who pirated
against the
Spanish, but only three of them live on now through their heroic
tales. The three most well known sea dogs include
John Hawkins, Sir Walter
Raleigh, and Sir
Francis Drake. Drake was by far the most
popular of all the
sea dogs. It is said that he accumulated the most
wealth of anyone in the
pirating business
(Wood 102). Sir Walter Raleigh was
another sea dog, but
he didnt prove to
be as successful (Cochran 32). Another
pirate during the
Middle Ages was
John Hawkins. He robbed the Spaniards of
slaves and
riches (Cochran
26). Together these three men were
accountable for what
would be worth
millions and millions of dollars being converted from Spanish
hands to English.
These three sea dogs were not just part time
pirates though. Pirating
was their main
job. William Wood stated that,
...(Spaniards) they were only
naval amateurs,
compared with the trained professional sea dogs. Drake
alone was
responsible for over 150 attempted or successful attacks on
Spanish treasure
ships (Howarth 105). Drake also
accomplished something
that only a
select few (George Bush) are able to do: he was knighted. One
reason many
believe he was knighted though was not because of heroics, but
because, ...a
fair share of the immense booty he brought back to England
passed quietly
into royal hands (Cochran 29). Hawkins
and Raleigh also
accomplished many
great achievements. Raleigh was knighted
as well, but
even this and
many other great feats, are still over shadowed by Drakes
clever and bold
pirating. But, if you look at the big
picture, these sea dogs
were just puppets
in a political war between England and Spain.
Elizabeths reasoning behind having the sea dogs
do her dirty work
was quite simple:
the sea dogs were the best, most successful, and most
trained group of
naval operators in the world (Wood 170).
Many times the
Queen would
consult with Drake, Raleigh, or Hawkins on matters of relations
with Spain. She would also ask the sea dogs to take
reprisal against Spain for
any treasure they
managed to steal from her (Wood 119).
Usually this
revenge would be
to either rob back from them or atomize one of their ports.
But the
destruction was not why they enjoyed pirating.
Sea dogs enjoyed pirating for one main
reason: it was a fruitful
opportunity. In this line of business you could make a
great deal of money
depending on how
many ships you were able to hit. And the
money that we
are talking about
isnt small peanuts. The amount we are
referring to would
now be considered
millions. In fact, Francis Drake made
enough money in
his lifetime that
he was able to contribute funds to Shakespeares Globe
Theater. But the
sea dogs did not just attack treasure ships.
They also
attacked Spanish
colonies and ports.
In 1595 Raleigh ransacked the Spanish held
island of Trinidad. He
held the tiny
city of Saint Joseph at ransom for three days as he robbed all of
its inhabitants
(Cochran 33). The deceptive part of
robbing a Spanish port
was first getting
in it though; so, the English would resort to trickery. One
time Hawkins
needed to have some repairs done on his boat, but he was in
Spanish waters,
so he sailed into a Spanish port under Spanish flag and color.
And as he was
docking he rose up his native English colors, and conquered
the city - as
well as fixed his boat. But the sea dogs
were not only involved in
stealing gold and
riches. They were involved in the highly successful slave
trade.
John Hawkins is best known for his involvement
in the slave trade.
The weird thing
about this though, was that most of the slaves were being
taken from west
Africa and the Canarie Islands and being
traded to Spain
and Portugal
(Wood 75). But once the English heard
about this, Elizabeth
wanted in. So she supplied Hawkins with the ship Jesus
of Lubock, and he
and 170 other men
set off for Africa. This trip wasnt just
a slave trade trip
though, because
on the way home Hawkins captured 7 Spanish ships (Wood
78). So, as you can see, Hawkins was involved in
the slave trade with both
England and
Spain, but kept robbing the Spaniards.
The author of Pirates of
the Spanish Main,
by Hamilton Cochran, actually stated that he didnt think
Hawkins was a
pirate at all. He said that he thought
that he was actually a
privateer, and
slave trader. Which means that he didnt
steal for himself, but
solely for the
queen; therefore, he received complete backing from the queen
Cochran 25).
In 1585 the inevitable war with Spain was fast
approaching,
(Cochran
29). After many years of terrorized gold
ships, King Philip had
grown quite
irritable of England; so, in 1588 he attacked them in the, furious
battles of the
English channel, (Cochran 29). The
battles of the English
channel were
between the Spanish Armada and the English navy. At this
point in time the
Spanish Armada was considered to be the best navy in the
world. But they proved to be no match against the
clever and extremely
lucky, English
navy. In this famous battle Drake was
Admiral of the ship
Revenge, and
Hawkins and Raleigh were vice-admirals of other ships
(Howarth
99). But Revenge was not Drakes ship, it
belonged to
Elizabeth, which
proves yet again that England sponsored and supported the
English sea
dogs. But Drake was not the only pirate
sponsored in this battle.
The queen gave
(Hawkins) him a financial backing, as did a number of
nobles and the
Lord mayor of London, (Cochran
24/25). But because of
Drakes success he
received the most substantial support from nobles and
Queen Elizabeth.
The war between the Armada and England was the
proving ground for
the idea that the
sea dogs were sponsored by the queen.
Before the war
Elizabeth
promoted Drake to chief of the staff to Howard, which means he
was the brains
behind the English Fleet in this battle (Wood 176). This battle
was fought how
Drake wanted in to be fought. At one point
in the battle the
queen sent orders
down to Drake to use his own judgment in the
battle(Howarth
102). But the English were lucky that
the queen intervened,
because Drakes
idea was to confront the Spanish in their territory. But the
queen opposed (Howarth
101). And it is lucky that she did,
because the next
day the Armada
was caught in a ferocious storm.
In 1585, before the war broke out, Drake set
sail across the Atlantic,
...with the most
heavily gunned English fleet yet,
(Cochran 29). His plan
was to go to main
Spanish ports in the Caribbean and shut off the gold flow
from there to
Spain. When he reached the Caribbean he
put ransoms on the
main cities, and
started burning block after block until he received payment
(finally Spain
surrendered Hispanola to Drake.) These
attacks on Spanish
ports put a
damper on, the inevitable war, and
bought the English some
much needed time
(Cochran 29). As you can see Drake was
an amazing
pirate, and naval
mastermind. But, other than pillaging the
Spanish he also
achieved some
very impressive worldly feats.
The Dragon, as Drake was called, became the
second man in history
to sail around
the world; and, probably the first man to sail around the world
while robbing the
Spanish. Drake was also the first English man to sail
around Cape Horn
and raid Chile, Peru, and Mexico (Cochran 28).
Elizabeth
finally realized
his success in the English Channel Battle of 1585, and from
then on all of
Drakes trips were sponsored by the Queen (Wood 151). She
mostly sent him
to New Spain (S. America, Caribbean) though, to raid the
newly weakened
Spanish strongholds. But in 1596, during
another attack on
Spain, he fell
ill and died. In Drakes 56 years he led
the most successful and
profitable life of
any other sea dog.
Sea dogs brought with them much more than gold,
jewels, and fine
cloth
though. They also brought with them technical advancement in
the
world of naval
operation. In the earlier times of
boating the English, as did
the Spanish, used
large galleon vessels, which were tall, long, and top
heavy. These boats were excellent because of their
capacity for crew
members and guns,
but they eventually were the downfall of the Armada
because of their
sluggishness. So in 1587 Hawkins set out
to develop a
sleeker, faster,
and more maneuverable ship. And by the
end of the year he
had completed his
re-designed vessel (Walker 47).
Before Hawkins had developed this ship the
English navy only had
twenty-five
ship. By 1595 they had 47 ships in their
fleet. This increase in
numbers was due
to the fact that Hawkins ships were smaller, therefore less
expensive. And also because at this time the English
were at an all time high
for robbing the
Spanish, and could then put more money towards their navy.
In the latter
part of the 1590s this smaller ship had become the standard for
fighting ships in
all of England, and helped to lead the English to become the
naval power of
the century (Walker 47).
Apparently Queen Elizabeth knew a good thing
when it came along.
Over all, she
made millions from Drakes and other pirates attacks on King
Philip and the
Spaniards. So, the reasoning behind the
queens backing of the
sea dogs was
simple: she made tons of money from them.
She also was able
to hinder Spanish
development, which was her main objective all along. She
was killing two
birds with one stone: she was hampering the development of
New Spain, as
well as putting money in the bank. In
the end the risk for
gold was well
worth it for the queen, who sponsored and employed the
English sea dogs.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Botting,
Douglas. The Pirates. Alexandria, Virginia: Tim Life Books, 1978.
Cochran,
Hamilton. Pirates of the Spanish
Main. New York: American
Heritage, 1961.
Howarth,
David. The Voyage of the Armada. New York:
Viking P, 1981.
Walker,
Bruce. The Armada. Alexandria, Virginia: Time life Books, 1981.
Wood,
William. Elizabethan Sea Dogs. New York: Yale U P, 1918.
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