Chile today and tomorrow

by L. E. Elliott Joyce

At Tongoy Bay, where they put in next, they found no water, and went on to the beautiful Herradura just above it, a few miles south of Coquimbo Bay with its little Spanish stronghold of La Serena. Twelve men went ashore here to get water, but were attacked by a number of Spanish horsemen. Thomas Minivy, leader of the shore party, got his men into the boat, but was attacked, and, defending their embarkation with arquebus and sword, was killed. Drake now went on to Salada Bay, where he stayed for over a month to careen the Golden Hind, to bring up from the hold and place in position his artillery, and to build, on board the Capitana, a pinnace with planks brought from England. She was launched on January 9, 1579. Several times during his stay Spaniards came from Coquimbo to look at him, but did not attack, according to the statement made later to Captain Sarmiento by Juan Griego, the boatswain of the Capitana taken along the coast by Drake, and corroborated by the log-book and Nuño da Silva the pilot.

Setting sail, they missed the mouth of the Copiapó River, and had an anxious search for water along the arid coasts of Tarapacá. Entering at length the mouth of the Pisagua River they had a stroke of luck, for there on the bank lay a Spaniard, fast asleep, in charge of a train of llamas laden with silver bars from Potosí and a quantity of charqui (dried meat). Taking him as a guide, and seizing his cargo, they sailed for the port of Arica, a village of only 20 houses, but at that time the chief point of embarkation of the silver from the interior mines. Brought from the mountains by Indians and llamas, the precious bars were sea-borne from Arica to Peru (Callao, for Lima) to await the yearly despatch of treasure to Panama City, and overland by Cruces to Porto Bello. Of these arrangements and their usual date Drake well knew, for but six years previously he had lain in wait for and captured the train load of mules carrying silver ingots along the cobble-paved pathway through the Isthmian forest.

Proceeding to Arica, the Golden Hind surprised and took two ships, one containing 33 bars of silver; but hearing that a ship laden with a richer treasure was in the port of Chule (about five miles north of Ilo) he hurried on. However, before his arrival warning had reached the captain, who disembarked and buried the silver bars, and Drake’s only satisfaction was to take the ship along and set her adrift, himself sailing on to Callao. Strangely enough, no news had reached Lima of the long sojourn and repeated raids of Drake upon the coast, and he was able to enter the bay without rousing suspicion on the part of the vessels anchored there. At this time (February 13, 1579), John Oxenham was still alive, in the prison of the Inquisition in Lima, with two or three of his crew; Drake knew it, and although he could not risk the ruin of his expedition by any such attempt as an attack on Lima, he hoped to seize Spaniards of sufficient importance to exchange for the English prisoners. When John Drake was examined before the Inquisition in Lima in 1587 he said that “Captain Francis ... in the boat, with six or seven men, accompanied by the pinnace carrying twenty or thirty men, went to the other vessels anchored there and cut their cables.... This was done so that, having been cut loose, the wind would carry these ships out of port, where he could seize them and hold them for ransom, so that in exchange they would give him the Englishman who was said to be a prisoner in Lima.” The plan did not succeed. A calm fell, and an attack by the pinnace on a ship from Panama was repulsed with the loss of a man; she was afterwards taken when her crew abandoned her. At night the tide carried them outside the port, and when in the morning three or four vessels came out against the Golden Hind Drake ran before the wind, sailing north until Paita was reached. A ship was taken here and another farther north, but it was not until the first day of March that young John Drake won the chain of gold that had been promised to the first person sighting the coveted treasure ship of San Juan de Anton. Two days later Drake transferred from the captured ship an immense treasure, including much gold and fourteen chests of silver, letting her go on March 6.

Thence his exploits do not greatly concern the Pacific coast; he took vessels off Nicaragua, plundered the Port of Guatulco in Mexico, sailed to the Californian coast, and when he met ice shaped his course southwest, making for the Moluccas, the Cape of Good Hope, and so back to Plymouth, arriving with the greatest treasure that was ever carried in one little sailing vessel and the undying record of an extraordinarily bold feat in the circumnavigation of the globe.

It is the effect of Drake’s exploit upon the West Coast which concerns these pages chiefly, but it is only fair to the memory of a gallant man and fine sailor to say that not only was he beloved at home, but that the noble Spaniards with whom he came in contact did justice to his qualities. Not unnaturally, the ports that he raided feared and hated his name; but such a man as Don Francisco de Zarate taken prisoner by Drake off Acajutla (El Salvador) in April, 1579, called him “one of the greatest mariners that sails the seas, both as a navigator and as a commander.” A remark of Zarate’s that follows sheds a bright light on Drake: “Nine or ten cavaliers, cadets of noble English families, form part of the council which he calls together for the most trifling matter, although he takes advice from no one. But he enjoys hearing what they say, and afterwards issues his orders.” Zarate was shown, and apparently accepted the propriety of, Elizabeth’s commission to Drake, and informs the Viceroy of Mexico that “I managed to find out whether the General was liked, and they (the crew of the Golden Hind) all said that they adored him.”

Thomas Cavendish

The effect of Drake’s feat upon the New World was electric. The Viceroys of New Spain and Peru, the Audiencia of Panama, Governors of every province, hastened to strengthen weak ports with troops and artillery; ships changed their routes, scores of reports and letters went home to Spain. Philip II, who through his clever Ambassador at the court of Elizabeth knew of the expedition before it sailed, wrote discreetly on the margin of one such letter, “Before the Corsair reaches England it is not expedient to speak to the Queen. When he arrives, yes. Investigate whether it would be well to erect a fort in the Port of Magellan.”

But noisy as was the repute of the exploit in the Pacific and in Spain, it had no less effect upon the imagination of Europeans desiring a share in exploration and its rewards. Spain’s tragic effort to found a settlement in the Strait was almost blotted out when Thomas Cavendish passed through in 1586.

Cavendish was a native of Trimley in Suffolk, a good mariner; he sailed across the Atlantic with three ships, the largest of 120 tons, entered the Strait in January, 1586, and passed out into the Pacific on February 24. Sailing north to the island of St. Mary, he found stores of good wheat and barley, and potato roots “very good to eat.” Hogs and hens, introduced by the Spaniards, were thriving, and although the Indian small farmers were so much in subjection to the Spaniards that they dared not eat a hog nor hen themselves, in compensation for these restrictions all had been made Christians.

Running north, Cavendish anchored near Concepción; in the bay of Quintero they had an encounter with Spaniards on horseback, and the captain himself, who travelled eight miles inland, declared the valley country to be “very fruitful, with fair fresh rivers.” Off Arica the raiders took a ship, and went on north, raiding the coastal vessels; eventually they burnt Paita, raided Puna Island at the mouth of the Guayas River, and lost men there.