Francis Drake and his "Golden Hind"
This is what Francis Drake's ship, the Golden Doe, might have looked like when it entered the Pacific Ocean. Frame from the movie "Shogun" (1980)
Do you want to live without grief?
Well, so listen to me:
Only ocean and sea.
You pirates will be drunk.
"Hearts of Three". Jack London
Well, so listen to me:
Only ocean and sea.
You pirates will be drunk.
"Hearts of Three". Jack London
Ships and captains. Francis Drake was lucky in the way that only very few are lucky: during his lifetime he became a legend and a role model in England. But in Spain they hated him fiercely and called him El Drago - the Dragon. When he died in 1596, the king of Spain ordered bells to be rung throughout the country as if on a church holiday. In fact, Drake's actions can be called piracy, since in peacetime he conducted military operations against a state with which his state was not at war. But be that as it may, Queen Elizabeth I herself did not hesitate to come to his ship and knight him, and even more than that, she ordered to keep his ship "Golden Hind" ("Golden Hind") as a monument. And today we will just tell about him and his ship, and it will be a new cycle, similar to the good old Soviet “Club of Famous Captains”. That's just the characters for this "club" will be chosen by the author himself according to his desire and capabilities. Well, the first story will be about Francis Drake, primarily because ... one interesting event from the life of the author is connected with him.
And it happened that back in the early 80s of the last century, the author decided to write a book for children “The Ship on the Bookshelf” and tell in it how to make very simple and accessible models of ships from paper and cardboard, and not only bench, but also floating. And... I made 30 of these models, which I had to arrange on the top of the piano and in cabinets throughout the house. But ... it just so happened that things did not work out with this book, although some materials from it ended up in the magazine "Family and School", and others - in the book "From Everything at Hand", which was published in 1987. Part of the "squadron" was shown in the programs of the Penza television "Studio of Young Technicians", and one of these models was just a copy of the Golden Hind galleon, built using a very simplified technology. It is clear that it was impossible to live at the shipyard, and I gave away all these ships, and to a variety of people and organizations.
Years have passed, and just recently, not far from my house, in the premises of the former Skillful Hands store, a large antiques store was opened.
This is how my own ship, made 38 years ago, fell into my hands!
My wife went there, looked, and said: “What an interesting boat they have!”. And indeed - I look and see: on the shelf they have ... my ship of 1985, which has come into complete disrepair. “They brought it to us as a gift!” sellers told me. “We wanted to throw it away, but regretted it. He's very handsome!"
Repair work has begun!
That's how, it turns out, fate can play with a person, only with someone in a big way, but with someone like this - in small things! Told the saleswomen history this boat, that he is 38 years old, and took it home from their store to fix it, and at the same time to shake the old days, because I haven’t done this for a long time. Well, and "shaken", repaired, and my "boat" became better than before. Although it is clear that this is far from a copy model with a voluminous body, with a sheathing made of wooden slats, but a very simple, albeit floating, model for children.
Masts of kebab sticks - the "thing" for a model on such a small scale
I thought that this is downright a finger of fate, clearly indicating what I need to take and write about Francis Drake and his ship, and use photos of my model as illustrations. I thought so and did.
And this is how this model began to look after repair ...
Well, now, before talking about Drake himself, we should remember what important events took place even before his birth, but greatly influenced his fate. And it happened that back in 1493, the Pope, having learned about the discoveries of Columbus, simply took and divided the entire New World between Spain and Portugal. And a year later, in the city of Tordesillas, both of these countries signed an agreement on the delimitation of all open lands. Naturally, neither England nor France agreed with such a division, and the King of France did once say:
"Let me be shown that clause in Adam's will, by virtue of which the New World is to be divided among my brothers, the kings of Spain and Portugal, and I am to be deprived of my share of the inheritance."
This is how, or something like this, Francis Drake's ship looked like - the galleon "Pelican", later renamed the "Golden Doe"
So do not be surprised that after such words, French pirates and corsairs in the XNUMXth century began to rob Spanish ships sailing from America. And the British did the same for the French, only their enmity with the Spaniards was also fueled by religious strife.
Since no one knows exactly what the real Golden Hind looked like, many modeling companies produce a model of this ship, decorating it according to their taste and capabilities. Here, for example, is a model of this ship on a scale of 1:85 by the Spanish company OcCre
And then Francis Drake was born in England, only the exact date of this event is unknown to us. Something "about 1540", but how "about" and how much, only God knows. However, it is known that Francis was the eldest of 12 children in the family, and his parents were zealous Protestants (in particular, his father, Edmund Drake, was a ship's priest). In 1561, he received a vicarage in Kent, but by this time Francis was already a sailor, starting his sea career as a cabin boy at the age of 10 or 12 years. Moreover, his love for the sea and enthusiasm for everything connected with it so pleased the owner of the ship on which he sailed that he bequeathed to him his ship "Judith".
The same model - view from the stern of OcCre
In 1568, under the command of John Hawking, he participates in a fierce battle with the Spaniards in San Juan de Uloa. And - here it is fate, both came out of this battle alive and unharmed!
Then Drake makes a successful trip to Central America and by the mid-1570s he already deservedly enjoys the reputation of a skilled and brave commander and an experienced sailor. It was he who, from the high mountains of Panama, was the first of the British to see the Pacific Ocean, although he did not go down to its coast.
At this time, relations between England and Spain deteriorated completely, so that the war between them became inevitable. And so, in order to undermine the power of Spain in the New World, it was decided to strike at the Spanish possessions where no one expected it, namely from the Pacific Ocean. Drake was appointed leader, to whom Queen Elizabeth herself gave a secret audience. And she not only approved of his bold plan, but also supported him with a fair amount of money for that time, that is, in fact, she became a shareholder of this pirate raid.
And on the evening of November 15, 1577, Drake quietly went to sea from Plymouth along with five ships. His flagship was the Pelican, in addition to which under his command were the galleons Elizabeth, Marigold and Swan, as well as the small pinnace Christopher. Total number of crews flotilla was 164 people, that is, it was quite small.
Many details of the company's model, such as window sashes, are made using the photography technique.
What was this ship? It was built in Apdeburgh (Suffolk) and launched in 1576. It was a small galleon, but built of good oak, and not only the set was oak, but also its lining. The displacement ranged from 150 to 300 tons, the length of the ship's hull along the keel was 21,3 m, the width along the midships was 5,8 m. The ship had three masts: foresail, mainsail and mizzen. The first two masts carried direct sails - fore and mainsail, fore-topsail and main-topsail, but the mizzen-mast carried a sail ... mizzen - oblique, Latin sail. Under the bowsprit, a straight sail was also hung - a blind. The Pelican had a low bow, characteristic of a galleon, but a high superstructure at the stern. Moreover, on the transom board of the stern there was an image of a pelican feeding its chicks.
The ship was equipped with 14 four-pounder guns on the main deck and four two-pounder falconets fore and aft. For some reason, the two small-caliber guns on board were not included in this list, so the Pelican was called an 18-gun ship.
The start of the campaign was complicated by strong headwinds, but by Christmas the flotilla still reached Mogadar in Morocco. There, the Moroccans captured the sailor John Frey on the shore. But when the local sultan found out that he was an Englishman, and not a Spaniard or Portuguese, he not only freed the prisoner, but also gave Drake rich gifts in parting. But since the British ships had already left, the Sultan sent Frey home on an English ship that accidentally entered Mogadar. So he, perhaps, was the luckiest of all: he did not swim for long, and returned home a rich man, without experiencing any special hardships!
The model of the ship "Golden Hind" by the Italian company Mamoli is made on a scale of 1:53
And Drake, meanwhile, went farther and farther, capturing the Spanish and Portuguese ships he met along the way, from which, first of all, they took nautical charts, books on navigation and navigational instruments, but they didn’t rob or kill anyone. No one was taken prisoner either, except for the experienced Portuguese navigator Nunes da Silva, who, by the way, was released as soon as Drake's ship was off the Pacific coast of America. Moreover, he had to be landed ashore almost by force, so he did not rush to the Spaniards. Drake later said that during the entire time of this voyage, not a drop of Spanish blood was shed.
The stern of the Mamoli ship is very different from the stern of the OcCre
But in the bay of San Julian, one of his captains, Thomas Doughty, tried to revolt. But the attempt failed, the rebellious captain was tried and offered a choice of punishment: the death penalty on the spot, landing on the coast of Patagonia, or sending to England to be judged by the Queen's Privy Council. Doughty chose to be executed on the spot and was promptly beheaded.
Drake now only had three ships. Moreover, Drake decided to rename the "Pelican" to "Golden Hind" ("Golden Doe"). It is believed that this was done to flatter one of the organizers of the expedition, namely the Lord Chancellor Christopher Hutton, in whose coat of arms there was a doe. He also took the motto of the Hutton family - "Cassis Tutis Sima Virtus" ("courage is the best defense"), which he ordered to be carved on the transom board of his ship.
The nose of the Mamoli model
The ships entered the Strait of Magellan on August 22, 1578, passed it and on September 6 ended up in the Pacific Ocean, which met them with a strong storm that scattered the ships of the flotilla. The Marigold was killed, and Captain Winter on the Elizabeth considered that he was the only one left and hurried back to England. For 52 days the sea was stormy without ceasing, and when the weather improved, it turned out that the British ships were carried far to the south. Thus, Drake and his comrades, quite by accident, managed to open the strait, which was later named after him. It turned out that Tierra del Fuego is not a protrusion of the southern mainland, as everyone thought at that time, but just an archipelago of several islands, behind which lies the great Pacific Ocean.
To be continued ...
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