Pirates: Behind the Legends (2024) s01e01 Episode Script

1
[Narrator] For centuries,
pirates have terrorized
the oceans--
looting ships,
seizing captives,
pillaging settlements--
men and women out
for blood and riches,
striking fear into the hearts
of entire populations.
[Expert 1] Piracy is
thievery on the high seas.
[Expert 2] We've really
romanticized the pirate life.
[Expert 3] Almost
no one in human history
self-identifies as a pirate.
[Narrator] Were they skilled
seamen loyal to their crews
or savage criminals ready
to kill for their treasure?
[Expert 3] They all had reasons
to justify their behavior.
They all had arguments for why
what they were doing was okay.
[swords clanging]
[Expert 1] It's often
a matter of perspective.
[Narrator] Perhaps
no other historical figure
is more famous for
treading this murky line
than Sir Francis Drake,
a man who inspired generations
to take to the sea
seeking their fortunes.
[Expert 3] Sir Francis Drake
could be perceived
as the ultimate English pirate.
Any Englishman who performed
an act of sea marauding,
they saw him as a hero,
as a model.
[Narrator] The first Englishman
to circumnavigate the globe,
he earned a knighthood
from his queen
and a place
in English high society.
Drake's time at sea
revealed his true character
as a power hungry
ruthless pirate.
♪
♪
[Expert 3] Francis Drake
grew up in Plymouth,
which is in the West
Country of England.
He would have been surrounded
by sailors and sailing culture.
[Narrator] Having already
spent years of his life at sea,
Francis Drake sets sail
for West Africa
under the command of his
wealthy cousin, John Hawkins,
an experienced captain
who built his fortune
in a most sinister industry.
Hawkins was an early profiteer
of the transatlantic
slave trade.
[Mark Hanna] Piracy has
an interesting relationship
with the history
of the slave trade.
The first slave traders
were, in fact, pirates.
In many ways,
the slave trade itself
was associated with piracy.
Sir John Hawkins,
Drake's cousin,
was one of England's
first slave traders.
[Harcourt Fuller]
In the late 15th century
and then into the 16th century,
the Spanish controlled
the transportation of enslaved
Africans to the Americas.
They were the dominant power,
and essentially the Spanish
forebode other European powers
from trading
in their territories.
Peru, Mexico, Cuba,
all of these places
had enslaved Africans
that were the driving forces
of the economies
in precious metals,
plantation commodities,
et cetera.
[Narrator] Drake and Hawkins
arrive on the coast
of Sierra Leone with six ships
bustling with 100 men,
determined to loosen
Spain's grip
on the lucrative
transatlantic slave trade.
♪
[Richard Blakemore]
They raid villages.
They also ally
with local African rulers
who are involved in warfare
because most enslaved people
are prisoners of war
at this time.
And they do carry large numbers
of enslaved people
over to the Americas,
and they try to force Spanish
ports to trade with them,
even though this is against
the rules of the Spanish Empire.
[Narrator] Spanish colonies
across the New World
are making great sums of money
off the vast number
of enslaved laborers
being transported
from African countries.
Under King Philip II's law,
it's illegal
for Spanish merchants
to trade with the English,
but when Hawkins and Drake
reach the New World,
they care little
for Philip's rules.
By threatening Spanish traders,
they force the sale
of their captives.
[Craig Lambert] Hawkins
is buying for 2 pound
in West Africa and selling
for 22 pound in the New World,
which is significantly
undercutting
the Spanish merchants.
[Narrator] September 1568.
Drake has been given
command of his own ship
in Hawkins' convoy,
and the duo are hoping to land
one of their biggest sales yet
at the Spanish port
of San Juan de Ulúa.
But whilst attempting
to barter their goods
and trade enslaved people,
Drake and Hawkins
are interrupted
by the sudden arrival
of a Spanish fleet.
[Lambert] There's a standoff
between the two fleets,
and they come to a decision
that Hawkins will
be allowed to leave.
However, later on,
the Spanish fleet
attacks the English at night.
Drake is on one
of the other English ships,
and he sees this happening.
Hawkins' fleet is in trouble
because it's bottled
into the harbor.
And rather than helping
Hawkins stand and fight
against the Spanish,
Drake turned around
and heads back for England.
♪
It's an interesting reflection,
I think, on Drake's character
in that he's got
steely determination,
he's very ambitious.
He's also quite willing
to, to ditch friends
when he thinks
it's right to do so.
[Narrator] Drake
races home to Plymouth.
Hawkins, however,
isn't captured or killed
in the skirmish.
A sudden shift of wind
blows the Spanish fleet
off course,
allowing his escape.
Hawkins washes up on
English soil some weeks later,
furious, accusing Drake
of abandoning him.
Their voyage
has been a disaster,
and it puts an end
to English involvement
in the slave trade
for the next century.
The cousins' once-lucrative
partnership is terminated.
[Fuller] He escaped
with his life,
but he was humiliated.
That incident really
made him hate the Spanish,
and he vowed that he
would dedicate his life
to harassing them, destroying
them, and breaking them down
so that he could build up
England for Queen Elizabeth I.
[Narrator] But Spain
is a formidable adversary
for the upstart captain.
King Philip II controls the
mightiest empire in the world,
encompassing Spain itself,
the Netherlands,
parts of Italy,
and vast territories
of the Americas.
Spain's unmatched wealth stems
from the millions of pounds
of silver extracted from
the mines of the New World,
attracting the envy
of every monarch in Europe,
including Queen Elizabeth.
Their rivalry is further stoked
by a difference in faith.
Elizabeth is Protestant.
Philip is Catholic.
[Iszi Lawrence] Queen Elizabeth
was in a world of trouble
geopolitically
because Britain was under
constant threat of invasion.
Spain wanted to stamp out
Protestants.
All of this made Spain
an existential threat.
[Lambert] But Elizabeth doesn't
want a full-scale war with Spain
because A,
she can't afford that
and B, it's gonna be
very dangerous for her.
But increasingly,
she wants to attack Spain,
where it might hurt,
to take the war
to Spain's overseas territories.
[Lawrence] She needed
men who were capable
of stopping the Spanish
from expanding further.
[Narrator] The Crown then
takes a cut of any plunder.
Hawkins is amongst those whose
actions against the Spanish
are, to the English queen,
legitimate.
[Blakemore]
There's a big debate.
The Spanish don't consider
this legal at all.
[Mélanie Lamotte]
The view of Queen Elizabeth I,
she didn't care much
about what the Spaniards
were saying.
She saw it as a way
to enrich England
and then to attack
enemy vessels.
[Blakemore] So all of these
raiders are not actually
formally at war with Spain,
but they're pursuing it
under this legal instrument
called letters of reprisal.
[Hanna] These men became
known as the Sea Dogs.
And they weren't openly
supported by Elizabeth,
but she also didn't
openly condemn them.
In some ways, she wanted
to maintain some deniability
in the face of potential
Spanish reprisal.
[Narrator] Drake readies
himself for another expedition,
preparing to attack Spanish
ports in the New World,
but since parting with Hawkins,
he's no longer protected
by a letter of reprisal.
Any assault by Drake
on the Spanish
will be considered
an act of piracy.
However, behind closed doors,
Queen Elizabeth seems
quietly supportive
of Drake's ambitions.
[Blakemore] The rules
around piracy were evolving
at this time.
Drake claims that he's
carrying out revenge
for the attacks that the
Spanish Empire mounted on him.
And it's not entirely clear
if he has a just cause,
which he claims to have,
then that pushes him
into this sort of slightly
murky category of legal raider,
which is less clear-cut
than being a pirate.
But from the Spanish
point of view,
he's definitely a corsario,
a pirata, a pirate.
♪
[Narrator] For Drake, any
Spanish target is legitimate.
He sets his sights
on the port of Nombre de Dios
on the isthmus of Panama,
a major artery in the
movement of Spanish silver.
[Blakemore] It's a crucial node
in the Spanish silver route.
So silver being mined in Peru
is brought up the west coast
of the Americas to Panama
carried across
to Nombre de Dios,
and then shipped
from there to Spain.
[Hannah Cusworth] Nombre de Dios
is an incredibly
attractive place to raid
because of the fact that
for such an important place,
it wasn't very well protected.
♪
[Narrator] Drake slips
into the port
where he discovers
the treasury lies vulnerable.
It's time to strike.
[Narrator] Acting with speed,
Drake and his crew
dismantle the town's defenses,
but it's too late;
the alarm is raised.
In the melee, a shot
slams through Drake's leg.
But he's lucky, merely injured,
forced to retreat,
escaping with his life.
Drake survives
to fight another day.
But he now realizes that he
requires greater manpower
and local knowledge
if dangerous raids
of this ambition
are to succeed.
Fortunately, a multilingual
sailor known only as Diego
has recently joined his crew.
[Cusworth] The likelihood
is Diego came from a region
known as Senegambia
in West Africa.
Diego had been enslaved
in the household
of the captain
of Nombre de Dios,
and we get the sense
that he wanted to seek freedom
in some way.
There was a sense going around,
whispers in the Atlantic
world at this time,
that England was somewhere
that didn't do slavery,
and that if you then
stepped onto English soil,
you would become a free man.
Not that much longer after
Drake, that completely changes.
Diego was so central to Drake
being able to do this raid
on Nombre de Dios by easing that
path, being eyes on the ground,
someone who had
really good local knowledge,
which Drake wouldn't
necessarily have had.
♪
[Narrator] Another direct
attack on Nombre de Dios
is out of the question,
so Diego approaches a group of
people who are living quietly
in the Panamanian hinterlands--
the Cimaroons.
[Cusworth] The Cimaroons
are a group of Africans
who had previously been
enslaved by the Spanish
and had been able to escape.
[Fuller] These were
formerly enslaved people
that had escaped
from the plantations,
and they hid themselves
in inhospitable territory,
so we're talking about
mountains and forests.
[Cusworth] They set up their own
communities being able to live
a lot more by their own rules
in a state of freedom.
For understandable reasons,
they hated the Spanish.
[Narrator]
Drake manipulates that hatred
to forge an alliance
with the Cimaroons.
They provide him
with invaluable intelligence
covering the movement
of Spanish silver,
including news of a mule train,
picking its way through
the Panamanian forests,
laden with a fortune
in precious metal.
[Lawrence] There are
weaknesses in this chain.
You've got to get your silver
from the mines to the ports,
and it's 12 days
through the jungle,
the mules packed up
with this precious metal,
and you better hope
that nobody attacks
before your big battleships
can come and defend you.
[Narrator] Drake and his crew
trek through the jungle
to a point just south
of Nombre de Dios,
where they lay in wait
for the train.
[Lambert] Drake and the others
set an ambush,
so they divide
the forces in two.
Drake goes on the eastern side
of Nombre de Dios
a few kilometers away, and
they wait for the mule train.
♪
[Narrator] Drake and his allies
spring the trap.
Spanish guards put up
a fierce resistance,
but Drake overwhelms them.
The surviving Spaniards
flee into the jungle.
[Lambert] This time,
it's a really great success.
Drake just takes
the silver bars and clears off.
[Narrator] Drake
and his crew drag the silver
across 18 miles of jungle.
Their heist has been
so successful
that they are unable to haul
all of the heavy treasure
back to their boats.
And so the men bury it.
They carefully draw up a map
so that one day the silver
can be reclaimed.
[Lambert] This is where
the treasure map originates
because legends grow up
that Drake never went back
to collect all these bars
of silver, and therefore,
there's potential
that they might be there.
[Narrator] So begins one
of the most enduring
and seductive myths
around Drake, the map,
and the silver,
which has never been found.
Generations of future seafarers
will pass on tales of plunder
buried in
the Panamanian jungle,
Drake's map providing the
catalyst for hundreds of years
of legends of fearsome pirates
and their hidden treasure.
♪
[Narrator] August 1, 1573.
Drake returns to England
a hero and fabulously wealthy.
[Blakemore] When they came
back with the plunder,
the queen probably
wasn't going to quibble
over how they got it,
so when Drake returns,
she takes a cut.
[Lambert] Elizabeth
quite likes him.
He's effectively a useful tool.
But Elizabeth
was liked to be charmed
by quite a lot of people.
The favors slip in and out
of the nexus quite quickly.
But there is certainly
a connection
that he did have at times
with, with Elizabeth.
So Drake is now the man
at the forefront, the hero.
[Blakemore] When Drake was
on the isthmus of Panama,
he supposedly sees
the Pacific Ocean
for the first time,
and this awakes in him
an ambition to reach that ocean.
It's also part of Spain's
global silver networks
because a lot of the silver
from the Americas
is being shipped to Manila
and to China for trade there.
And this is much less protected
because it's much less
accessible than the Caribbean.
So this is probably where
Drake's plan comes from,
the knowledge that
there is money to be made
in these vulnerable
shipping routes
along the west coast of America.
[Narrator] Drake begins
planning what he hopes
will be the greatest voyage
in his nation's history--
an illicit assault
on the unguarded Spanish towns
on the west coast
of the Americas.
But fearing
that few would enlist
if they knew the dangers
and duration of the expedition,
Drake conceals his true plans.
Without a letter of reprisal,
they'll all be
committing piracy.
Instead, he boasts of a short
voyage with easy plunder.
[Lambert] Seafarers actually do
have a reputation in this period
as being seen
as itinerant drunks.
So this idea that they're
moving from place to place
and they don't have a set home
creates an image of them
that they're an unruly bunch.
[Hanna] If you're
someone who grew up
in the same Plymouth
along the coast
and you were part
of a fishing family,
that might be all
you're ever going to do
for the rest of your life
and always be sort of
living hand to mouth.
And so the idea that you could
go on a voyage like Drake's
could mean a change
of your entire existence.
You and your family could be set
for the rest of your life.
[Narrator] Drake assembles
a crew of 164 men
from across every sector
of English society,
a solid mixture of sailors,
soldiers, apprentices,
and even a dozen gentlemen.
[Cusworth] Pirate crews
were more multiracial
than I think
we previously assumed.
In England, we have records of
African people being paid wages.
And so not all people who were
in England at this time
who were Black were enslaved,
very far from it.
[Narrator] Forever pious,
Drake also recruits a preacher
to offer God's message
to his men
and hires musicians
to accompany them
in the daily singing of psalms.
[Blakemore] And often
we find sailors sailing
with the same captains
over multiple voyages,
and that's happening
with Drake as well.
♪
[Narrator] December 1577.
Drake sets sail,
bound for waters unknown,
guided by his dogmatic faith
and the promise of loot
beyond compare.
But the challenges
of this epic expedition
will be far greater than
he could ever have imagined.
At the head of Drake's fleet
sails a galleon
known as the Pelican,
later renamed the Golden Hind.
Measuring 80 feet
from bow to stern,
she carries 22 guns
and a crew of 80 men.
Her speed would give Drake
a distinct advantage
when confronting larger, less
nimble Spanish trading ships.
[Blakemore] Francis Drake
and other raiders like him
want fast ships,
they want maneuverable ships,
and these are the kind of
vessels that they are using.
They've a fairly substantial
size and quite well-armed.
But they're not as big
as the enormous Spanish galleons
that they're targeting.
[Narrator] Following
two months at sea,
the fleet arrive at Cape Verde
and immediately attack
a Portuguese vessel.
Drake forces the ship's
navigator to join his crew,
bringing rare charts
of the Pacific with him.
The information is priceless.
Whilst maps of the New World
were riddled with inaccuracies,
they nevertheless provided
a basic sense of lands
little known to the English
captain and his men.
[Blakemore] The Spanish
and Portuguese empires
really tried to control
navigational knowledge
because it was so valuable,
so maps of the Americas
were tightly regulated
in the early period
of the Spanish
and Portuguese empires.
[Narrator] Drake
makes a decision.
They'll sail west
from Cape Verde,
hitting South America
and pushing south,
where they will face
the treacherous
Straits of Magellan.
But it's going to take them
several months
to cross the Atlantic.
Having risen through
the ranks himself,
Drake knows that
the success of the voyage
depends on the morale
of his crew.
Even as captain, he joins in on
the rougher tasks of seafaring.
[Lambert] Conditions
are very cramped.
Mariners would sleep either
on the main deck or below.
It's extremely wet.
They would only usually
have one pair of clothing,
so the clothing gets caked
in salt quite easily.
[Blakemore] Ships are fragile.
They are perishable.
Wood rots.
Rope decays and frays.
Part of the life of sailors
is continually repairing
these ships simply
to keep them afloat.
And it makes you think
about the amount of effort
that goes into these really long
voyages over months and years.
[Lambert] Food is rudimentary.
You would have ship's biscuit,
a hard kind of tack.
The hunt for fresh water
is a perennial problem
that they're
always trying to solve.
[Blakemore] We think
about the kind of grimness
and the hardship
of these voyages,
and that's absolutely true,
but there's also
a really important
dimension of community.
[Lambert] There's probably
gambling activities
and things like that
occurring on board these ships.
Wills will say, you know,
you must pay this person
the money I owe him.
♪
[Blakemore]
He clearly cares deeply
for the men under his command.
For example, we know
that very few sailors
die of scurvy or sickness
during his voyages,
which is quite unusual
at the time,
so he's clearly taking measures
to protect the people
serving with him.
He is motivating the sailors
who are joining him.
The men do get a share
of the plunder,
perhaps not as much
as he got himself,
but certainly he seems
to be rewarding them.
But he's also not
hesitating to be brutal
when he feels that
the circumstances demand it.
♪
[Narrator] As the expedition
drags on into the unknown,
the ships pushing
ever further south,
the crew begin to suspect Drake
has deliberately misled them.
This will be
a far lengthier voyage
than they had expected
or been promised.
Some men begin
to openly complain;
others conspire in secret.
The most vocal among them
is Thomas Doughty,
Drake's second-in-command.
[Lambert] Doughty's a gentleman,
so Drake sees him as
a challenge to his authority.
And this is a real issue
for Drake.
He has a paranoia.
[Blakemore] Thomas Doughty
seems to think
that he's sharing
command with Drake.
That's not how Drake sees it.
He, first of all, moves Doughty
to a less important ship,
and then he puts him
on trial for treason.
[Narrator] Drake
knows he cannot afford
to be witnessed
tolerating disobedience.
He must secure
his position as captain.
Having carefully
selected a jury,
Drake ruthlessly prosecutes the
case against his former friend.
♪
[shouting]
[Lambert] The crew
was scared of Drake.
[shouting]
Every voyage that he goes on,
he identifies
a particular individual
who he has to discipline
to the crew.
[Narrator] The crew
fall in line behind Drake.
No one on the jury
dares vote against him,
and Doughty is found guilty
by unanimous consent.
Given his high status
as a gentleman,
Doughty enjoys the cruel
luxury of a beheading,
rather than being hanged
like a common criminal.
[Narrator]
With renewed confidence
in their captain's
total authority asserted,
Drake's crew
are poised to become
the first ever Englishmen
to sail into the Pacific Ocean.
But before making history,
he must face the notorious
Magellan Strait,
a 350-mile waterway
punctuated by lethal currents,
violent winds,
and jagged coastline.
Drake's fleet presses on.
[Lambert] They suffered
quite badly.
It was freezing cold.
There were storms.
They had to survive
by killing penguins down there
and eating penguin meat.
The fleet got separated
and broken up.
It wasn't a pleasant trip.
[Narrator] And the worst
is yet to come.
The Pacific welcomes Drake
by unleashing a vicious storm,
relentlessly pounding
his boats for 50 days.
One ship is sunk.
Everyone on board drowns.
Another abandons the voyage
and returns to England.
Only Drake's flagship,
the Golden Hind,
and its small crew remain.
[Blakemore] It's very difficult
to sail that route,
and things are looking
pretty hairy
by the time
they reach South America.
But the Spanish Empire there
is really not prepared
for the arrival
of an English ship.
[Lambert] Spanish ships on that
side of Panama, down into Chile,
on the Pacific side,
they're not armed.
They don't expect someone
like Drake to be there.
[Blakemore] The first thing
they do on arrival is construct
more smaller vessels
to help them sail around
on sort of coastal
voyages as well.
So they begin to raid
these major Spanish settlements
all along the coast
of South America.
[Narrator] 11 perilous months
have passed since
the expedition left England.
Finally, a determined Drake
works his way up
the Pacific coast,
the soft underbelly
of Spain's New World empire.
He strikes several towns
in quick succession.
At Valparaíso, his men
loot the storehouse,
making off with thousands
of bottles of wine.
At La Herradura,
they steal pigs
before being repelled
by Spanish horsemen.
And at Arica, they pillage
two ships, plundering silver.
[Lambert] Those raids
follow the same pattern
as they do in the Caribbean.
They'll enter a harbor,
sometimes they'll go in,
sometimes they won't,
it depends on what the defenses
are like within that place.
They will usually try
and capture ships
that are sat
riding in the harbor.
If there's anything on them,
they'll rifle them
and take things off them.
[Blakemore] He's taking
prisoners who apparently
his crews are torturing
to get them to reveal
where their wealth is hidden
aboard the ship
that they've captured.
[Narrator] So far, the raiding
has brought only modest return.
Drake has heard whispers
of the riches to be discovered
aboard a treasure galleon
named Nuestra Señora
de la Concepción,
but the ship proves elusive.
That is until, during their
17th arduous month at sea,
Drake spots the Concepción
off the coast of Peru.
He and his men close in
on their prize,
a haul large enough to finally
justify their expedition.
Disguising the Golden Hind
as an innocuous trading vessel,
the wily pirate tracks
the Concepción until nightfall,
when he strikes.
[gunfire]
Firing a broadside
into the galleon,
the Spaniards
are caught unprepared,
their cannons silent.
They surrender instantly.
♪
[Lambert] It's this ship
in particular that's probably
responsible for the few hundred
thousand pound in money
that Drake brings back.
Several million
in today's money.
In fact, they say
that they captured so much
that they don't use stones
as ballast anymore.
They use silver bars
as ballast for the ship.
So it's a huge cache of silver
and also the precious items that
Drake captures on that vessel.
[Narrator] Drake plunders
rare jewels, 80 pounds of gold,
and a mountain of silver.
No Englishman has ever seized
such an impressive prize.
Drake and his men
will be extremely rich
if they survive the long voyage
home through enemy waters.
It will be months,
if not years,
before they reach safe harbor.
In that time, death
could strike at any moment--
from shipwreck, battle,
or disease--
and if captured by the Spanish,
Drake and every last one
of his men
would be tried as pirates
and face the noose.
♪
[Narrator] Drake continues
to raid the coast,
eventually reaching
the Mexican port of Huatulco
in April 1579.
Having seized
the settlement's valuables,
Drake's gaze lands
on their Catholic church.
[Jorge Cañizares-Esguerra]
Drake arrived in many
of these places and began to
do destruction of religious
images in churches.
Drake and his peers
were often seen as heretics,
destroyers of cities,
particularly targeting
their churches.
[Narrator] Drake and his crew
smash crucifixes,
remove all the bells
from the belfry,
and take the priest
as their hostage.
Reports of this Protestant
attack on the Catholic Church
turn Drake into a despised
figure throughout Spain.
[Hanna] The Spanish saw him
as one of the greatest enemies
that they've ever had
in their entire history.
[Cañizares-Esguerra]
He was known as the Dragon
of the Apocalypse,
the multiheaded dragon.
[Hanna] The Spanish put
a massive ransom on his head
to sort of capture him.
[Lambert] He feared that going
back across the Atlantic,
that there would be
a Spanish fleet waiting for him.
[Narrator] Spanish warships
are closing in.
If Drake attempts to sail east
through the Magellan Strait,
the Golden Hind will almost
certainly be destroyed
by an enemy fleet.
He's left with only
one other option--
sail west on a long,
perilous journey
across a hostile Pacific Ocean.
[Lambert] The idea slowly
formulates with Drake
about making the trip
across the Pacific.
So, in a sense,
the circumnavigation happens
because Drake doesn't want to go
back through the Atlantic.
[Narrator] July 1579.
A weather-beaten Golden Hind
leaves the coves of California
and heads west into the vast
unknown of the Pacific Ocean.
Drake's crew have been at sea
for nearly two years.
The return journey
will be longer still.
For 68 monotonous
days and nights,
Drake and his men
face an endless sea.
But then, finally,
they spot land,
a small island in
the Micronesian archipelago.
From there, the Golden Hind
picks her way
through the East Indies,
crosses the Indian Ocean, and
rounds the Cape of Good Hope.
At last, they're back in the
familiar wash of the Atlantic.
Drake pushes for home.
The Golden Hind
docks at Plymouth
on September 26, 1580.
164 men had left England,
and three tough years later,
only 59 return.
The survivors claim a feat
unlike any other Englishmen
before them--
a successful circumnavigation
of the globe.
[Hanna] One of the most amazing
elements of the Age of Sail
is the sheer amount of risk
it took to go
on one of these voyages.
And Drake's is
a good example of that,
having hundreds of men
on board ship when they leave,
all very excited to have
the adventurous trip
and only to have dozens be alive
when they return back home.
And even that is lauded
as a successful voyage.
But those 59 all shared
in a massive amount of wealth.
♪
♪
[Blakemore] The first
thing that he does
when sailing into England,
when he meets a boat
coming out of England, is ask,
"Is Queen Elizabeth
still alive?"
Because he's clearly worried
that if she's dead
and a successor has taken over,
they might look differently
on his actions,
and he might get
into some serious trouble.
Luckily for him, she is alive
and he is welcomed as a hero.
[Narrator] Drake deposited
loot to the value
of roughly 264,000 pounds
in the vaults
of the Tower of London,
a sum equivalent
to $100 million today.
[Blakemore] That plunder
first had to go through
a legal process,
at least in theory,
and some part of it
was due to the queen.
And then what was left
was shared out to the suppliers
who had provided the ship, also
to the captain and to the crew.
And different members
of the crew got different shares
depending on their rank.
[Narrator] The queen authorized
her favorite pirate
to pocket 10,000 pounds,
almost $5 million
in today's money,
and to distribute
a further 8,000 pounds
amongst his faithful crew.
[Blakemore] The sailors probably
make years' worth of wages
in just that one voyage.
And there's a lot of concern
amongst Crown officials
that actually the sailors,
who are the ones on the ship,
are taking a lot of it before
it even gets to the judges.
And so the Crown
is continually concerned
that they are not
getting their full share
because by the time
they get down to the ship,
a lot of it has already
been snuck away
into the taverns
and the local shops
of the maritime communities.
[Narrator] Even so, the Crown's
share of Drake's haul
was still greater than the
queen's usual annual revenue.
[Lambert] Elizabeth is
obviously happy at this,
but she doesn't want
to overly publicize this
for obvious reasons,
that she doesn't want
to antagonize the Spanish
even more.
The narrative of the voyage
is suppressed.
There's clearly sensitivity
about what's happened.
[Narrator] Francis Drake proves
to be a contentious figure.
Courtiers and merchants
believe he has unsettled
a delicate balance
of affairs across Europe.
[Blakemore] When he comes to
court, some of the wealthy elite
will refuse to meet with him,
refuse to take gifts from him,
refuse to encounter him
because he has
this very divisive reputation.
[Narrator] Meanwhile, reports
of Drake's violent excesses
at sea, his blatant acts
of piracy, begin to circulate,
throwing into question
his status as a hero.
[Blakemore] There's one
particularly interesting example
where he and his sailors
during the circumnavigation
capture several African people,
one of whom is a woman
who we think was called Maria.
[Cusworth]
She was heavily pregnant.
We get the sense that
she probably became pregnant
on Drake's ship,
so she seems like she's in an
incredibly vulnerable position
and that she might have been
subject to sexual assault.
There have been a number
of people who have said
that the father
of Maria's child was Drake,
but there isn't anything
that definitely proves that.
I think what we do know was
that Drake didn't protect her.
♪
[Blakemore] They leave
Maria on an island
in the Indian Ocean,
and he's probably doing that
to protect his reputation
back home,
but it's actually recorded
by writers at the time,
so it's clearly a rumor
that's getting home somehow.
♪
[Narrator] April 1581.
Despite whispers
of his betrayal of Maria,
Drake is knighted
by Queen Elizabeth
on board his flagship,
the Golden Hind.
A bloody career of violent
piracy is legitimized,
elevating Drake
into English high society.
[Blakemore] Him being
knighted represents this shift
towards the image
of a maritime hero.
[Lambert] The French ambassador
and all the other people there,
it's a grand affair,
it's very public,
and so Elizabeth is showing
that she respects Drake
and that she's accepted him.
[Hanna] Not only was Drake
knighted by the queen,
but he was made mayor
of Plymouth.
For Drake
and his own self-image,
that was actually one
of the most important things
he ever achieved,
as well as eventually becoming
a member of Parliament.
[Narrator] Drake's story
isn't over yet.
In 1588, war breaks out
between England and Spain.
Queen Elizabeth calls on Drake
to serve as her vice admiral,
charged with fending off
the mighty Spanish Armada,
a fighting force of 73 ships
and 30,000 men.
[gunfire and swords clashing]
Drake succeeds,
defeating the Spaniards
with a far smaller force.
At the age of 46,
the mariner's life
has seen an incredible
transformation--
from commoner, to pirate,
to a victorious commander
of Queen Elizabeth's navy.
And yet as rapidly
as he rises, Drake falls.
The following year, he leads
a disastrous attack on Spain.
His force is
violently repulsed,
with roughly 10,000
Englishmen left dead.
He drifts home to England,
humiliated,
his name falling out of favor.
It's seven years until
he's given another command.
August 1595.
Drake sets sail
for the Caribbean
for what would become
his final campaign.
[Lambert] It's a voyage
that breaks down quite a bit.
There's fractious relationships
between members of the crew.
But, of course, the big issue
on these voyages is disease.
[Narrator] Drake's
campaign disintegrates.
The Spanish ships
policing the Caribbean
have grown stronger
and wiser to his tactics.
Meanwhile, a fever ravages
the English crew,
seizing lives on a whim,
and Drake falls ill.
January 28, 1596.
Drake dies.
He's buried at sea
in a lead-lined coffin.
To this day,
treasure hunters search
for Drake's
final resting place,
but his remains
have never been found.
Sir Francis Drake
measured his success
in the ships he captured,
the cities he plundered,
and the oceans whose
waves he battled against.
[thunder]
[Blakemore] I think he's
a very complex character,
and I think he's characteristic
of the complexities of that age.
[Narrator] He transcended
his bleak beginnings
through determination,
great risk, and a ruthlessness
which bore little consideration
for human life.
[Lambert] I think Drake
is a very ambitious man
who knew exactly
what he wanted.
And he did raise himself
through piracy
to become an extremely
wealthy individual,
to rise to the heights
of the social strata.
So he's successful
in that regard.
But I wouldn't trust Drake.
He was a man who looked
after his own interests.
[Narrator] During
his tumultuous lifetime,
he found status as a great hero
to the Protestant English
and as Catholic Spain's
most detested enemy
whilst also becoming
the first Englishman
to successfully
circumnavigate the globe.
[Cusworth] Drake's
circumnavigation of the globe
was incredibly significant.
I think it showed
that England was a naval force
to be reckoned with,
and Britain becomes a big empire
on the basis
of its naval supremacy.
[Narrator] But to truly
understand Drake's legacy,
we must follow those English
sailors who emerged in his wake
for generations to come.
Pirates and privateers
inspired by Drake
would descend
upon the Caribbean
seeking fame and fortune doing
whatever they felt necessary
to seize an almost
ever-elusive treasure.
[Hanna] So, in some ways,
he is the most heroic
and the most anti-heroic
naval figure in world history.
[Narrator]
Francis Drake was dead,
but the great age of piracy
had only just begun.