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Warships on the Horizon
In 1493 Spain had been granted ownership of all that lay west of a
demarcation made by Pope Alexander VI. This point was 300 miles west of the Azores, and encompassed all of the new World, and the New World pathways to the Orient. Other seafaring European powers - the English, French, and Dutch - refused to recognize this papal demarcation as a legal boundary and were determined to fight to gain a share of wealth from the New World. Each country sent out war ships to protect and / or steal its treasures, and the seas were a very dangerous highway with roving robbers and murderers at any turn.
The Spanish ships were constantly at risk - even when protected by
armadas of war galleons. Carrying tons of gold and silver mined in Central America along the route to Spain called the Spanish Main, or treasures from the Orient, these fleets were attacked by government sanctioned mercenaries called privateers who operated under license from other foreign governments. The pirates were also a threat, owing allegiance to no nation, and out solely for their own personal profit.
Names that Americans learn of as heroes - Sir Francis Drake, Thomas
Cavendish - these men were heroes only to the English, and were dreaded
adversaries to the Spanish. Cavendish boarded and took over a Spanish galleon loaded with treasure in Mexico, and after rounding the tip of Baja California in escape, he, the ship and crew, and the treasure disappeared and were never heard from again. Drake died of dysentery on a voyage to he Caribbean. It was certainly not a safe profession, yet all the way into the 1800s, dreaded pirates threatened and plagued settlements along California’s coast.
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