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75-779: Tomales Bay is a long, narrow inlet of the Pacific Ocean in Marin County in northern California in the United States . Tomales Bay is approximately 15 mi (24 km) long and averages nearly 1.0 mi (1.6 km) wide, with relatively shallow depths averaging 18 ft, effectively separating the Point Reyes Peninsula from the mainland of Marin County. It is located approximately 30 mi (48 km) northwest of San Francisco . The bay forms

150-718: A knighthood in 1581 which he received aboard his galleon the Golden Hind . Drake's circumnavigation inaugurated an era of conflict with the Spanish and in 1585, the Anglo-Spanish War began. Drake was in command of an expedition to the Americas that attacked Spanish shipping and ports. When Philip II sent the Spanish Armada to England in 1588 as a precursor to its invasion, Drake was second-in-command of

225-657: A pirate , known to them as El Draque ("The Dragon" in old Spanish). He died of dysentery after his failed assault on Panama in January 1596. Francis Drake was born at Crowndale Farm in Tavistock, Devon , England. His birth date is not formally recorded – such writers as E. F. Benson have claimed that he was born while the Six Articles of 1539 were in force, but British naval historian Julian Corbett , writing of William Camden 's account, on which this information

300-461: A 1591 portrait by Marcus Gheeraerts . On one side of the pendant is a state portrait of Elizabeth by the miniaturist Nicholas Hilliard , on the other a sardonyx cameo of double portrait busts, a regal woman and an African male. The Drake Jewel is a rare documented survivor among sixteenth-century jewels; it is conserved at the Victoria and Albert Museum , London. Queen Elizabeth awarded Drake

375-497: A discreet site at which the crew could prepare for the journey back to England. The northernmost extent of this leg of the expedition has been the subject of much scholarly debate, but most sources agree that Drake reached a latitude of at least 48° north before turning back and heading south. On 5 June 1579, the ship briefly made first landfall at what is now South Cove, Cape Arago, just south of Coos Bay, Oregon , and then sailed southward. On 17 June, Drake and his crew found

450-483: A fortune in gold. (An account of this may have given rise to subsequent stories of pirates and buried treasure). Badly wounded, Le Testu was captured and beheaded. The small band of adventurers dragged as much gold and silver as they could carry back across some 18 miles (29 km) of jungle-covered mountains to where they had left the raiding boats. When they got to the coast, the boats were gone. Drake and his men, downhearted, exhausted and hungry, had nowhere to go and

525-635: A knighthood aboard Golden Hind in Deptford on 4 April 1581; the dubbing being performed by a French diplomat, Monsieur de Marchaumont, who was negotiating for Elizabeth to marry the King of France's brother, Francis, Duke of Anjou . By getting the French diplomat involved in the knighting, Elizabeth was gaining the implicit political support of the French for Drake's actions. During the Victorian era, in

600-681: A prominent sea captain in Plymouth . In 1572, he set sail on his first independent mission , privateering along the Spanish Main . Drake's circumnavigation began on 15 December 1577. He crossed the Pacific Ocean, until then an area of exclusive Spanish interest, and laid claim to New Albion , plundering coastal towns and ships for treasure and supplies as he went. He arrived back in England on 26 September 1580. Elizabeth I awarded Drake

675-481: A protected cove when they landed on the Pacific coast of what is now Northern California. While ashore, he claimed the area for Queen Elizabeth I as Nova Albion or New Albion . To document and assert his claim, Drake posted an engraved plate of brass to claim sovereignty for Elizabeth and every successive English monarch. After erecting a fort and tents ashore, the crew laboured for several weeks as they prepared for

750-631: A quoit of Spanish gold from his clothes and said, "Our voyage is made." By the second week of August 1573, he had returned to Plymouth. It was during this expedition that on 11 February Drake and his lieutenant John Oxenham climbed a high tree in the central mountains of the Isthmus of Panama and thus became the first Englishmen to see the Pacific Ocean , mirroring the achievement of the Spaniard Vasco Núñez de Balboa in 1513. The Cimarróns had cut steps into its trunk, on which Drake and

825-434: A short time later, and gave each one gifts appropriate to their rank, as well as a letter of safe conduct . Drake continued north, raiding more Spanish settlements and ships as he went. His last stop in this phase of the voyage was in the town of Guatulco, where he and his crew stayed from 13 to 16 April, looting provisions and other materials. From here, Drake began to consider how best to return to England. One possibility

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900-624: A sixth ship, Mary (formerly Santa María ), a Portuguese merchant ship that had been captured off the coast of Africa near the Cape Verde Islands . He also kidnapped its captain, Nuno da Silva , a man with considerable experience navigating in South American waters. Drake's fleet suffered great attrition; he scuttled both Christopher and the flyboat Swan due to loss of men on the Atlantic crossing. He made landfall at

975-464: A small share of the profits. Based on this association, scholar Kris Lane lists Drake as one of the first English slave traders. The Spanish and Portuguese were aggrieved that the English had entered into the slave trade and were selling slaves to their colonies despite being forbidden from doing so. Queen Elizabeth I, under pressure to avoid an armed conflict, forbade Hawkins from going to sea for

1050-430: A spirit of nationalism, the story was promoted that Elizabeth I had done the knighting. After receiving his knighthood Drake unilaterally adopted the coat of arms of the ancient Devon family of Drake of Ash, to whom he claimed a distant but unspecified kinship. The right to use the arms was disputed in court so Queen Elizabeth awarded Drake his own coat of arms. Drake's heraldic achievement and coat of arms contains

1125-688: A third slave voyage. In response, he set up a slave voyage with a relative, John Lovell , in command in 1566. Drake accompanied Lovell on this voyage. The voyage was unsuccessful, as more than 90 enslaved Africans were released without payment. In 1567, Drake accompanied Hawkins on their next and last joint voyage. The crew attempted to capture slaves around Cape Verde , but failed. Hawkins allied himself with two local kings in Sierra Leone who asked for help against their enemies in exchange for half of any captives they took. Attacking from both sides, they took several hundred prisoners, though Kelsey says

1200-475: A trial in England. The main pieces of evidence against Doughty were the testimony of the ship's carpenter, Edward Bright, who after the trial was promoted to master of the ship Marigold , and Doughty's admission of telling Lord Burghley , a vocal opponent of agitating the Spanish, of the intent of the voyage. Drake consented to his request of Communion and dined with him, of which Francis Fletcher had this account: And after this holy repast, they dined also at

1275-631: Is a fjord , typically but not always in mountainous coastlines and also in montane lakes. Multi-arm complexes of large inlets or fjords may be called sounds , e.g.,  Puget Sound , Howe Sound , Karmsund ( sund is Scandinavian for "sound"). Some fjord-type inlets are called canals , e.g.,  Portland Canal , Lynn Canal , Hood Canal , and some are channels, e.g.,  Dean Channel and Douglas Channel . Tidal amplitude, wave intensity, and wave direction are all factors that influence sediment flux in inlets. On low slope sandy coastlines, inlets often separate barrier islands and can form as

1350-540: Is based, writes that "As a slip of memory, too, we must put down his difficult assertion that Edmund Drake was driven from Devonshire during a persecution under the Six Articles Act of 1539 ." His birth date is estimated from the wording of texts in contemporary sources such as: "Drake was two and twenty when he obtained the command of the Judith " (1566). This would date his birth to 1544. A date of c. 1540

1425-471: Is home to many aquatic species, and its habitat diversity is supported by eelgrass beds and intertidal mudflats. In the bay’s waters, bony and cartilaginous fish species including halibut , coho salmon, bat rays and leopard sharks can be found. Along muddy parts of bay's shore, it is common to find the gastropods such as the invasive False Cerith snail , recognizable from its dextrally coiled shape and brown-gray pattern. The area surrounding Tomales Bay

1500-824: Is some anecdotal evidence to support Drake serving as a common seaman on the first two voyages, and good evidence of his presence for the last two of four slaving voyages made by Hawkins' ships between 1562 and 1569. In 1562, Hawkins sailed to the coast of the Sierra Leone, seized Portuguese slave ships, and sold the Africans in the Spanish Indies. It was highly profitable, so for his second slave voyage in 1564, Hawkins gained Queen Elizabeth I's support. She lent him one of her ships, Jesus of Lübeck , which served as his flagship. Hawkins attacked an African native town and sold many of its inhabitants in Spanish ports on

1575-519: Is suggested from two portraits: one a miniature , painted by Nicholas Hilliard in 1581, when he was allegedly 42, which would place his birth c. 1539, while the other, painted in 1594 when he was said to be 52, would give a birth year of c. 1541. He was the eldest of the twelve sons of Edmund Drake (1518–1585), a Protestant farmer, and his wife, Mary Mylwaye. The first son was said to have been named after his godfather , Francis Russell, 2nd Earl of Bedford . Due to religious persecution during

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1650-574: The Isthmus of Panama , known to the Spanish as part of Tierra Firme and to the English as part of the Spanish Main . This was the point at which the silver and gold treasure of Peru had to be brought ashore and transported overland to the Caribbean Sea , where galleons from Spain would take it aboard at the town of Nombre de Dios . Drake left Plymouth on 24 May 1572, with a crew of 73 men in two small vessels, Pascha (70 tons) and Swan (25 tons), to capture Nombre de Dios. Drake's first raid

1725-685: The Prayer Book Rebellion in 1549, the Drake family fled from Devon to Kent . There Drake's father obtained an appointment to minister to the men in the King's Navy. He was ordained deacon and was made vicar of Upchurch Church on the Medway . At an early age, Drake was placed into the household of a relative, sea-captain William Hawkins of Plymouth, and began his seagoing training as an apprentice on Hawkins' boats. By 18, he

1800-465: The 200 defenders and several hundred more men, women and children of Clan MacDonnell. Meanwhile, Drake was given the task of preventing any Gaelic Irish or Scottish reinforcements reaching the island. Therefore, the remaining leader of the Gaelic defence against English power, Sorley Boy MacDonnell , was forced to stay on the mainland. Essex wrote in his letter to Queen Elizabeth's secretary that following

1875-508: The Caribbean mainland, making another large profit for himself, the Queen and the consortium of investors from her court. Sources vary on the dates and the age of Drake at the time; Harry Kelsey says he was twenty years old, "[a]ccording to Howes" (in reference to the English chronicler Edmund Howes writing in 1615). Drake was not a member of that consortium, but the crew would have received

1950-473: The Cimarrón leader Pedro ascended to a platform at the top of the giant tree, where they were joined by Oxenham. The Englishmen vowed when they saw the Pacific Ocean that one day they would sail its waters – which Drake would do years later as part of his circumnavigation of the world. When Drake returned to Plymouth after the raids, the government signed a temporary truce with King Philip II of Spain and so

2025-530: The Earth, and his was the second such voyage arriving with at least one ship intact, after Elcano 's in 1520. Queen Elizabeth declared that all written accounts of Drake's voyages were to become the queen's secrets of the Realm, and Drake and the other participants of his voyages on the pain of death sworn to their secrecy; she intended to keep Drake's activities hidden from the eyes of rival Spain. Drake presented

2100-654: The English Nation of 1589) along the Chilean coast. In the Magellan Strait Francis and his men engaged in skirmishes with local indigenous people, becoming the first Europeans to kill indigenous peoples in southern Patagonia. During their stay in the strait, crew members discovered that an infusion made of the bark of Drimys winteri could be used as remedy against scurvy . Captain Wynter ordered

2175-465: The English fleet that fought against and repulsed the Spanish fleet. A year later he led the English Armada in a failed attempt to destroy the remaining Spanish fleet. Drake was a member of parliament (MP) for three constituencies: Camelford in 1581, Bossiney in 1584, and Plymouth in 1593. Drake's exploits made him a hero to the English, but his privateering led the Spanish to brand him

2250-563: The Moluccas and Spice Islands from there. At this time Diego died from wounds he had sustained earlier in the voyage; Golden Hind later became caught on a reef and was almost lost. Afterwards, the sailors waited three days for convenient tides and had dumped cargo. Befriending Sultan Babullah of Ternate in the Moluccas, Drake and his men became involved in some intrigues with the Portuguese there. He made multiple stops on his way toward

2325-406: The Pacific coast of South America, attacking Spanish ports and pillaging towns. Some Spanish ships were captured, and Drake used their more accurate charts to inform his navigation. Before reaching the coast of Peru , Drake visited Mocha Island off the coast of what is now Chile, where he and his manservant Diego were seriously injured by hostile Mapuche who shot them with arrows. Later he sacked

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2400-584: The Pacific coast, heading south-west to catch the winds that would carry his ship across the Pacific, and a few months later reached the Moluccas , a group of islands in the western Pacific, in eastern modern-day Indonesia . Harry Kelsey maintains, against scholarly consensus, that because of the contrary prevailing winds and currents, it is much more probable that Drake careened his ship on the shore of Magdalena Bay in Lower California , and sailed to

2475-597: The Pacific, making for the East Indies , and from there return to England by completing a circumnavigation of the world. In May, Drake's two ships passed the Baja California peninsula and continued north. Prior to Drake's voyage, the western coast of North America had only been partially explored in 1542 by Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo who sailed for Spain. So, intending to avoid further conflict with Spain, Drake navigated north-west of Spanish presence and sought

2550-535: The Point Reyes Peninsula still operate today. It was purchased by a private foundation and given to the state in 1984 to operate as a conference center. Inlet In marine geography , the term "inlet" usually refers to either the actual channel between an enclosed bay and the open ocean and is often called an "entrance", or a significant recession in the shore of a sea, lake or large river. A certain kind of inlet created by past glaciation

2625-609: The Spanish is said to have started with the battle and its aftermath. The voyage of 1567–1569 was Drake's last association with slaving. In total, approximately 1,200 Africans were enslaved on these four voyages, and an estimated three times as many Africans were killed (based on the contemporaneous accounts of slavers). On the issue of slaving, scholar John Sugden writes that "Drake was in his twenties and did not question what his elders accepted", but must share some culpability for his participation. In 1572, Drake embarked on his first major independent enterprise. He planned an attack on

2700-468: The Spanish were not far behind. At this point, Drake rallied his men, buried the treasure on the beach, and built a raft to sail in a heavy swell with four men twelve miles along the coast to where they had left two pinnaces . When Drake finally reached them, his men were alarmed at his bedraggled appearance. Fearing the worst, they asked him how the raid had gone. Drake could not resist a joke and teased them by looking downhearted. Then he laughed, pulled

2775-560: The attack Sorley Boy "was likely to have run mad for sorrow, tearing and tormenting himself and saying that he there lost all that he ever had." Following the success of the Panama isthmus raid, Drake's so-called "Famous Voyage" – an expedition against the Spanish along the Pacific coast of the Americas – was organized and financed by a private syndicate that included Francis Walsingham , Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester , John Hawkins, Christopher Hatton , and Drake himself. Drake acted on

2850-484: The barque to Drake. In 1562, the West African slave trade was a duopoly dominated by the Portuguese and the Spanish. Sir John Hawkins devised a plan to break into that trade, and enlisted the aid of colleagues and family to finance his first slave voyage. Drake was not part of that group of financiers, though his presence as one of hundreds of seamen on Hawkins's first two slaving voyages has been assumed. There

2925-657: The bay's shore served as currency. Francis Drake is thought to have landed in nearby Drakes Estero in 1579. Members of the Vizcaíno Expedition found the Bay in 1603, and thinking it a river, named it Rio Grande de San Sebastian . Early 19th-century settlements constituted the southernmost Russian colony in North America and were spread over an area stretching from Point Arena to Tomales Bay. The narrow gauge North Pacific Coast Railroad from Sausalito

3000-399: The bay. Watercrafts may be launched on Tomales Bay from the public boat ramp at Nick's Cove, north of Marshall. The sandbar at the mouth of Tomales Bay is notoriously dangerous, with a long history of small-boat accidents. Oyster farming is a major industry on the bay. The two largest producers are Hog Island Oyster Company and Tomales Bay Oyster Company , both of which retail oysters to

3075-573: The circumnavigating voyage ahead by careening their ship, Golden Hind , to effectively clean and repair the hull. Drake had friendly interactions with the Coast Miwok and explored the surrounding land by foot. When his ship was ready for the return voyage, Drake and the crew left New Albion on 23 July and paused the journey the next day when anchoring the ship at the Farallon Islands where they hunted sea lions or seals. Drake left

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3150-620: The collection of great amounts of bark – hence the scientific name. Historian Mateo Martinic , who examined records of Drake's travels, credits him with the discovery of the "southern end of the Americas and the oceanic space south of it". The first report of his discovery of an open channel south of Tierra del Fuego was written after the 1618 publication of the voyage of Willem Schouten and Jacob le Maire around Cape Horn in 1616. Drake pushed onwards in his lone flagship, now renamed Golden Hind in honour of Sir Christopher Hatton (after his coat of arms ). Golden Hind sailed north along

3225-505: The crew of Minion in panic and fear cut the lines securing them to Jesus . Hawkins was among those who jumped from the flagship's bulwarks to Minion' s decks. Drake, by this time the captain of Judith , fled leaving Hawkins behind. Hawkins escaped on Minion and limped back to England with dozens of his men dying along the way, and arriving with a crew of just 15. Hundreds of English seamen were abandoned. After arriving back in England, Hawkins accused Drake of desertion and of stealing

3300-634: The eastern boundary of Point Reyes National Seashore . Tomales Bay is recognized for protection by the California Bays and Estuaries Policy . On its northern end, it opens out onto Bodega Bay , which shelters it from the direct currents of the Pacific (especially the California Current ). The bay is formed along a submerged portion of the San Andreas Fault . The fault divides the Point Reyes Peninsula through Tomales Bay in

3375-472: The gloomy bay of Puerto San Julián , in what is now Argentina . Ferdinand Magellan had called there half a century earlier, where he put to death some mutineers. Drake's men saw weathered and bleached skeletons on the Spanish gibbets . Following Magellan's example, Drake tried and executed his own "mutineer" Thomas Doughty . The crew discovered that Mary had rotting timbers, so they put the vessel ashore, stripped it, and abandoned it. Drake decided to remain

3450-403: The kings kept "the larger share of slaves and dared Hawkins to do anything about it". Events worsened for the fleet as it faced storms, Spanish hostility, armed conflict, and finally a hurricane that separated one ship from the rest, and it had to find its own way home. The remaining ships were forced into the port of San Juan de Ulúa near Vera Cruz so they could make repairs. Soon afterward

3525-417: The motto, Sic Parvis Magna , which means: "Great achievements from small beginnings". A hand coming out of the clouds is labelled Auxilio Divino , which means "By divine aid". Drake first became a member of parliament for the last session of the 4th Parliament of Elizabeth I , on 16 January 1581, for the constituency of Camelford . He did not actively participate at this point, and on 17 February 1581 he

3600-471: The mule trains that transported gold, silver and trade goods from Panama City. One of these men was Diego, who later became a free man after years of service under Drake. Among Drake's adventures along the Spanish Main, his capture of the Spanish silver train at Nombre de Dios on 1 April 1573 made him rich and famous. Near Cabo de Cativas he encountered a French privateer, Guillaume Le Testu , who

3675-474: The newly appointed viceroy of New Spain, Martín Enríquez de Almanza , arrived with a fleet of ships. While still negotiating to resupply and repair, Hawkins' ships were attacked by the Spanish ships in what became known as the Battle of San Juan de Ulúa . The battle ended in an English defeat with all but two of the English ships lost. The Spanish launched a fireship against Hawkins' flagship Jesus of Lübeck , and

3750-402: The north of the mouth of the bay, and Tomales just to the east. California State Parks department monitored, surf-free beaches on the bay include Heart's Desire, Shell Beach, Indian Beach, Pebble Beach, and Millerton Point. Most beaches require a hike-in, so if visiting, prepare with walkable shoes. Swimming, picnicking, sailing, kayaking, motorboating, and fishing are all popular activities on

3825-678: The north, and the Bolinas Lagoon in the south. The Bear Valley Visitor Center in Point Reyes Station is home to the Earthquake Trail, where visitors can see a visible rift formed on the fault during the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Towns bordering Tomales Bay include Inverness , Tomales , Inverness Park , Point Reyes Station , and Marshall . Additional hamlets include Nick's Cove , Spengers, Duck Cove, Shallow Beach, and Vilicichs. Dillon Beach lies just to

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3900-407: The plan authored by Sir Richard Grenville , who in 1574 had received a royal patent for that purpose; just a year later this patent had been rescinded after Elizabeth I learned of Grenville's intentions against the Spanish. Elizabeth likely invested in Drake's voyage to South America in 1577, but never issued him a formal commission. This would be the first circumnavigation in 58 years . Diego

3975-540: The port of Valparaíso further north in Chile, where he also captured a ship full of Chilean wine . Near Lima , Drake captured a Spanish ship with 25,000  pesos of Peruvian gold, amounting in value to 37,000  ducats of Spanish money (about £7m by modern standards). Drake also discovered news of another ship, Nuestra Señora de la Concepción , which was sailing west towards Manila . It would come to be called Cacafuego . Drake gave chase and eventually captured

4050-444: The public and have picnic grounds on the east shore. Hillsides east of Tomales Bay are grazed by cows belonging to local dairies. There is also grazing land west of the bay, on farms and ranches leased from Point Reyes National Seashore. The California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) has developed a safe eating advisory for fish caught here, based on levels of mercury or PCBs found in local species. The bay

4125-464: The queen with a jewel token commemorating the circumnavigation. Taken as a prize off the Pacific coast of Mexico, it was made of enamelled gold and bore an African diamond and a ship with an ebony hull. To show her gratitude the queen gave him the Drake Jewel , a valuable pendant surrounded by diamonds, rubies and pearls. It was an unusual gift to bestow upon a commoner, and one that Drake wore in

4200-424: The result of storm events . Alongshore sediment transport can cause inlets to close if the action of tidal currents flowing through an inlet do not flush accumulated sediment out of the inlet. Francis Drake Sir Francis Drake ( c. 1540 – 28 January 1596) was an English explorer and privateer best known for his circumnavigation of the world in a single expedition between 1577 and 1580. This

4275-477: The same table together, as cheerfully, in sobriety, as ever in their lives they had done aforetime, each cheering up the other, and taking their leave, by drinking each to other, as if some journey only had been in hand. Drake had Thomas Doughty beheaded on 2 July 1578. In January 1580, when Drake became stranded upon a reef off the Celebes Sea, the ship's chaplain, Francis Fletcher, in a sermon suggested that

4350-407: The south end of the bay that had been drained for grazing in the 1940s. The Marconi State Historical Park (formerly Marconi Conference Center State Historic Park) preserves a small hotel built in 1913 by Guglielmo Marconi to house personnel who staffed his transpacific radio station nearby. RCA purchased the station from Marconi in 1920, and it closed in 1939, though other nearby radio stations on

4425-481: The strait and caused another, Elizabeth , captained by John Wynter , to return to England, leaving only Pelican . After this passage, Pelican was pushed south and discovered an island that Drake called Elizabeth Island . Drake, like navigators before him, probably reached a latitude of 55°S (according to astronomical data quoted in Richard Hakluyt 's The Principall Navigations, Voiages and Discoveries of

4500-485: The tip of Africa, eventually rounded the Cape of Good Hope , and reached Sierra Leone by 22 July 1580. On 26 September 1580, Golden Hind sailed into Plymouth with Drake and 59 remaining crew aboard, along with a rich cargo of spices and captured Spanish treasures. The queen's half-share of the cargo surpassed the rest of the crown's income for that entire year. Drake was hailed as the first Englishman to circumnavigate

4575-492: The trail, to within a mile of the city while the Cimarróns performed reconnaissance. The next morning, 1 April, they surprised the mule convoy and seized more than 200,000 pesos' worth of treasure. After their attack on the richly laden mule train, Drake and his party found that they had captured around 20 tons of silver and gold. They buried much of the treasure, as it was too much for their party to carry, and made off with

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4650-447: The treasure ship, which proved his most profitable capture. Aboard Nuestra Señora de la Concepción , Drake found 36 kilograms (80 lb) of gold, a golden crucifix , jewels , 13 chests of silver reals and 26,000 kilograms (26 long tons) of silver. Drake was naturally pleased at his good luck in capturing the galleon, and he showed it by dining with the captured ship's officers and gentleman passengers. He offloaded his captives

4725-432: The treasure they had accumulated. Drake denied both accusations asserting he had distributed all profits among the crew and that he had believed Hawkins was lost when he left. The bitter end of the fourth voyage turned Drake's life in a different direction: thereafter he would not pursue trading and slaving but would, instead, dedicate himself to attacking Spanish possessions wherever he found them. Drake's hostility towards

4800-526: The winter in San Julián before attempting the Strait of Magellan . On his voyage to interfere with Spanish treasure fleets, Drake had several quarrels with his co-commander Thomas Doughty and on 3 June 1578, accused him of witchcraft and charged him with mutiny and treason in a shipboard trial. Drake claimed to have a (never presented) commission from the Queen to carry out such acts and denied Doughty

4875-546: The woes of the voyage were connected to the unjust demise of Doughty, Drake chained the clergyman to a hatch cover and pronounced him excommunicated. The three remaining ships of his convoy departed for the Magellan Strait at the southern tip of South America. A few weeks later in September 1578 Drake made it to the Pacific, but violent storms destroyed one of the three ships, Marigold (captained by John Thomas) in

4950-655: Was a purser , according to the English chronicler Edmund Howes , and in the 1550s, Drake's father found the young man a position with the owner and master of a small barque , one of the small traders plying between the Medway River and the Dutch coast. Drake likely engaged in commerce along the coast of England, the Low Countries and France. The ship's master was so satisfied with the young Drake's conduct that, being unmarried and childless at his death, he bequeathed

5025-507: Was constructed along the east side of the bay in 1874 and extended to the Russian River until it was dismantled in 1930. Tomales Bay State Park was formed to preserve some of the bay shore; it opened to the public in 1952. The Ramsar Convention , signed in 1971, listed Tomales Bay as a wetland of international importance . The Giacomini Wetland Restoration Project, completed in 2008, returned to wetland several hundred acres at

5100-567: Was granted leave of absence "for certain his necessary business in the service of Her Majesty". Drake became the Mayor of Plymouth in September 1581. During his tenure, he installed a compass in the town's Hoe , and passed a law regulating the local pilchard trade. During his term as lord mayor, Drake contracted to construct a leat , or canal, to bring water from the River Meavy , and to build six new gristmills on it from which he derived

5175-530: Was in command of the 80-ton warship Havre , and joined forces with him in a combined fleet. Drake had determined to intercept the mule train at the Campos River, two leagues from Nombre de Dios, and instructed the captains of his pinnaces to meet them at the Francisca River on 3 April to carry them off after the raid. The combined English and French raiding parties marched through the forest towards

5250-458: Was late in July 1572. Drake captured Nombre de Dios, but he was badly wounded when the Spanish arrived from Panama, and his forces had to retreat without the gold, silver, pearls and jewels stored in the royal treasury. Rather than sacking Nombre de Dios again, Drake raided Spanish galleons along the coast and with his Cimarrón (African slaves who had escaped from their Spanish owners) allies looted

5325-653: Was once again employed under Drake; his fluency in Spanish and English would make him a useful interpreter when Spaniards or Spanish-speaking Portuguese were captured. He was employed as Drake's servant and was paid wages like the rest of the crew. Drake and the fleet set out from Plymouth on 15 November 1577, but bad weather threatened him and his fleet. They were forced to take refuge in Falmouth, Cornwall , from where they returned to Plymouth for repair. After this major setback, Drake set sail again on 13 December aboard Pelican with four other ships and 164 men. He soon added

5400-468: Was once the territory of the Coast Miwok tribe. Documented villages in the area included Echa-kolum (south of Marshall ), Sakloki (opposite Tomales Point ), Shotommo-wi (near the mouth of the Estero de San Antonio ), and Utumia (near Tomales). The tribe's history is deeply rooted in the bay and its surrounding areas. Fishing and hunting supported their liveilhood, and shells and clams collected from

5475-474: Was the first English circumnavigation, and second circumnavigation overall. He is also known for participating in the early English slaving voyages of his cousin, Sir John Hawkins , and John Lovell . Having started as a simple seaman, in 1588 he was part of the fight against the Spanish Armada as a vice-admiral . At an early age, Drake was placed into the household of a relative, William Hawkins ,

5550-588: Was to sail back south, along the Spanish coast, and return to the Atlantic Ocean via the Strait of Magellan (or possibly Cape Horn); this route was ruled out, however, to avoid the dangerous weather near the strait and presumed Spanish resistance all along the coast. This left two possible routes – continue north up the American coast, and return to the Atlantic by the rumored Strait of Anián ; or, sail across

5625-684: Was unable to acknowledge Drake's accomplishment officially. Drake was considered a hero in England and a pirate in Spain for his raids. Drake was present at the 1575 Rathlin Island massacre in Ireland. Sir John Norris (or Norreys ) and Drake, acting on the instructions of Sir Henry Sidney and the Earl of Essex , Robert Devereux, laid siege to Rathlin Castle . Despite its surrender, Norris' troops killed all

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