I changed my face again to tell you the particularity of the great Francis Drake (1540-1596)

An interview with Bruce Lenman

This interview with Bruce Lenman (BL) was carried out by Yorkshire Television (YTV) for the Channel 4 programme Elizabeth's Pirates. Bruce Lenman is professor of modern history at the University of St Andrews.

Privateering

YTV: What was a privateer?

BL: A privateer was not a pirate. The problem is, of course, that the Spaniards call all other Europeans in American waters 'pirates'. But leaving that aside, a privateer is someone with a licence from his crown to collect damages that are due from another crown that is dragging its feet about making payment or indeed judging a case. Given the legendary slowness of Spanish bureaucracy, that was an easy situation to find. Privateering is a business. Anyone who indulges in it who doesn't want to make money is a lunatic.

YTV: Was the system of privateering corrupt?

BL: The lord high admiral, Lord Howard of Effingham, is spectacularly corrupt. That, I think, is true because issuing these licences more or less gave carte blanche to those who received them. They were often very bad at distinguishing the nationality of the ships they knocked off.

Nevertheless it's not corrupt in the sense that Drake's corrupt. I don't think you can accuse him of being corrupt, it's not applicable. He is ruthless, he is egotistical – he wouldn't have succeeded if he wasn't – but corrupt, no. The great danger a privateer faced was repudiation by his crown. Then he became a pirate and might have been hanged. So obviously you had to keep the crown on side. So Drake's contributions to the queen's treasure chest are simply common sense. He's got to pay the queen off to keep her on side.

I mean, it's so profitable that she thought it was well worth knighting him and saying what a good chap he'd been. If he hadn't brought back that amount of loot, she clearly wouldn't have done that. On top of which you have to remember she had dreadful fiscal problems and all contributions were gratefully received.

And I have to add that I knew what I was doing: when I started piracy, never criticized me because I attacked spanish ships!

But I understood alone I had to be careful and I became discreet, patriot, I joined the army in , under the command of the Queen’s favorite soldier, the Essex’s earl. Even if and were in peace, Elizabeth reacted and, helped by powerful salers, offered me the project of a great expedition: the first world travel ever lead by the english crown. The second ever realized in world history, after those of Magellan!

YTV: But the queen didn't want to be seen to be having open season on the Spanish, presumably?

BL: She is in a very difficult position. The last thing she wants is war. She had no martial ambitions, which makes her most unusual among 16th-century sovereigns. She simply wants to die holding the wreckage of the medieval empire in England and Ireland and the Channel Islands that she had inherited. Her sole territorial ambition was to get back a small town in northern France [Calais] that her sister had lost to the French. She had no other ambitions.

Privateering didn't involve declaring war. It's an act of legal redress that is acknowledged by contemporary international law. The fact that it is riddled with corruption merely means that it is like every other aspect of early modern government. All early modern government is riddled with corruption, partly because its officials are so miserably paid. What she is hoping is that it will put pressure on Spain. 

YTV: Was Drake ruthless?

BL:  You don't succeed as a privateer unless you're ruthless. You don't succeed at anything much unless you're ruthless. Drake is an egotist and he does leave dead bodies behind him. On the other hand, he is not a psychopath. He doesn't kill for the sake of killing – in fact, he kills remarkably few people – so you are looking at a ruthless businessman. But aren't all successful businessmen ruthless?

This professor learned his lesson! I wasn’t the most bloody pirate even if I wasn’t known for my compassion: in fact, I didn’t have much sympathy for black slaves of whom I thought that their value were mesured with ginger, gold, pearls, sugar or fairs! As my "brothers in crime" thought too, making considerably profit with the slaves sale, marked on bottom or chest as the cattle were. Since my childhood I learned and enjoyed the hard and ruthless meaning of piracy, since my name was a legacy of the Vikings, from the scandinav root composing the word "drakkar"!

But I was more a tactical man, my elegance was congratulated, in the same way that the care I took to spare death to prisonners. I was careful: I rarely attacked in deep seas, focalising on ports, making alliances with autochtones, and rebel and escaped black men, using light boats...

YTV: What kind of ships did Drake use?

BL: You didn't build specialised ships for privateering because, by definition, it was an occasional activity. The thought of specialised warships is only just becoming normal in the late 16th century. Philip of Spain, when he was king of England, had insisted on building English battleships that, in fact, ended up fighting his Spanish armada.

Drake just takes appropriate ships, not specialised warships and certainly not specialised privateering warships. They are quite small. That is very important as it makes it relatively easy for them to enter certain, very difficult waters, certainly much easier than a bigger ship. They all have a small pinnace, either aboard or towed behind. Much of the activity is done in these even smaller boats, pinnaces or long boats.

 
Of course, a simple matter of logiq and one of my famous ships was the Golden Hind, bringing 250 barrels, and becoming the admiral ship of 4 others and 160 men! 

For four years, I defied the seas and the storms: Africa, Brasil, Fire Lands, Magellan straits... Valparaiso gave up under my loots, as well as the Nostra Senora de la Concepcion, a galion carrying silver, gold and diamonds that I nicknamed the Cacafuegos!

YTV: Was part of Drake's motivation that he did not like the Spanish?

BL: Drake is strongly Protestant, we know that. He comes from a ministerial background. On the other hand, he's a Spanish speaker. He does not have psychopathological attitudes towards Spaniards. He is trying to gain compensation. He is also like all the rest of them, trying to hit the jackpot, which he does, knocking off things like the Cacafuegos, which was a staggeringly wealthy prize, totally different from 99.99% of the prizes stolen by normal privateers. At that time, of course, he is building himself up as a man of reputation and honour and entering the gentry class, and that is probably his deepest ambition.

Soon, the spanish began to hate me, calling me El Dragon, (the sea-snake), and Phillipe II of asked my head for the huge reward of 20000 “ducats” and reclaimed my death by the English crown.

At the beginning, my ally Elizabeth refused. She even visit me on board and made me a knight, Sir Francis Drake, mayor of Plymouth, using a special humour during the ceremony: “ Captain Drake, the king of has demanded your head, and I have now a sword to cut it!”

Surprising irony when I understood for good the ruthless of privateering, during my last night alive, the stomach perforated by poison she certainly reserved for me!

Emerging from the obscure bottoms, here appears the Queen Anne’s Revenge! My majestic vessel, caught with my pirate ally Benjamin Hornigold from the french fleet, a huge boat firstly named Le Concorde before I nicknamed it! One of the bigger ships of the seas!

At the top of its stern mast, floats my dark flag, fearsome warning of my power!

Who would dare to affirm that he doesn't know this face?!
He doesn't survive long the one who believes ignoring the most famous pirate of history!
My cruelty and my look are at my fame's origine: everybody knows me as Blackbeard!

Do you remember now? of course you do, I belong to world's memory and thats an indelible trace!
But who can really tell the story of my life? I'm the only one who knows what's sleeping deep inside of me, and I will deliver you some secrets...

Here I am: the great and famous Captain X: nobody knows my name because I have many! I change it during my travels, depending on my mood, on the shores!!

Come on board in an endless journey trough the mysteries of the seas!