Sir John Hawkins, Seaman and Administrator. page 3

His old friend Sir Francis Drake was to go with him, for the Queen had assented; but rumours of a fresh Armada kept them in England, for "all men," says Camden, "buckled themselves to war," and mothers only bewailed that their sons had been killed in France instead of being alive and well to defend hearth and home in England. But all the Spaniards did was to cross from Brittany with four galleys and land at Penzance. This town they sacked and burnt, but as the inhabitants had fled inland, no lives were lost. This was the last hostile landing made by the Spaniards on England's shore.

Next year, in August 1595, Drake and Hawkins left Plymouth with twenty-seven ships and 2500 men, Drake sailing in the Defiance as Admiral, Hawkins in the Garland as Vice-Admiral; Sir Thomas Baskerville was the Commander by land. The plan was to sail to Nombre de Dios and march across the isthmus to Panama, there to seize what treasure they could. But just before they sailed letters came from the Queen informing them that they were too late to intercept the West Indian fleet; it had already arrived in Spain; but one treasure-ship had lost a mast and put back to Puerto Rico; they were to seek for this and take it. So they sailed on the 28th of August, and in four weeks reached the Grand Canary. Drake and Baskerville wished to land, victual the fleet, and take the island; Hawkins, still smarting under Elizabeth's lash, was for strictly obeying the Queen's instructions. However, Baskerville promised he would take the place in four days, and Hawkins consented to wait. But finding that a strong mole had been built, and that the landing-place was defended by guns, and as a nasty sea was rising, they just landed to get water on the western side of the island and made for Dominica.

After making some traffic in tobacco they went on to Guadaloupe, where they cleaned their ships and let the men land. The next day, seeing some Spanish ships passing towards Puerto Kico, Drake concluded that the treasure-ship was still there, and that this force had been sent to convoy it. Captain Wignol in the Francis, having straggled behind out of Hawkins' fleet, fell in with these Spanish ships under Don Pedro Tello, and was captured. Tello put his men to torture, and drew from them the object and proposed course of the English ships. When Hawkins heard of this from a small vessel that had escaped the Spaniards, he suddenly fell sick: age, the troubles of the voyage, this last disappointment - all were too much for him; he struggled bravely against his malady, but every day he grew weaker. They started in three days from Guadaloupe and reached the Virgin Islands, where they took plenty of fish. Drake and Hawkins had some dispute here, some difference of opinion, and this was the last straw to weigh down the balance of death. For on the morning of the 12th of November the fleet passed through the Strait; and at night, when it was off the eastern end of Puerto Rico, Hawkins breathed his last.

Drake sailed in imprudently under the forts; one shot wounded his mizzen-mast, another entered the steerage, where he was at supper, and struck the stool from under him, killing two of his officers, but not hurting him. The treasure had been removed from the galleon, and the empty galleon had been sunk in the mouth of the channel. After a fierce fight Drake had to give up the attempt to get the treasure and sail away.

He only survived his old friend by eleven weeks. Thus England lost two of her grandest seamen in this expedition. Hawkins was seventy-five years old - too old to be exposed to the burning sun and all the anxieties of warfare. Then came bitter disappointment, and the feeling that he had done nothing to rescue his son, and little to avenge his wrongs. For six weeks Sir John Hawkins strove to make head against this "sea of troubles," but his work had been done, his body was worn out, and he could endure no more. In his adventurous life he had done many questionable things; but we ought not to judge him by the moral standard of another age; in his day, the rights of the slave had not yet been thought of. Hawkins had tried to do his duty to God and man, as he conceived that duty, and to his unflagging labours and zeal as Treasurer of the Navy, the success of England against the Armada was largely due.