Under the Bloody Flag (51 page)

  
16.
  Corbett (ed.),
Spanish War
, p. 102. The expedition has been described as ‘privateering writ large’, Andrews,
Elizabethan Privateering
, p. 94.

  
17.
  C. Hopper (ed.), ‘Sir Francis Drake’s Memorable Service done against the Spaniards in 1587. Written by Robert Long, gentleman’,
Camden Miscellany, V
(Camden Society, 87, 1864), pp. 12, 15–6, 19, 22;
PN
, VI, pp. 438–41;
CSPF 1586
–
88
, pp. 280, 286.

  
18.
  Hopper (ed.), ‘Drake’s Memorable Service’, pp. 21–2.

  
19.
  And for the following quote, Corbett (ed.),
Spanish War
, pp. 109, 112, 194–5. Drake had written to Foxe during the circumnavigation, Nuttall (ed.),
New Light
, p. 357.

  
20.
  In their absence, Boroughs and the ringleaders were sentenced to death by a court held aboard the
Elizabeth Bonaventure
, BL, Additional MS 12505, ff. 241–6v. As Corbett commented, for some, Drake was little better than a ‘pardoned pirate’,
Spanish War
, p. xlvi.

  
21.
  One of the best studies of the Armada campaign, among a rich selection, is C. Martin and G. Parker,
The Spanish Armada
(2nd edition, Manchester, 2002) and on strategy G. Parker,
The Grand Strategy of Philip II
(New Haven, 1998), pp. 179–268.

  
22.
  J.K. Laughton (ed.),
State Papers relating to the Defeat of the Spanish Armada
, 2 vols. (Navy Records Society, 1 & 2, 1894), I, pp. 59–61; II, p. 214; Andrews,
Drake’s Voyages
, p. 127.

  
23.
  Laughton (ed.),
State Papers
, I, p. 94. There was a demand for open war in the parliament of 1589, Cheyney,
History of England
, II, pp. 212–3, 227–8.

  
24.
  Laughton (ed.),
State Papers
, I, pp. 124–5, 147–9, 165–7.

  
25.
  Ibid., I, pp. 130, 135–6, 143–5, 151–3, 160–1.

  
26.
  According to one tradition the Armada was first sighted by the pirate, captain Flemyng,
Monson’s Tracts
, I, p. 170. Laughton (ed.),
State Papers
, I, pp. 255, 283–4, 321 for supply problems. A Spanish report claimed that Elizabeth could send out 200 ships against the Armada, but ‘most part of them are more fit for piracy than to fight a real battle’,
CSPF 1586
–
88
, p. 342.

  
27.
  Laughton (ed.),
State Papers
, II, pp. 102–3; Andrews,
Drake’s Voyages
, pp. 130–1; McDermott,
Frobisher
, pp. 353–5, 363–6.

  
28.
  Laughton (ed.),
State Papers
, II, pp. 11, 54; Rodger,
Safeguard of the Sea
, pp. 261–71; G. Parker, ‘The
Dreadnought
Revolution of Tudor England’,
MM
, 82 (1996), pp. 273–4. On rate of fire see also N.A.M. Rodger, ‘The Development of Broadside Gunnery, 1450–1650’,
MM
, 82 (1996), pp. 313–6.

  
29.
  Laughton (ed.),
State Papers
, II, p. 95.

  
30.
  Ibid., II, pp. 163–5, 183–4, 239, 261–2, 272–3; Loades,
Tudor Navy
, pp. 253–4.

  
31.
  R.B. Wernham (ed.),
The Expedition of Sir John Norris and Sir Francis Drake to Spain and Portugal, 1589
(Navy Records Society, 127, 1988), pp. 27–31; Andrews,
Drake’s Voyages
, pp. 136–8.

  
32.
  Wernham (ed.),
Expedition
, p. 83.

  
33.
  Ibid., pp. 56–7, 133–8, 343–52.

  
34.
  Ibid., pp. 141–54, 162.

  
35.
  Ibid., pp. 177, 179.

  
36.
  Ibid., pp. 222–4, 248–9, 285, 296–9; Andrews,
Drake’s Voyages
, pp. 143–6.

  
37.
  Rodger,
Safeguard of the Sea
, pp. 278–81.

  
38.
  Andrews, ‘The Expansion of English Privateering and Piracy’, pp. 210–7.

  
39.
  Andrews,
Elizabethan Privateering
, pp. 100–2, 225–30; R. Brenner,
Merchants and Revolution: Commercial Change, Political Conflict, and London’s Overseas Traders, 1550
–
1653
(Cambridge, 1993), pp. 19–20, 47–9.

  
40.
  
EPV
, pp. 40–2; Andrews,
Elizabethan Privateering
, pp. 76–7, 104–9; R.T. Spence,
The Privateering Earl: George Clifford,
3
rd Earl of Cumberland, 1558
–
1605
(Stroud, 1995), pp. 146–70.

  
41.
  Andrews,
Spanish Caribbean
, pp. 162–3; Andrews,
Elizabethan Privateering
, pp. 185–6, 219–24.

  
42.
  Ibid., pp. 70, 75–9; G.C. Williamson,
George, Third Earl of Cumberland (1585
–
1603): His Life and His Voyages
(Cambridge, 1920), pp. 240–3;
Law and Custom
, I, pp. 278–80.

  
43.
  Andrews,
Elizabethan Privateering
, pp. 32–4; Fury,
Tides in the Affairs of Men
, pp. 102–8. English men–of–war also sailed with French or Dutch commissions, including those issued by Leicester when he was in the Low Countries,
CSPF 1586
–
88
, p. 297.

  
44.
  Andrews,
Elizabethan Privateering
, pp. 30–5.

  
45.
  Ibid., pp. 76–8, 107, 218, 252.

  
46.
  
Fugger News
–
Letters
, pp. 219–20;
CSPF 1586
–
88
, pp. 503, 560;
CSPF 1588
–
89
, p. 66.

  
47.
  Andrews,
Spanish Caribbean
, p. 156;
EPV
, p. 173.

  
48.
  Andrews,
Elizabethan Privateering
, pp. 164–8;
EPV
, p. 95; BL, Additional MS 12505, ff. 467–9.

  
49.
  
EPV
, pp. 44–8, 59–67, 107–12.

  
50.
  Rodger,
Safeguard of the Sea
, p. 259; Andrews,
Elizabethan Privateering
, pp. 124–49.

  
51.
  BL, Additional MS 12505, ff 351–1v. In 1589 Sir William Herbert complained that Munster ‘is made a receptacle of pirates’,
CSPI 1588
–
92
, pp. 190–2.

  
52.
  Andrews,
Elizabethan Privateering
, pp. 73, 127–8, 131–2;
Monson’s Tracts
, I, pp. 290–5; A. Latham and J. Youings (eds.),
The Letters of Sir Walter Raleigh
(Exeter, 1999), pp. 76–80, 87–8.

  
53.
  Andrews,
Elizabethan Privateering
, pp. 68, 147–9.

  
54.
  
CSPF 1586
–
88
, pp. 28–30;
Monson’s Tracts
, I, pp. 269–74; Cheyney,
History of England
, I, pp. 463–5, 477–9, 482–6.

  
55.
  
CSPF 1586
–
88
, pp. 89, 114–5, 169, 280, 654.

  
56.
  Ibid., p. 214.

  
57.
  And for the rest of the paragraph,
CSPF 1586
–
88
, pp. 483, 556, 565–6, 613, 632–3.

  
58.
  
CSPF 1586
–
88
, pp. 57–8, 90, 295–6, 300–1.

  
59.
  
CSPF 1586
–
88
, pp. 295–6, 357–8, 371.

  
60.
  
CSPF 1586
–
88,
pp. 494, 568–9.

  
61.
  
Select Pleas
, II, pp. 163–5.

  
62.
  Hatfield House, CP 16/2. I am grateful to Mr Robin Harcourt Williams for a copy of this document.

  
63.
  Laughton (ed.),
State Papers
, II, pp. 172–3.

  
64.
  
APC 1586
–
87
, pp. 143–4, 168, 203.

  
65.
  
APC 1586
–
87,
pp. 167, 198–9, 212, 215, 255–6;
Calendar
, p. 57.

  
66.
  
HMC Salisbury
, III, pp. 193–6, 200–3, 222–3, 288, 372, 378–9; XIII, p. 322.

  
67.
  
CSPF 1588
–
89
, p. 149;
APC 1587
–
88
, pp. 59–60, 236–7, 309, 316. Leveson was involved in various disorderly ventures. In 1590 he was imprisoned for debt; he escaped, was re–captured and later died in prison.
Tudor Proclamations
, III, p. 59; N.E. McClure (ed.),
The Letters of John Chamberlain
, 2 vols. (Philadelphia, 1939), I, pp. 56–7, 169.

  
68.
  
APC 1586
–
87
, pp. 236–7, 331;
APC 1588
, pp. 12–3, 365–6, 371–2;
CSPD 1581
–
90
, p. 635.

  
69.
  Laughton (ed.),
State Papers
, II, p. 172:
Calendar
, pp. 61–2.

  
70.
  
APC 1588
, pp. 228–9, 236, 254, 268, 385–6, 414–5.

  
71.
  On this phase of the sea war see R.B. Wernham,
After the Armada: Elizabethan England and the Struggle for Western Europe 1588
–
1595
(Oxford, 1984), pp. 235–60; Andrews,
Trade, Plunder and Settlement
, pp. 241–55.

  
72.
  
CSPF 1588
, p. 227.

  
73.
  
List and Analysis 1590
–
91
, pp. 321–2;
List and Analysis 1591
–
92
, p. 338;
Calendar
, p. 62;
APC 1588
–
89
, pp. 260–1;
APC 1589
–
90
, pp. 28–9;
APC 1591
–
92
, pp. 22, 35–6, 65–6.

  
74.
  
List and Analysis 1591
–
92
, pp. 351, 360, 369–70, 372–3;
List and Analysis
1592
–
93
, pp. 300–4, 325–6, 329–32.

  
75.
  
List and Analysis 1589
–
90
, pp. 419–20, 423–30, 434; BL, Cotton MS Nero B III, ff. 294–5.

  
76.
  
List and Analysis
1589
–
90
, pp. 195–7, 214–5, 227–8, 232; Wilson,
Queen Elizabeth and the Revolt of the Netherlands
, p. 115.

  
77.
  
List and Analysis 1591
–
92
, pp. 6–11, 158–62;
List and Analysis 1590
–
91
, pp. 119, 177–81;
Law and Custom
, I, pp. 262–5.

  
78.
  
List and Analysis 1590
–
91
, pp. 199–203, 207–12;
List and Analysis 1591
–
92
, pp. 162–3;
List and Analysis 1592
–
93
, pp. 141–2;
Tudor Proclamations
, III, pp. 83–6; HCA 1/45, ff. 4–5.

  
79.
  
APC 1588
–
89
, pp. 352, 358–60, 370–410
passim
on the hulks;
Calendar,
p. 63;
Fugger News
–
Letters
, pp. 207–8.

  
80.
  
APC 1592
–
93
, pp. 356–7, 385–93;
Tudor Proclamations
, III, pp. 71–4;
Fugger News
–
Letters
, pp. 222–3, 255–6. Seckford’s ships were also involved in attacks on Venetian vessels, Maxwell, ‘Henry Seckford’, pp. 392–5.

  
81.
  
APC 1588
–
89
, pp. 48–9;
APC 1589
–
90
, pp. 66, 209–10, 433;
APC 1590
, p. 104;
APC 1592
–
93
, pp. 469–70;
HMC Salisbury
, XIII, pp. 386, 435.

  
82.
  
APC 1589
–
90
, pp. 367–8.

  
83.
  
HMC Salisbury
, IV, p. 72; XIII, p. 434;
APC 1590
, p. 367.

  
84.
  
APC 1591
, pp. 226, 302–3, 341–2;
APC 1592
, p. 230;
APC 1592
–
93
, pp. 312–3, 481–2.

  
85.
  Proclamations issued during 1591, 1592 and 1594 tried to regulate the war at sea,
Tudor Proclamations
, III, pp. 99–101, 109–10, 137–8.

  
86.
  The most comprehensive treatment of the sea war after 1595 remains J.S. Corbett,
The Successors of Drake
(London, 1900).

  
87.
  
List and Analysis 1591
–
92
, p. 118. About 1580 merchants of Chester claimed to have suffered losses of about £12,000 to piracy since 1570, D.M. Woodward,
The Trade of Elizabethan Chester
(Hull, 1970), pp. 45–6, 87–8.

  
88.
  
List and Analysis 1590
–
91
, pp. 380, 389;
List and Analysis
1592
–
93
, pp. 359–60.

  
89.
  
CSPD 1595
–
97
, pp. 21, 34, 40, 51. There may have been as many as fifty privateering vessels operating from the port between 1584 and 1586, V.W. Lunsford,
Piracy and Privateering in the Golden Age Netherlands
(New York, 2005), p. 31.