The Secret Voyage of Sir Francis Drake 1577-1580 - Hardcover

R. Samuel Bawlf

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1550549774 ISBN 13: 9781550549775

Publisher: Douglas & McIntyre, 2003

Synopsis

When Sir Francis Drake returned to England in 1580, many questions concerning his momentous voyage were left unanswered--his journals were impounded and his men were forbidden, on pain of death, to divulge where they had been. Drawing on newly uncovered evidence, geographer and maritime historian Samuel Bawlf masterfully reconstructs Francis Drake's historic round-the-world expedition, exploring the drama surrounding the voyage and offering intriguing insights into life at sea in the sixteenth century. But it is Bawlf's assertion of Drake's whereabouts in the summer of 1579 that gives the book even greater originality: from an intensive study of maps of the period, Bawlf shows with certainty that Drake sailed all the way to Alaska--much farther than anyone has heretofore imagined--thereby rewriting the history of exploration in North America.

About this title

Review:

Samuel Bawlf first went public in 2000 with his sensational discovery of evidence indicating that Sir Francis Drake may have detoured as far north as Alaska on his famous circumnavigation of the globe. If correct, these assertions would completely change Canadian history and detractors were quick to argue that the claims were little more than an elaborate conspiracy theory.

Bawlf strikes back with The Secret Voyage of Sir Francis Drake, a persuasive, 400-page volume illustrated with dozens of historical and modern maps and documented with extensive references to sources written in Drake's lifetime, all suggesting that the British admiral and pirate may indeed have travelled to areas of North America's western coast, including Vancouver Island and the Queen Charlotte Islands, 200 years before the first Europeans officially explored the region.

Bawlf, geographer, sailor and former British Columbian cabinet minister, convincingly argues that Drake's ambitious around-the-world voyage was, in fact, an elaborate cover for a scouting mission to find the elusive Northwest Passage. Afraid that spies for King Phillip II of Spain might learn of the venture, which was intended to open an important trade route, Queen Elizabeth insisted that the mission remain absolutely secret.

When Drake set out with five ships from Plymouth in 1577, the official story was that they were headed to the Mediterranean. Instead, they sailed directly to the Straight of Magellan and returned almost three years later after circling the globe. "Reworking his narrative", Bawlf writes in his dense and informative prose, "[16th-century British propagandist Richard] Hakluyt eliminated all mention of a search for the northern strait and said upon departing Guatulco, Drake had taken a 'somewhat northerly' course to the Moluccas, but after encountering bitterly cold winds at latitude 42 degrees, he turned back toward land and found the harbour he called Nova Albion at 38 degrees. However, Hakluyt neglected to instruct the printers to remove the note in the margin of the old page which read 'the purpose of Sir Francis to return by the Northwest passage', and this incongruous statement was printed alongside the carefully expurgated account."

Bawlf also demonstrates how official accounts of the voyage appear to describe many coastal features exactly 10 degrees of latitude south of where they actually occur, and these same accounts leave a gap of almost six months between Drake and his company leaving Mexico and arriving in the Philippines--just long enough for a quick hop up to Alaska and back. --Deirdre Hanna, Amazon.ca

Review:

"A fresh and compelling account of Elizabethan intrigue."

A fresh and compelling account of Elizabethan intrigue. (James P. Delgado, author of "Across the Top of the World")

About this edition

• Publisher: Douglas & McIntyre
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 1550549774
• ISBN 13: 9781550549775
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1