THE GOLDEN HIND and the Circumnavigation of the Globe

Biographies of Drake are commonplace, the most recent being George Malcolm Thomson's Sir Francis Drake (KR, 1972) which we appropriately called a ""leaky vessel"" and Neville Williams' 1973 life published in England but not yet here (Williams also finished the Roche book, the latter dying before the ms. was completed). On the other hand, says Roche in his introduction, Drake's flagship Golden Hind has been neglected and ""The object of this book then is to redress the balance, to describe the ship and her exploits."" And so we sail off into the heady waters of historical lacunae, following the course of the circumnavigation -- that adventure which broke the Spanish and Portuguese hold on nautical heroics, learning why Drake renamed Golden Hind for his patron Sir Christopher Hatton at the entrance to the Magellan Straits, rejoicing in the plunders of Spanish galleons and particularly the treasure ship Cacafuego, hand-wringing over the exact site of Drake's California landing, ending finally in the safe harbor of Albion and a knighthood for the intrepid voyager. Roche, properly drawing on extant primary sources (contemporary accounts, the correspondence, Drake's log), reclaims that hearty ship, a symbol, like Drake himself, of the Elizabethan character.