Port Royal: The Earthquake that Destroyed the Infamous Pirate Den

today's video is sponsored by wren a very cool  new sponsor that is helping you discover what your   carbon footprint is ren is a website focused on  the effects of climate change and how we can all   individually help to do something about it  so you head on over to their website you go   through a quick free questionnaire about what your  consumption habits are we're talking questions   like how often you shop online how many times per  week do you eat red meats it all takes about five   minutes and when you're done they've got lots of  handy information and graphs that put your carbon   footprint into perspective but ren doesn't  just stop there they're not like look at you   now you feel super guilty what they do is they're  constantly scouring the globe for reforestation   efforts and carbon capture projects that they  want to help and if you're so inclined you can   help too after you've determined your carbon  footprint you can choose to donate a monthly   sum that will offset your own footprint by  helping to fund some of these environmental   projects and once you've made a financial  commitment you can begin receiving a monthly   update centered around rainforest protection tree  planting initiatives and carbon capture projects   but ren knows that it's going to take a lot of  work to address climate change but it's easier   when we all contribute a little bit towards it so  if that sounds like something you'd be interested   in checking out you can head to ren.com or use  my referral link in the description box below   and as a special partnership between ren and me  we're going to plant 10 extra trees for the first   100 people who sign up using the referral  link below excellent and now today's video if you are a fan of films based on  theme park rides you may be familiar   with today's destination port royal jamaica  the unofficial capital of the pirates of the   caribbean in the second half of the 17th century  the films i'm referring to however take place   after 1720 when the fame of porol as  a pirate den and wickedest city in the   americas had already waned the franchise  also missed the most interesting chapters   of poor old's history how it became the base  of operations for the dreaded buccaneers and   how a devastating earthquake destroyed in barely  three minutes all of the wealth they had built the first dwellers of the town known as port roll  were jamaica's early inhabitants the tainos they   had named the town kage or kaguya and used it as  a small fishing port and it could have remained   as such if it weren't for christopher columbus  who declared jamaica to be the fairest island   eyes have beheld his positive review of the place  convinced his spanish patrons to take possession   of the island as one of their first american  colonies the spanish also seized the small   kagwy from tyno control but did not invest much  in developing the original port the future and   fortune of jamaica changed drastically in  1654. this is when oliver cromwell sends an   expedition to the caribbean under general robert  vernables and admiral william penn the founder   of pennsylvania their mission to capture from the  spanish the island of hispaniola present-day haiti   in april of that year pen and venables invaded  hispaniola with 8 000 men soon losing almost   3 000 to torrential rain disease in hospitable  terrain and most likely of all pesky spaniards   ambushing them with pikes and muskets the two  senior officers left hispaniola in haste but   fearing to return to cromwell empty-handed decided  to invade jamaica instead which was less populated   less developed and less defended in fact the  english captured jamaica in about a week although   a sizable number of spanish soldiers retreated  to the interior where they would wage a long   guerrilla campaign penn found that the waters  near cagway were a good mooring point for his   ships and venables erected for cromwell on the  shore to protect the harbor thus the settlement   of point cagway began to develop back in london  cromwell encouraged colonists to relocate to   jamaica either from the motherland or from other  english possessions in the caribbean bermuda   and barbados from 1655 to 1661 port cagway became  the main entry point for some 12 000 settlers you   had quakers from barbados experts in growing  tobacco dutch jews expelled from brazil skilled   at planting sugarcane a thousand pre-teen irish  boys sent as indentured servants after cromwell's   invasion of ireland then hundreds of vagabonds and  robbers transported by the sheriffs of scotland   sadly almost 9 000 of them died in the very first  years from their arrival ravaged by disease and   malnutrition the survivors were also keenly  aware of living deep into a spanish colonial   area under threat from seaborne invasions as  well as the ongoing guerrilla attacks colonial   governor edward deolay successfully repelled two  spanish invasions in 1657 and 1658 a victory which   also dispatched the remaining guerrillas  doilay had control of the island militarily   but for how long he certainly did not have enough  skilled manpower to arm a navy of his own in port   cagway but he could certainly hire one doyle knew  exactly whom to call the brethren of the coast back in the day spanish vessels and colonial  settlements were constantly harassed by the   brethren of the coast the buccaneers who operated  from the island of tortuga we've already covered   tortuga and the buccaneers in a separate  video which i'd encourage you to watch because   it has one of the best dad jokes in history in it  but in case you're not in the mood well here's a   quick summary the buccaneers were originally  a community of french dutch english and welsh   hunters and traders operating in hispaniola  after realizing that piracy was a more profitable   enterprise they took to attacking spanish vessels  with little more than a few canoes and a handful   of muskets after the spanish drove them out from  hispaniola in the early 1630s these buccaneers   relocated to the nearby french colony of tortuga  in 1642 governor jealous vassour formalized the   practice of issuing letters of mark to the  buccaneers this is when the hunters turned pirates   became fully fledged privateers a mercenary force  plundering spanish booty on behalf of the french   crown their ranks were swelled by veterans of the  30 years war which improved practical practice   with military tactics and discipline far from the  ragtag motley cruz portrayed in popular fiction   the buccaneers in their brethren were often better  trained and equipped than spanish regular forces a   buccaneer vessel may have been smaller than its  quarries and surely it carried less guns but it   was faster and more maneuverable allowing  raiders to close close to their targets a   typical attack would start with a devastating  saba of cannon and musket fire dispatching the   enemy helmsman and damaging the sails next the  buccaneers launched some grappling hooks from   the stern of their sloop or schooner and proceeded  to board again hollywood taught us that pirates of   the caribbean dealt with their foes in protracted  and spectacular duels cutlasses drawn and maybe   a dagger between the teeth but the buccaneer's  favorite weapon was the simple and devastatingly   effective hand grenade after returning to port  captains proceeded to share their booty in equal   parts with their men strictly abiding to pre-drawn  up contracts these agreements included provision   for those who had suffered severe wounds for  example your stereotypical pirate with an eye   patch and a hook for a hand would have received  a total of 700 pieces of eight or spanish dollars   for his injuries so what did they do with all  that money well some capable captains would   reinvest their funds in weapons provisions or  larger vessels some sensible crewmen would set   something aside for their retirement there are  also some rare accounts of buried treasure but   the majority of the stolen hordes went into what  mattered the most to these guys booze tobacco   and prostitutes when ole invited the buccaneers  and other pirates to port royal he enticed them   with the promise of letters of mark they could rob  the spaniards as much as they liked provided they   left english ships alone the sea rovers obliged  and flocked to their new practical den of course   they brought along their old habits and lifestyle  in a matter of a few years poor royal had built a   solid reputation for being the wickedest city  in the americas the sodom of the new world it   is said that one in four buildings in town was  either a tavern a gambling den or a brothel at six thousand inhabitants port royal was not  exactly a metropolis but its economy flourished   thanks to the effects of piracy raiders returned  into port with pockets full of cash which they   happily poured into the coffers of innkeepers and  brothel madams some of these pirates were known   to spend two or three thousand pieces of eight per  night in turn they used these earnings to buy new   supplies refurbish establishments or erect new  buildings demand for logwood sugar and alcohol   boomed and traders of these commodities were quick  to supply them they were soon followed by another   type of import slaves from africa it is thus  that by the early 1660s port cagway had become   a hub for some of the most despicable trades known  to mankind state sanctioned robbery and murder and   mass kidnapping in the entire populations it's  no small wonder years later reverend emmanuel   heath described the dwellers of port royal as the  most ungodly and debauched people in 1661 jamaican   colonists learned that cromwell had fallen and  the monarchy had been restored under charles ii   poor kagway then received its current name port  royal this rebranding exercise did not change the   core business of the harbour which greatly worried  governor de ole as buccaneers enjoyed one success   after the other honest planters and colonists  decided to swap their plows for cutlasses in 1665   the second anglo-dutch war broke out which pitted  england against the dutch republic in france this   was music to the ears of the jamaican privateers  as they had more targets for their raids the war   ended in 1667 but was followed by an undeclared  conflict against the french colonies in the   caribbean as a result english-funded buccaneers  from port royal were sent on expeditions against   french-funded buccaneers from tortuga a pirate  empire a battle in the caribbean sounds awesome   cinematically speaking but it probably never took  place bound by a brotherhood beyond political   barriers buccaneers from all sides met in  secret in isla de la vaca halfway between   tortuga and jamaica from there they planned  joint raids against merchant ships of any   flag this period saw the emergence of a legendary  figure sir henry morgan one of the most successful   privateers at port royal his services were held  in such a steam that in 1675 he was appointed   lieutenant governor of jamaica as such he led  a crackdown against over piracy that is those   raiders who did not hold official letters of mark  so maybe there were pira vs pirate duels after all port oil continued to grow becoming the busiest  and most successful harbour in english america   in 1688 for example its maritime commercial  traffic peaked at 213 ships beating both bermuda   and barbados but could an economy so  largely based on exploitation and warfare   actually be sustainable well we'd never know  four years later the city would be stricken   by a catastrophe of biblical proportions on the  morning of the 7th of june 1692 the reverend dr   emmanuel heath conducted his morning prayers at  saint paul's church before joining his friend   john white acting governor of jamaica sitting at a  nearby tavern the two shared a bottle of wormwood   wine and then lit their pipes at about 11 40 am  he's noticed that the ground was moving under   his feet white commented it is an earthquake  be not afraid it will soon be over jamaica was   indeed prone to tremors but none of them had  been caused for concern on previous occasions   but this time white's judgment proved to be the  understatement of the century almost immediately   the two friends heard the steeple of saint paul  as it collapsed to the ground as they ran outside   in terror they witnessed the earth opening  up and swallowing a multitude of townsfolk   as tremors grew stronger houses began to  crumble the major faults of the town the   mighty fort james fort carlisle and fort rupert  sunk underground in a matter of minutes at the   same time many of the private homes and  businesses were quickly sliding into the   sea the ground opened at port royal where i dwell  with a shake and swallowed whole houses the shake   opened the earth the water flew up and carried the  people in quick i lost my wife my son apprentice a   white maid and six slaves and all that i ever  had in the world the destruction did not spare   those who were already dead the town's cemetery  was dragged underwater with tombstones caskets   memorials trapped in a maelstrom of unforgiving  surf skeletons and decomposed bodies wrenched   from their final resting place appeared on the  surface floating by the newly dead eventually   more than half of port oil sank into the harbor  destined to remain forever under 20 feet of water   and unbeknownst to heath and white the earthquake  was causing another terrifying consequence far   from dry land the sea was withdrawing as far as  one mile away from the coast and then the waters   returned rushing back towards the shoreline in a  six foot high wave maybe not an impressive hide   by tsunami standards but this surge carried enough  volume and energy to sweep inland leveling houses   and human beings in its path but most of the  damage that day had been dealt by a process known   as liquefaction this happens when earthquakes  strike sandy grounds already saturated with water   the tremors cause water pressure to increase  which in turn separates the sand particles   soon the terrain becomes a sludge similar  to quicksand for liquefaction to have taken   place the port royal earthquakes may have had a  magnitude of 7.5 or higher those buildings who   remained standing after the 7th of june eventually  fell to the numerous aftershocks that battered the   town in the ensuing days between 1 500 and 2 000  inhabitants died during those three minutes of   agony of whom up to 700 were african slaves some  of the victims were crushed under falling masonry   others drowned when the rising waters flooded  the streets many more were simply sucked into   the ground where the soil liquefied and those  were the lucky ones some citizens were caught   only halfway down when the earth stopped shaking  they were trapped in the ground chest high with   watery sand pressing around their shoulders sides  and diaphragms then the ground around their bodies   regained firmness gripping them like a slowly  clenching fist gradually knowingly they must have   gasped for precious air while they realized their  lungs could not expand anymore the cruelest of   buccaneers could not have devised a more refined  torture for his victims one designed to squeeze   their lives out to the very last breath the  vicious means of execution by catastrophe however   did spare at least one lucky soul this was mr  louis galdi a french protestant who had relocated   to the caribbean according to contemporary sources  including his gravestone he was swallowed up by   the great earthquake and by the providence of  god was by another shock thrown into the sea the   resourceful gowdy remained afloat until the boat  saved him the lucky frenchman lived another 47   years working as a cocoa merchant pirate hunter  and slave trader until the ripe old age of 80. the ground had shaken for just about three minutes  180 seconds of panic and mayhem had been enough to   level one of the wealthiest english colonies at  about 11 43 am the earth had stopped rattling but   the ordeal was not over for the colonists first  came the looting only natural in a place where   the violent seizure of property was encouraged by  authorities one inhabitant wrote your heart would   abhor to hear of the depredations robberies and  violence that were in an instant committed upon   the place by the vilest and bassist of the people  they that were the strongest and most wicked   seized what they pleased in the following week  survivors were stricken by infectious diseases   fueled by malnutrition and decomposing bodies  a further 2 000 people died in the epidemic   including acting governor white his good friend  reverend heath survived he later wrote that the   earthquake had been an act of god a cataclysm  sent by the almighty to punish the wicked   ways of the inhabitant support royal pirates  slave traders and other heathens congregating   in houses of ill repute best narrative became  common both in the colonies and in mainland   britain the sodom of the americas deserved to be  obliterated with an act of divine intervention   other contemporary authors were not so biblically  inclined and they recognized that the earthquake   was of course just a natural phenomenon no scholar  at that time could be aware that jamaica sits on   the ganave microplate separating the caribbean  and north american plates and this is what makes   it so prone to tremors colonists though knew  very well that the ground took to shaking quite   often on the island and there wasn't anything  special about it just another earthly occurrence   the previous earthquake simply had not been as  intense as the one in 1692 and its effects have   been made worse not by the sins of the port royal  folk but by their poor planning and construction   practices most of the town had been built on poor  foundations a patch of water saturated sand and   gravel connected to the mainland by a thin tombolo  or strip of land the previous taino and spanish   settlers had taken care to erect small wooden  buildings no more than one story tall moreover   they had taken the care of anchoring them with  long wooden stakes planted firmly into the ground   until the 1660s british colonists had followed  roughly the same building principles but from the   1670s onwards they found that they needed more  real estate to accommodate a thriving community   unable to extend beyond the 53 acres of port  rail's surface they expanded vertically and as   a result of their increased wealth inhabitants  replaced wood with bricks reflecting the   architecture in vogue in the motherland thus on  the eve of the earthquake population density and   port roll reached levels similar to central london  in the 1930s 150 inhabitants per acre densely   packed in tall brick houses resting on flimsy  foundation of loose sand this was in other words   a structural cataclysm in waiting as the townsfolk  invested in cementing their status wealth and   position they were only accentuating the very  fragility of the world that they had built   the disaster did not immediately put an end to  the wicked ways of port royal for another 50   years buccaneers and other privateers continued to  visit its harbor for example jack rack also known   as calico jack was known to operate here in the  early 18th century and it was also in port royal   that he met his fate hanging from the gallows by  order of pirate hunter woods rogers but the pirate   then never recovered to its former glory nearby  kingston gradually became jamaica's most important   trading and political center at the same time the  ever-increasing presence of official naval forces   in the caribbean put an end to the golden age of  privateering the royal navy in fact established an   important base in port royal one where a certain  horatio nelson would receive early training as   an officer nonetheless poor old seemed destined  to be ravaged by catastrophes on a regular basis   in 1704 for example it was burned by a fire in  the following 200 years it was hit by countless   hurricanes one of these in 1722 sunk the ranger  the ship of legendary pirate bartholomew roberts   known as black bard then on the 14th of january  1907 a second devastating earthquake inflicted   more destruction upon kingston and the unfortunate  port royal claiming 1 200 victims what was once   one of the largest and busiest port cities of the  caribbean is today a small village at the mouth   of kingston harbor but poor oil refuses to be  overshadowed by the neighboring capital since 1999   it has been designated as a national heritage site  and the town has filled an application to become a   unesco world heritage site as well as mentioned  one of the consequences of the 1692 quake was   for most of the city to simply slide underwater  while the ruins of the old pirate dent are still   there eerily preserved under several feet of  water salt and silence hundreds of buildings and   shipwrecks lie on sand and sill to real treasure  trove for authorized divers and archaeologists a   sort of pompeii of the caribbean if you like  since the 1950s such researchers have explored   the submerged city cataloguing artifacts shedding  light on pirate life and the history of colonial   jamaica among many artifacts archaeologists found  delicate earthenware apothecary bottles a chamber   pot elegantly glazed in green and a tortoiseshell  comb case emblazoned with henry morgan's crest   but the most famous piece is probably a pocket  watch found by explorer edward link in 1969. the   watch was manufactured in 1686 and its owner still  carried it on that fateful 7th of june 1692 when   the earth started to shake as the port violently  slid into the sea so did the pocket watch and its   unlucky carrier as he and hundreds of compatriots  met their sudden fate so did that watch its hands   are now forever frozen at the exact time of 11  43 a perennial reminder of the fragile existence   of an entire city so i really hope you found  this video interesting if you did please do   hit that thumbs up button below don't forget to  subscribe and as always thank you for watching you

Channel: Geographics

Views: 241,468

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Id: xU6OlsLQwIQ

Length: 21min 21sec (1281 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 30 2021