would have seen that adventurous soldier of fortune, Sir Anthony
Shirley, sail up the harbour, whence he plundered the island and burnt
St. Jago; in March 1643, the buccaneering hero Captain William Jackson,
with his marauding company of three ships sent out from England by the
Earl of Warwick, recruited at Barbados and St. Kitts, again insulted the
powerless or supine Spaniards, passing Port Royal, which was then an
island; and in May 1655, the inhabitants fell an easy prey to a
ragamuffin army of 8000 troops contained in thirty-eight ships under
Penn and Venables, who tried to atone thereby for their ineffectual
attempt on Hispaniola. This was probably the largest fleet which up to
that moment had entered Kingston harbour.
The English conquerors soon saw the strategic advantage of Cagua (which
they corrupted into Cagway), or the Point, as they called it, as a
protection to the harbour and the capital at St. Jago de la Vega.
The earliest act of this motley crew, when they tired of killing the
cattle which the Spaniards had been at great pains to breed on the
sea-washed savannahs on the south side, was to erect a fort at Cagway
under Sedgwick in March 1656. At the Restoration it not unnaturally
received the name of Fort Charles, and the collection of houses that
grew up around it was called Port Royal, at the dictates of loyalty or
sycophancy, according to the political creed of the members of the new
colony. But the governor and council had often great difficulty in
persuading the Assembly to vote the funds necessary for its upkeep and
improvement. A writer during Sir Charles Lyttelton’s governorship,
1662–1664, says it was called Port Royal from the excellency of the
harbour; but it was apparently not till February 1674 that that became
its official name, when the Assembly voted “Point Conway (an obvious
misprint for Cagway) to be called Port Royal.” In addition to Fort
Charles there were three other principal forts called James, Carlisle
and Rupert.
For a time Port Royal was the residence of the Lieutenant-Governor,
while the Governor’s official residence was at Spanish Town. In November
1661, it was ordered “that no person remain on Point Cagua without
giving security to a Justice of the Peace not to be chargeable to the
inhabitants for more than one month. Any waterman bringing a person
likely to be chargeable to pay a piece of eight and carry him back
again.” In 1664 the Assembly desired and advised the Council that the
Court of Common Pleas should be held constantly “in St. Jago de la Vego
and no more at Port Royal,” and the Council agreed. In March 1674–5
Peter Beckford wrote home:
Lord Vaughan arrived on the 13th inst. at night and landed at Port
Royal; next day his commission was read, and he was entertained as
well as the island could afford; 15th, he remained on Port Royal,
viewing the fortifications; came next day to St. Jago, being received
at the seaside [at Passage Fort, probably] by 150 horse and a company
of foot, besides the gentlemen of the country and seven coaches, all
which attended him to the town, where he was received with two
companies of foot, and dined with Sir Thos. Modyford.
By 1675, residence by the Governor at Port Royal had gone out of favour.
In that year was passed a resolution to the effect that—the
“Captain-General’s salary to be £2000 per annum, residing usually at St.
Jago, his residence at Port Royal to be omitted.”
In 1680, the custos of Port Royal was Sir Henry Morgan, J.P. The judges
of court of common pleas were William Beeston, Reginald Wilson and
Anthony Swimmer. The justices of the peace were, besides the judges,
John White, Theodore Cary, Prichard Herne and Harbottle Wingfield.
Sir Thomas Lynch wrote, in 1682, to the Bishop of London, of Beeston:
“You may be disposed to credit him as Dr. Beeston’s brother, and a very
ingenious man, to whose skill and zeal we owe the building of our church
at Port Royal, the handsomest in America....” This church, called
Christchurch, perished in the earthquake. The present building, erected
in 1725–26, contains monuments to many of those who succumbed to yellow
fever. Its most notable monument is that to Lieutenant Stapleton (d.
1754) by Roubiliac. Of the rest the most interesting is that to Captain
de Crespigny (d. 1825), who had served under St. Vincent, Nelson and
Collingwood, and during his career saved no less than sixteen lives. The
carved organ loft was erected in 1743.
In the Council minutes for June 1685, occurs the valuation of two
parcels of land taken for the public use. One “contiguous to the breast
work” (probably identical with the “Redoute” in Lilly’s plan) was valued
at £125.
As early as 1661 there were in Fort Charles “some as good cannon planted
as the Tower of London would afford,” but it was not ever thus. The fort
was “not shook down, but much shattered” by the earthquake of 1692.
Seven or eight years later it was reconstructed by Colonel Christian
Lilly, an engineer officer of considerable ability, who had laid out the
town of Kingston in 1694, and who, in 1734, was captain of the fort. He
was probably the author of “An Account of Commodore Wilmot’s Expedition
to Hispaniola” of the year 1696, in which occurs a very caustic
description of the “small fort” at Port Royal, which he regarded as
Of little significance in case of an attack. It is something like a
square redoubt of forty or fifty paces to a side with two small
bastions towards the town, but nothing towards the sea but a small
semi-circular advance in the middle of that side, capable of
containing three or four pieces of cannon. The walls are built after
the ancient way of fortifications and are not cannon-proof. The
embrasures are arched over, and so large as to be more like gates for
the enemy to enter at than port-holes. There is not so much as a
trench or palisade round it, and I believe not six pieces of cannon
that can bear at one time upon a ship when opposite to it. Outside
this fort, when I was there, there was a long line of cannon; but so
extremely exposed to the enemy’s fire that it would be hard matter for
any one to use them in case of an attack, and they are of no use at
all in case an enemy gets into the harbour, for they can then be taken
in reverse. This is the chief artificial fortification of Port Royal,
and the natural fortification is not much except that it is now an
island, for the town is all open to the harbour and partly to the sea.
In my opinion, therefore, there would be no difficulty for a small
fleet to master it, and less risk than in encountering two stout
men-of-war, were it not for our own ships in the harbour, as I can
explain if required. This place, being the bulwark and gate to the
conquest of the island, should be better secured. The side of the fort
towards the sea, already falling down, should be rebuilt in some
figure better suited for its defence, and the whole should be
surrounded by a good deep ditch and a row or two of strong palisades.
The embrasures should be lessened to two feet at most to protect the
gunners at their guns. The battery on the east side should be made
defencible and cannon-proof. The plot of land to north-west of the
fort should be taken into a horn-work and fitted for several guns, to
defend it against attack in reverse. To eastward of the town a work
should be thrown up to cover it against the isthmus, and to guard
against surprise by boats on that side. These fortifications could
also be built of earth and wood; which would save much expense and
would suffice if they lasted to the end of the war.
This account tallies with a description of Port Royal, dated October 25,
1699, signed by Lilly himself.
Sir William Beeston, writing to the Council of Trade and Plantations in
February 1700, said—with all the self-sufficiency of one in authority:
The storehouses are finished and of great use, and so is Fort Charles
with all the advantage the ground will afford. Captain Lilly would
have had it built in another figure, but that was more to show his
desire it might be done by his directions than of any use, for, as he
proposed, there would have been much less room, and the spurs were not
capacious enough to contain any guns. I had the approbation of all
people in the figure I proposed, and it’s not only very useful but
very beautiful also. The next public work we go about is to lay a line
of thirty or forty guns in good stone work to the eastward of Fort
Charles, which guns will be right up the channel where all ships come
in, and make the place not easy to be attempted by sea.
From the earliest times the members of the House of Assembly, ever ready
to insist on their rights, were admitted to view the forts and
fortifications, and a joint committee of the Assembly and Council used
to report annually on Fort Charles. After pointing out various defects
for thirty or forty years, the committee in 1736 got angry, and
complained “that the present state and condition of the fortifications
in Port Royal, which is very defenceless, require the immediate
consideration of the Legislature, as they are the strength and security
of the island,” and that “little or no notice had been taken to remedy
the grievances complained of.”
Towards the close of the eighteenth century there were thirty forts and
batteries in the island. At present there are but three worthy of the
name—Fort Nugent at Harbour Head, Fort Clarence, opposite Port Royal,
and Rocky Point, on the Palisadoes.
As the island became more settled under the British colonists, vessels
which had at first been equipped for home defence began to assume the
position of private men-of-war, or privateers, and to bring into Port
Royal, sometimes with the warrant of the governor, sometimes without,
spoils from the Spaniards. When it suited the home programme the local
Governor was praised for zeal in Imperial service. When the complaints
of the Spanish court became too insistent, he was made a scapegoat and
recalled. But the habit of plundering the hated Spaniard had got into
the blood of men who were ill-fitted to lead a sedentary life, and the
steps from authorized privateersmen, first to unauthorized buccaneer,
and then to pirate and murderer, were easy. And no close scrutiny was
placed upon the origin of the wealth poured into Port Royal, which its
owners squandered in drinking and gaming as quickly as they had gained
it. Port Royal was then the centre of much debauchery.
Modyford, the governor, wrote home, “The Spaniards wondered much at the
sickness of our people, until they knew of the strength of their drinks,
but then they wondered more that they were not all dead.” The
buccaneers, another writer tells us, “have been known to spend 2000 or
3000 pieces of eight in one night.”
The memory of the wild deeds done by those who put off from Port Royal’s
shore is kept alive in the name of =Gallows Point=, where many notorious
pirates were, when condemned, hung up, and where the last of those
executions, of which one is graphically described by Michael Scott in
“Tom Cringle’s Log,” took place in 1831. Rackham, another pirate, was
executed on the cay which still bears his name.
The following interesting account of Port Royal is given, in Francis
Hanson’s account of Jamaica, written in 1682, appended to the first
printed edition of the “Laws of Jamaica”:
The Town of Port Royal, being as it were the Store House or Treasury
of the West Indies, is always like a continual Mart or Fair, where all
sorts of choice Merchandizes are daily imported, not only to furnish
the Island, but vast quantities are thence again transported to supply
the Spaniards, Indians, and other Nations, who in exchange return us
bars and cakes of Gold, wedges and pigs of Silver, Pistoles, Pieces of
Eight and several other Coyns of both Mettles, with store of wrought
Plate, Jewels, rich Pearl Necklaces, and of Pearl unsorted or
undrill’d several Bushels; besides which, we are furnished with the
purest and most fine sorts of Dust Gold from Guiney, by the Negroe
Ships, who first come to Jamaica to deliver their Blacks, and there
usually refit and stay to reload three or four Months; in which time
(though the Companies Gold may be partly sent home) yet the Merchants,
Masters of Ships, and almost every Mariner (having private Cargoes)
take occasion to sell or exchange great quantities; some of which our
Goldsmiths there work up, who being yet but few grow very wealthy, for
almost every House hath a rich Cupboard of Plate, which they
carelessly expose, scarce shutting their doors in the night, being in
no apprehension of Thieves for want of receivers as aforesaid. And
whereas most other Plantations ever did and now do keep their accounts
in Sugar, or the proper Commodities of the place, for want of Money,
it is otherwise in Jamaica, for in Port-Royal there is more plenty of
running Cash (proportionably to the number of its inhabitants) than is
in London....
One of the earliest to bring lustre to the crown of Port Royal was
Admiral Myngs, by his capture in 1662 of St. Jago de Cuba, and other
naval exploits.
Then came Sir Henry Morgan, the conqueror of Panama, whose deeds of
undoubted valour were smirched by cowardly conduct towards priests and
defenceless women. In later life he turned respectable, even to the
extent of persecuting his former comrades, when he acted as
lieutenant-governor. But the old spirit died hard, and we are not
surprised when we read that the governor, Lord Vaughan, complained that
Morgan made himself “so cheap at the port drinking and gaming at the
taverns” that he intended to remove thither himself, from Spanish Town,
for the credit of the island. In justice to Morgan’s memory it may be
said that some historians hold that Oexmelin’s account of the buccaneers
is a libel on Morgan, and that he was not nearly so black as he has been
painted: and when we find his methods of warfare, and worse, adopted by
a nation that has hitherto claimed to be in the forefront of
civilization we are tempted to forgive Morgan much. As admiral of the
Jamaica fleet, Morgan at the time commanded twenty-eight English-built
ships and eight taken from the French—thirty-six in all, with a tonnage
of 1585, the size of a small passenger steamer of to-day.
The Council was sitting at Port Royal on June 7, 1692, when by the ever
memorable earthquake of that day many important colonists lost their
lives. Houses, said to have been as good as many in the city of London,
were destroyed; and the part of the town bordering on the sea entirely
disappeared, owing to insecure foundations. A century later remains of
these houses were still visible. Lewis Galdy, a French immigrant, was
swallowed and cast up again, and lived many years. He will be referred
to in the chapter on St. Catherine. The mace brought out by Lord Windsor
in 1662 (erroneously supposed to have been the bauble which Cromwell
ordered out of the House of Commons), was damaged at the time of the
earthquake, and repaired after it; but it has since disappeared. The two
maces in the Institute of Jamaica are of later date.
The principal authorities usually quoted on the earthquake of 1692 are
Sir Hans Sloane’s account in the “Philosophical Transactions”; the
description given by Long, in his History of Jamaica; and a letter by
the rector of the parish which appeared in the “Gentleman’s Magazine”
for 1750, and was reprinted by Bridges—all of which information was
epitomized by Gardner in his history.
In addition to these is available a broadside in the British Museum, a
copy of which is in the Institute of Jamaica. The key and letter which
form part of the broadside appeared in the “Journal of the Institute of
Jamaica,” in 1892.
The following accounts of the earthquake have also been printed in the
“Journal of the Institute of Jamaica”:
(1) Sir Hans Sloane’s account consisting of (_a_) “An account ...
which I wrote myself being present in it.” (_b_) “Extract from a
letter from one in Jamaica who was in the terrible earthquake.” (_c_)
“Extract of a letter ... giving an account of the sickness that
followed the earthquake.” (_d_) “Part of a letter ... giving a further
account from another hand.” (_e_) “Part of another from the same
hand.” (_f_) “Part of a letter from a gentleman in Jamaica ... not
being present in the earthquake ... very curious.” (2) Notes by Mr.
Maxwell Hall on an article by Colonel A. B. Ellis in “Popular Science
Monthly” for 1892. (3) “A full account of the late dreadful earthquake
at Port Royal in Jamaica written in two letters from the minister of
the place [Dr. Heath],” which is copied incompletely and incorrectly
by Bridges. (4) An account by Mrs. Akers of Nevis, printed in a
“Natural History of Nevis ... by the Rev. Mr. Smith ... 1745.” (5)
“The Truest and Largest account of the earthquake in Jamaica ...
written by a Reverend Divine there to his friend in London ... 1693,”
a copy of which is in the West India Library in the Institute. The
letter is dated “Withy Wood in the parish of Vere,” and it is possible
that the “Reverend Divine” was Thomas Hardwicke, who was appointed
Rector of Vere by the Earl of Carlisle. (6) “A letter to a friend from
Jamaica, Spanish Town, the 29th of June, 1692,” by John Pike, printed
in a pamphlet, a copy of which is in the British Museum.
There were also two letters dated from Port Royal on June 20 and June
28, 1692, given in “Earthquakes explained and Practically Improved ...
by Thomas Doolittle, M.A., Jamaica’s Miseries show London Mercies ...
London, 1693.”
In addition to all these there is a letter sent home by the Council to
the Lords of Plantations, which is given in an abbreviated form in the
“Calendar of State Papers (Colonial Series)—America and West
Indies—1689–1692.” The following is copied in extenso from the
manuscript Council minutes in the Colonial Secretary’s office, Jamaica,
a manuscript copy of which is in the Library of the Institute:
A letter from the President and Council of Jamaica to Lords of Trade
and Plantations of the date June 20 from on board the _Richard and
Sarah_, Jamaica. May it please Your Lordships on the seventh instant
it pleased God to afflict this whole island with an earthquake, the
dreadfullness whereof will sensibly enough appear in acquainting Your
Lordships that in the space of two minutes [the “Calendar of State
Papers” has ten] all the churches, the dwelling houses and sugar works
of the whole island were thrown down: two-thirds of Port Royal
swallowed up by sea, all its forts and fortifications demolished and a
great part of its inhabitants miserably either knockt o’th head or
drowned. As we are become by this an instance of God Almighty’s severe
judgment, so we hope we shall be of Your Lordships compassion. We have
in the midst of this confusion applied ourselves with all vigour to
the restoring of things. We have taken into Their Majesties’ service
the _Richard and Sarah_, a merchantship, where though to a great loss
in the neglect of our own private affairs, we sit _de die in diem_ in
Council; protecting the merchants in their fishing on the ruins of
their own houses; preventing robbery and stealing amongst the ruins;
deciding controversies and punishing quarrels too frequently arising
from the uncertain right of things. In sinking floating carcasses,
taking care of the sick and wounded; lastly, in feeding and sustaining
the necessitous which must now be done out of the Country stock, all
kinde of stores being lost in the ruin of Port Royall. We have sett
the masters of ships to the sounding a channell leading further up
into this harbour, where we are like to have a scituation equal to
Port Royall in everything and exceeding it in its being capable of
relieving the country or being on any invasion relieved by it. This
may it please Your Lordships we doe in all humble confidence hoping
Your Lordships will consider us as we are all open and exposed to the
attempts of enemyes by sea as well as by land. At land at this instant
we are contending against a party of French who have been for some
time ravageing the north side of the island, and though we have sent a
proportionable force against them both by sea and land, yet by reason
of the violent rains and earthquakes at land and blowing weather at
sea it has not pleased God as yet to make us able to give much account
of them as we still hope to doe. Among other accidents of the
earthquake, their Majesties ship the _Swan_, which was lying at the
wharves for careening, was suckt among the houses of Port Royall, has
lost her guns, rigging, cables, and anchors, and her keel damaged, and
is on survey cast, and we must inform Your Lordships that could
repeated persuasions or even threats have prevailed on Captain Nevill
to any degree of diligence, the _Swan_ had either been out of harbour
or rid out of danger. Many of the guns of the fortifications are two
fathoms under water, and are in danger of being lost. The small arms
of the country are generally broke by the fall of the houses, which
gives us apprehensions from the slaves. This being the true state of
our condition we must humbly beseech Your Lordships effectually to
intercede with their most gracious Majesties that we may have a
proportionable reliefe in time, and in all humility we think till we
shall be able to fortify it cannot be less than three fifth Rates with
one or two good fourth Rates for a battery, together with four or five
hundred land soldiers and all sorts of arms and ammunition (great shot
excepted), and that Your Lordships would procure us such a Governor
whose generous care and charity may be equall to the needs of this
distressed place, and we humbly take leave to inform Your Lordships
that a tollerable choice may be made from amongst ourselves till, by
the blessing of God and the just and equal administration of the
Government, it may again grow to be fitt reward for greater persons.
We humbly beg that this advice sloop may be speedily returned and the
master and men protected. All which is humbly submitted. We are, may
it please your honours, Your Lordships most humble servants, John
White, P.C., John Bourden, Peter Heywood, Samuell Bernard, John
Towers, Nicholas Laws, Francis Blackmore, Charles Knight, Thomas
Sutton.
Postscript—Since the foregoing their Majesties’ ship _Guernsey_ with
the sloop which we sent out against the French that had landed on the
north side of this island are come into port and have had good
success, having burnt the enemy’s ship and taken and destroyed all the
men both by land and sea, except eighteen which escaped in a sloop.
In all humility we are your Lordships most humble and obedient
servants.
Jamaica. From on board the _Richard and Sarah_, June the 20th, 1692.
The old bell in the Institute of Jamaica, is said to have been sunk
originally by the great earthquake, and to have been recovered during
some dredging operations off Port Royal. Tradition said that it was
given to the old Spanish church at Port Royal, by a convent in Spain,
but this is obviously incorrect as the Spaniards had no church, or in
fact, any building at the Point. It is, of course, possible that the
early English settlers took it from the ruins of some Spanish Town
church, for use in the church they built at the Point, or it may have
been taken to Port Royal at a later date. In any case it is curious that
the only Spanish bell known in Jamaica should have been discovered at
Port Royal and not at Spanish Town or at St. Ann’s Bay, where the first
Spanish settlement stood.
[Illustration:
SPANISH CHURCH BELL
]
Either in the ordinary course of events by the continual beating of the
clapper, or through a flaw in the metal, or through its fall at the time
of the earthquake or at some other time, the bell was cracked; but after
its recovery the crack was stayed by a drill hole, and the bell is said
to have been hung in the new church which had been built at Port Royal
in 1725.
In 1855, as the crack had extended in two directions and rendered the
bell useless, the “whitewash and plaster” churchwardens of the day sold
it for old metal. During the administration of Sir John Peter Grant it
was pointed out to the Government that it was lying in an old curiosity
shop in Kingston, in imminent danger of being melted down; and it was
purchased by the Government and deposited at the Ordnance Wharf, whence
it found its way to the Institute of Jamaica. It is 2 feet 1¾ inch in
height and 6 feet 7 inches in circumference at the base. Round the edge
runs the following inscription:
_Ihesv Maria et Verbum Caro Factum Est et Abita_.