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Sir Francis Drake
Sir Francis Drake was an English sea-captain and politician in Elizabethan Era. He was born in Tavistock, Devon. Even though his exact birthdate is unknown, it is known that he was born while the Six Articles were in charge. This would mean that the earliest date would be in 1535, and the latest in 1544. He was second in charge of the English fleet that countered the Spanish Armada. He also carried out the second circumnavigation of the world from 1577 to 1580. He died in January 1596 after an unsuccessful attack San Juan. He was the eldest of twelve sons. His father was a Protestant, so during Queen Mary’s reign, they fled from Devon to Kent, because of the persecutions that Mary had on the Protestants. Drake’s father apprenticed to his neighbour, a master of a barque, to help transport merchandise to France. Drake was so good at his duty, that that the neighbour handed down his barque to him. Francis Drake married Mary Newman in 1569. She died 12 years later, in 1581. In 1585, Drake remarried to a woman called Elizabeth Sydenham. After Drake's death, the widow Elizabeth eventually married Sir William Courtenay of Powderham. As Sir Francis Drake had no children, his estate and titles passed on to his nephew, who was also named Francis. His sailing career started when he was 23, when he sailed to the New World, also known as America on one of the fleets owned by his relatives. In 1586 he was sailing again when he was captured by the Spanish but managed to escape. Following this, he vowed revenge. He later made two journeys to the West Indies in 1570 and 1571 of which very little information is known. His first raid was late in July 1572. Drake and his men captured a town in the Isthmus of Panama and its treasure. When his men noticed that Drake was bleeding profusely from a wound, they insisted on withdrawing to save his life and left the treasure. Drake stayed in the area for almost a year, raiding Spanish shipping and attempting to capture a treasure shipment. With the success of the Panama isthmus raid, in 1577 Elizabeth I of England sent Drake to start an expedition against the Spanish along the Pacific coast of the Americas. Near Lima, Drake captured a Spanish ship which had 25,000 pesos of Peruvian gold on it, which is about £7m by modern standards. Drake also discovered news of another ship, //Nuestra Señora de la Concepción//, which was sailing west towards Manila. Drake gave chase and eventually captured the treasure ship, which proved their greatest capture. Aboard //Nuestra Señora de la Concepción//, Drake found 36 kg of gold, a golden crucifix, jewels, thirteen chests full of royals of plate and 26 tons of silver.

Spanish Armada
The Spanish Armada was the Spanish fleet that fought against England in 1588. It was meant to overthrow Queen Elizabeth to stop English involvement in the Spanish Netherlands and English privateering in the Atlantic and the Pacific. The fleet's mission was to sail to Gravelines in Flanders and transport an army across the channel to England. The Armada achieved its first goal and anchored outside Gravelines but while awaiting communications, it was driven away by an English fire ship attack, and in the naval battle at Gravelines the Spanish were forced to abandon. The Armada managed to regroup and withdraw north, with the English fleet following it for some distance up the east coast of England. A return voyage to Spain was plotted, and the fleet sailed north of Scotland, into the Atlantic and past Ireland, but severe storms disrupted the fleet's course. More than 24 vessels were wrecked on the north and western coasts of Ireland. Of the fleet's 130 ships, about fifty failed to make it back to Spain. The expedition was the largest engagement of the unofficial Anglo–Spanish War. English losses stood at 50–100 dead and 400 wounded, and none of their ships had been sunk. But after the victory, typhus and hunger killed many sailors and troops, with numbers thought to be around 6000-8000, as they were discharged without pay.