ABSTRACT
First, that they left Plymouth on 8 September of that year in the company of a fleet commanded by Francis Drake and John Hawkins, and that this ship and her companion lost company of the fleet four days before. They had orders that those who lost company should rendezvous at the isles of Bayona, Puerto Santa and Guadalupe, and if they failed to find the fleet in any of those ports they should go on to Puerto Rico, where they said they would stay ten days. Having arrived the previous afternoon at that island, they had seen and counted 19 sail, but were not able to draw near and speak with them, and believing the frigates to be ships of their company, they had approached to join them. Asked about the strength of the fleet, they said there were 26 sail, among them six of the queen's, five of these being of soo-8oo tons and the other of 300, and that among the 20 other, private ships some were equal in strength and size to those. All of them came at the queen's expense. The fleet carried 2,900 mariners and gunners and 3 ,ooo soldiers, including many captains and gentlemen. 2 The generals for the land were Thomas Baskerville and Nicholas Clifford, but
1 Isleo blanco. The contemporary matter printed in Principal Navigations) 111 (r60o), 613-27 (x (1905), 306-37), advised ships to negotiate the Virgin Passage keeping this 'white litle Island' to starboard. The unpublished rutter in B.M., Sloane MSS, 2292, ff. 34-40 gives similar advice to 'goe betwixt the Ilandes called virgines and the Iland called Blanca'. These instructions, and the statement in Principal Navigations) loc. cit.) that the island 'seemeth like a ship under saile' suggest that this island was the modern Sail Rock.
