Mexico City, Hernan Cortes final resting place

If I could watch one episode in the history of the world, I would have been here in April, 1573, because after nine months of toiling, death amongst the soldiers and his family, Francis Drake came here and struck it rich. Behind me is the plain of the river Kampos. You can see the V in the branches, and above the V you will see water and a beach of the river Nombre de Dios. And possibly on this hilltop, Francis Drake camped the night before attacking the mule train in the morning of April. And he struck rich. There were 190 mules, two mule trains of 75 mules, and then there was one of 50. Each mule was carrying between 200 to 300 pounds of bullion. And Drake was with the French who joined him in the San Blas Islands. He still had his band of escaped slaves. And when the bells of the mule train could be heard from the south, Drake took his men down to the brook, which is called the Juan Miguel. And the French were at the back of the line of the attackers and Drake was at the front. The mules crossed the Kampos plain down there and they started to climb the hill for the last stretch of the journey to Nombre de Dios, which is about two and a half miles away. And therefore the 45 guards were marching in a state of disorder, being very relaxed, they thought they'd made it. And they were hit by a hail of bullets and arrows. And after a short skirmish, the Spaniards fled to Nombre de Dios and those at the end of the packed train, they ran back to Panama City. The black slaves showed the assailants which mules were carrying the gold so they wouldn't waste time playing with the silver. The French actually hid treasure at the back of the mule train in the river Nombre de Dios, which was called the Kampos in Drake's day. And Drake's men hid their share on the brook called the Juan Miguel. They then made sure they could hide as much treasure as possible. And Drake would have worked out that he had about an hour here to sort out the treasure and carry off as much as possible before the Spaniards will be back. He knew the Spaniards would take about an hour to get to town, hour to muster reinforcements, hour to get back. So Drake would have had an hour to two. And he would attack the mule train about 10 in the morning, 11 in the morning, because the Spanish accounts tell us that the alarm was raised in Nombre de Dios at midday. So the Spaniards would have been back here at one o'clock. And Drake reckoned that he heard the Spaniards coming on horses, but I think that was a bit of poetic license. The road was muddy, it was hard, and it was difficult to traverse. This Kampos plain here, I discovered it with John Thrower back in 1993. And we've done a lot of research and revisits to consolidate that this is where Drake got rich between the brook called the Juan Miguel and the river, which was called the Kampos, which is the river Nombre de Dios. And it was here on the plain beneath us where Drake struck it rich. He returned home a millionaire, and he spent some of his money building a ship, which he would sail around the world as a result of climbing that tree in Cerro Brewster, which brings us to full circle that I hope you have enjoyed the series of videos of Draking Digitally in Panama. Gracias por su atencion, fin.