Title: MARTIN FROBISHER: "He is…so full of lynge talke as no man maye credytt hym in anye thinge that he doeth speake. The English in mid sixteenth century were well behind the Spanish and Portuguese as an exploring nation. England for too long had focused on its markets for wool and cloth on the continent while the other nations had been developing new markets in other parts of the world. When at last the English decided they would search for the highly valued origins of the oriental spice trade, the Spanish and Portuguese were already dominant in much of the southern hemisphere. The English, who had traded with the Baltic and Iceland for sometime, decided to search for a northerly passage to the orient. Martin Frobisher, took up sailing at 19. Later, he became a pirate. Piracy against Spain was legal in England, Frobisher, however, was too accomplished. He was a hindrance to Queen Elizabeth 1’s negotiations with Spain. She finally used his rogue abilities in the British Navy. Elizabeth introduced him to her counselor, John Dee. Dee was a mathematician, navigator and mystic. He induce Frobisher to find a Northwest passage to Asia through Arctic Canada and taught him navigation. The Northwest Passage would greatly shorten the sailing time between Europe and the Orient. In 1576, Frobisher set out in three very small ships to look for the passage to China. The largest ship had an 18-man crew. Frobisher arrived at Greenland thinking it was one of the Faeroe Islands. A storm sank one of his ships. A second deserted and returned to England. Maps at that time were vague and incomplete. When he reached two large bodies of land., he thought the northern one must be Asia and the southern one America. What he found was a 150-mile bay running into Baffin Island. There he met Inuit Indians who laughed at his men and ships. They'd knew of Leif Ericson. The Inuits kidnapped five of his crew. Frobisher then grabbed some mineral samples. He took a hostage and sailed for home. Back in England, one of his samples looked like it might contain gold. The Royal assayer said it was “fool's gold”. But England wanted the kind of wealth Spain had been taking from Central America. An Italian assayer finally said it was low-grade ore. Greedy merchants formed a Cathay Company. They sent Frobisher the pirate back to the Arctic. The Queen dubbed him the Admiral-of-Cathay. He set up a small fort on Baffin Island. This time he returned with 200 tons of ore. When it again proved worthless, his backers assumed Frobisher had mined in the wrong place. They outfitted him for the third time with a larger voyage. They sent 15 ships to build a colony. Frobisher realized he'd found an Arctic bay, not China. When he brought back 1100 tons of worthless ore, they asked him to make a fourth voyage. He refused. He wanted the fortune and recognition of finding the Northwest Passage, not a settler. One of the old “Seadogs”, he was a coarse, combative and brusque man. He later fought the Spanish Armada with Drake and finally perished in an action against the French. In a time of great maritime enterprise, Martin Frobisher’s adventures, regardless of his motives, brought England into a long period if exploration and discovery in the New World.
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