Raleigh: what a nasty, murderous, brilliant hero

 It's the deathday of an astonishing figure from history, Sir Walter Raleigh, one of the real yet questionable heroes of the past.

Most Brits have read and studied the history of this astonishing sailor and politician, and - (take a deep breath) - landed gentleman, writer, poet, soldier, politician, courtier, spy and explorer.

Yet reading through a short version of his history on Wikipedia now, I am left quite amazed, dazed, revolted in parts, by such an unusual fellow. His history is astonishing.

CALLOUS BUTCHER

Occasionally, he appears as some callous butcher, when for instance he was stationed in Ireland as a young blade.

And take this hair-raising sentence in Wikipedia, 'He was present at the Siege of Smerwick, where he led the party that beheaded some 600 Spanish and Italian soldiers.'

What an unconscionable butcher. It seems to suggest that he well deserved his own violent end – and a pity some torture wasn't added.

ASTONISHING THE SEAFARER IN ME

And yet, this following excerpt is one of the parts of his history that astonishes the seafarer in me. 
Shortly after the queen died, '…Raleigh was arrested on 19 July 1603, charged with treason for his involvement in the Main Plot against Elizabeth's successor, James I, and imprisoned in the Tower of London.'

That's, as the record shows, 1603. Wikipedia reports, 'He remained imprisoned in the Tower until 1616.'

He was born in 1552 or 1554, so he was at least 52 when the gates opened at last. 
He had plenty of intellectual exercise while locked away – 'he wrote many treatises and the first volume of The Historie of the World (first edition published 1614) about Greece and Rome. '

However, there's no hint at all that he took any physical exercise, apart from a moment or two with Mrs Raleigh to conceive a son, a good 12 years before the prison gates opened at last.

Hardly had he staggered home than the King ….  Continues on the blogs for my ocean-travel adventure book, Sailing to Purgatory, at SailingToPurgatory.com