Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 144 Navy and Pirates ([-])

On May 5, the First Fleet left the ocean near Massachusetts in a cloud of rain.

Lu Ming wore an oilskin raincoat and walked on the broad deck of the "August [-]th". There were some winds and waves on the sea, and the ship was bumping violently, but Lu Ming patrolled the deck as if walking on flat ground.After several years on the ship, he is now an old sailor.

"The British guy is really poor. After staying here for a week, he only grabbed one fishing boat for transporting fur." ​​Ensign Demel, who was already the navigator of the battleship "August [-]", muttered.Coming from the Netherlands, he looked down on this group of miserable British guys. If Lu Ming hadn't refused, he would have taken people up to take over the ruined villages of those British guys.

"Did you see their poor side?" Lu Ming turned around and looked at the navigator behind him.At this time, the rain became a little heavier, and the hair on Demel's forehead was completely wet, sticking wetly to his forehead.

"In 1620, the 'Mayflower' carried the Leiden Mission and some 'Strangers' ① to Plymouth, Massachusetts for reclamation. Half of them died in the first winter, and they only learned how to do it with the help of Indians. Instead of planting and hunting, they barely took root." Lu Ming said slowly, "It has only been a decade or so, and now the British influence has spread all over Massachusetts. The Massachusetts Bay Company's immigrant ships are continuously transported from the mainland. There are a large number of immigrants, and now they have an autonomous government. If they continue to develop like this, they may become a strong competitor of our country in the future." Lu Ming patted Demel on the shoulder and said worriedly, "Okay , my navigator, now go back to your post and check our route."

"Yes, Captain." Demel saluted, and couldn't help asking before turning away: "Will this colony really become a powerful enemy of our country?"

"Maybe." Lu Ming replied noncommittally.

"Then kill her! From now on, we will come to cut the wool once a year to see how she develops!" Ensign Demel clenched his fists and said.

The rain was getting heavier and heavier, and all the drainage holes on the battleship "August [-]" had been opened.Five battleships cut through the waves in the rough waters, heading towards the next destination.After wasting a few days in Massachusetts, the First Fleet has decided to go south to the Chesapeake Bay. Only wealthy Virginia can provide enough wealth for the First Fleet.

While the First Fleet was struggling to move forward in the wind and rain, the British fleet under the command of William Clifford was blatantly mooring in the port of St. Augustine, the capital of the Florida colony of the Kingdom of Spain.

Since the large-scale pirate attack on the city two years ago, the Spaniards have learned from the pain and spent tens of thousands of pesos to repair and expand the fort at the mouth of the Matanzas River and the castle in the river port.Today, the forts at the estuary have also been fortified, the number of artillery pieces has also increased to 16, and some army soldiers have been deployed for defense.The castle wall in the river port was also expanded and heightened. Not only did the cannon positions at the top of the city double, but wooden stakes and chains were also set up in many places in the river to prevent the enemy's ships from approaching and raiding.

Of course, with so many new things added, no one can do it.For this reason, the Spanish Kingdom of Florida, who was stationed here, repeatedly asked his superiors to increase his manpower.Therefore, last year and this year, the governor of New Spain sent several batches of immigrants to St. Augustine.Among them, some Indians were transported from Mexico, there were also Spaniards and Italians who immigrated from the native land, and many Central Europeans were brought from Austrian prisons.

With these new immigrants, the population of St. Augustine exceeded [-] in one fell swoop, becoming one of the few large cities in New Spain.New immigrants from central and southern Europe reclaimed a lot of wasteland under the organization of General Florida. They planted corn, sugar cane and tobacco leaves on the wasteland. After two years of development, St. Augustine, the best place in East Florida, was restored again. A bit of the prosperity of the past.

And this is why these British fleets came to trade.However, this year, they encountered a slightly different situation-the old market that remained unchanged in previous years seems to have undergone some changes this year.

To put it simply, these Spaniards don't seem to be very interested in the cloth they traded. They seem to be only willing to pick and choose among the woolen fabrics, and they keep yelling that the price is too expensive, so that the British can lower the price a little.

William Clifford and his deputy Nick looked at each other, and both of them saw something bad in each other's eyes.

Clifford, from the East India Company, had always made a profit by re-exporting Indian cotton cloth.After imposing high tariffs on Indian cotton cloth in the UK, he has been using the Netherlands, North France and other regions as markets, and the Netherlands market is the most important.The rich lowland area provided Clifford with a lot of profits, making him a businessman who should not be underestimated in the East India Company in one fell swoop.

However, due to the increasing investment in the local cotton textile industry in the Netherlands in recent years, market competition has become increasingly fierce.The quality of cotton cloth woven by the Dutch is getting better and better, and the price is surprisingly cheap, and the market for many Indian cotton cloth has been eroded.In order to get rid of this increasingly unfavorable situation, William Clifford spent a lot of money to go through some old relationships of the Kingdom of Spain, and obtained the charter rights to trade in certain Spanish ports in the New World.

The large market of the New World with a population of 200 million cannot be underestimated, and these people generally have strong purchasing power. In the first few years, William Clifford and some of his partners used this disguised market Monopoly was making a lot of money, until that black encounter in Colonia two years ago.Since then, they have never been to La Plata, not even the Brazilian area under the Portuguese control. Basically, they have given up the market there and started to fully manage the surrounding Caribbean areas. Help the people on the east coast live in peace.

But today, something seems wrong.

"William, we are old friends, you can't trick me like this." A middle-aged Spanish businessman looked at William Clifford with a slightly angry look, and said, "Look at your Indian cotton cloth, light and breathable enough. Yes, but the toughness is not enough at all! If I wear clothes made of this cotton, I will definitely wear them out after a month's work. And, your price is 4 pesos a piece! God, better than Indian cloth East coast cloth of even better quality costs 2.5 pesos a piece. If I bought your cloth, I'm sure I wouldn't be able to sell any of it. Well, William, for the sake of old friends, you have I want both calico and dyed cloth, but you have to lower the price. The current price is too high. This year, the East Coast cloth market has been hit hard, and even the high-end cloth market has to cut prices to seek sales."

"What? You were talking about people from the East Coast just now?" William Clifford frowned and asked in an inquiring tone.

"Yes." The Spanish businessman nodded silently, and said, "Some merchants from St. Augustine banded together to charter a boat to the east coast, and bought a large amount of white cotton cloth from the east coast and returned to St. Augustine. I asked someone to buy one and have a look. The quality is indeed quite good, not only light and breathable, but also relatively strong, and the quality is also very stable. To be honest, Indian calico is not competitive in this regard, not to mention that you have set an inappropriate price for these cotton cloth. Today Perhaps it is only on the dyed and printed cloth that people on the east coast have not yet set foot in, that they can make a little money."

"It's the people from the east coast again..." William Clifford thought with some annoyance and fear at the same time, "it's not enough to swallow up the market in La Plata, and now it has finally extended its tentacles to the market in the Caribbean region." gone."

Facing the complaints of the middle-aged Spanish businessman, Clifford was speechless.He is unable to keep up with the price of 2.5 pesos (2 yuan) per piece of calico from the east coast, because this is basically his cost line.It seems that we can only find a way to transport these Indian white cotton cloths to Guinea or even the territory of the Moors for sale.

Soon, Sheldon, Hampton, Hill and others also walked over dejectedly.A lot of their woolens have been sold, but the price is far from the high price they imagined.The Spaniards even threatened that if the British continued to insist on such unreasonably high prices, they would turn to the East Coast to buy cloth.This move completely defeated the shareholders of the British merchant adventurer company. After a brief round of negotiations, they had to painfully cut prices, almost overwhelming the thinnest profits.

William Clifford, who sold only a small amount of dyed cloth, turned his head away amidst the laments of the British merchants.

"Perhaps, it's time to take some measures to limit the unscrupulous development of the people on the east coast." He thought to himself, "The bureaucrats of the East India Company should also wake up, it's time to do something."

On May 5, the British merchant fleet, which had lingered in St. Augustine for two or three days, raised its sails, sadly left the city that had brought them countless wealth, and headed north toward Jamestown, Virginia.

The slow sales of some of the goods in their hands and the sale of a large amount of wool at a low price made these British merchants a little depressed, because it meant that they could not withdraw enough funds to purchase tobacco in the Virginia area.If they can't buy enough tobacco, it means that they will lose a lot of income.You know, Virginia tobacco has always been in short supply in Britain and even the European continent at this time.

① Leiden Mass: This is a group of Protestant Brownists who were persecuted by the Anglican Church. Later, they moved to Leiden, the Netherlands, and formed the Leiden Mass.After living in the Netherlands for 12 years, they decided to move to the New World on the grounds that "the children were being corrupted by the looseness and perversity of Dutch teenagers".These people boarded the "Mayflower" together with another group of immigrants (known as strangers) who went to the New World for "economic speculation". They were the first group of Puritan immigrants in the New England region of North America.

(End of this chapter)