page_title: Battle of Santo Domingo (1586)
section_title: Aftermath
hierarchical_section_title: Battle of Santo Domingo (1586) / Aftermath
caption_attribution_description: Portrait of Sir Francis Drake (1540-1596)
context_page_description: The Battle of Santo Domingo (1586) or the Capture of Santo Domingo was a military and naval action fought on 1 January 1586, of the recently declared Anglo-Spanish War that resulted in the assault and capture by English soldiers and sailors of the Spanish city of Santo Domingo governed by Cristóbal de Ovalle on the Spanish island of Hispaniola. The English were led by Francis Drake and was part of his Great Expedition to raid the Spanish New World in a kind of preemptive strike. The English soldiers then occupied the city for over a month and captured much booty along with a 25,000 ducat ransom before departing on 1 February.
context_section_description: On 1 February the English sailed away from Santo Domingo, having occupied the city for exactly a month. Upwards of 20 ships in the harbor were burned or sunk, the galley had been torched and three vessels were commandeered by Drake to replace three of his ships; Hope, Benjamin, and Scout that had to be abandoned as unseaworthy. One of the largest ships that was captured was a 600-ton armed merchant which the English renamed the New Years Gift. Two hundred and forty guns and quantities of merchandise were moved into the holds of the English ships, their ranks recruited from scores of liberated galley-slaves. A third of Santo Domingo itself lay in ruins and when the Spanish slowly returned they found all of its civic, military, and religious buildings had been destroyed. García Fernández de Torrequemada summed up the mood of the population in his report to the King:
  This thing must have had divine sanction, as punishment for the people's sins.
  As Drake left and headed south, news of his attack spread from Santo Domingo to other cities on the Spanish Main, warning that the English were likely to descend on them. Rumors soon spread to Europe and the Spanish got many conflicting reports of what happened. Pope Sixtus V commented about Drakes action:
  God only knows what he may succeed in doing.
  For Santo Domingo it would take many decades to recover from Drake's onslaught. For the Spanish it was major disaster, in particular a blow to prestige and for the English a huge morale boost both in England and on board the fleet. Drake's next target was the city of Cartagena de Indias on the mainland of New Granada. Drake attacked and captured the place giving it the same rough treatment as Santo Domingo; here the city was better defended and the ransom was more lucrative.
caption: Portrait miniature of Sir Francis Drake painted in 1581
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