Spanish Wrecks on Aberdeenshire Coast

[Rena]

Earlier this century I came into contact with a couple of am. researchers following the same Shirras of Aberdeen line as my late OH.  Both of them had a handed down story of an earlier generation being a shipwrecked sailor on the Spanish Armada.  I had to tell them that their family story hadn't been passed down in my brother-in-law's branch.  The only story he had was when an old aunt gave him the family bible and said there had been a sheriff of Aberdeen amongst the ancestors - I havent had a sniff of him if that was the case.

[Hanwell_A]

Dear Sir or Madam,
..... Thanks for that response. The Spanish Shipwreck story is common around Boddam where the Cordiners, Philips and Stevens families predominate. Research suggests that even in Scotland, there was little sympathy for Spanish sailors at the time of the Armada, but the gun-running story and the later date for the sinking of the Santa Catherina (Santa Caterina) all fit in with the story of the sailors being saved and homed by the locals.
..... Regards, Adrian.
 

[hdw]

One of the most famous episodes in the history of Anstruther in Fife is the arrival in the harbour, one day in 1588, of a shipful of survivors from the Spanish Armada, "for the maist part young berdles men, sillie, trauchled, and houngered", as the Rev. James Melville wrote in his Diary and Autobiography, which was published in 1842. The sailors were given "keall, pattage and fische" and patched up until they were fit to return home. This compared favourably with other parts of the British Isles where Spanish sailors coming ashore were set upon and murdered.

The Anstruther people's kindness was repaid some time later when the Spanish captain Juan Gomez de Medina intervened to rescue some Anstruther seamen imprisoned in the port of Calais and arranged for them to be sent home.

One day in 1984 a group of Spaniards from the "Tercio Viejo Del Mar Oceano", the Ancient Order of the Ocean Sea, renacted the arrival of the Armada survivors at the harbour of Anstruther, clad in uniforms and with weapons of the period.

What neither Melville nor anyone else ever suggested was that any of those Spaniards from 1588 remained behind in Fife!

Harry

[Skoosh]

James VI had shipwrecked Spanish sailors sent home, probably to the Spanish Netherlands!

[Hanwell_A]

Dear Rena / Harry,
..... Many thanks for that information.
All such information adds to the picture. Thanks again.
..... Regards, Adrian.
 

[Hanwell_A]

Dear Skoosh,
..... Many thanks for that information also. It arrived whilst I was typing my previous reply.
As I said previously, all such information adds to the picture. Thanks again.
..... Regards, Adrian.

[Hanwell_A]

Dear All,
..... The big difference between the Spanish Armada sailors, most other foreign sailors and the Santa Caterina crew would have been the need for the Earl of Errol's men to help their gun-running Spanish allies and to conceal their activities from the authorities.
..... With normal enemies, the populus would simply either, kill them, or arrest them and pass them on to the authorities. With gun-running allies, you would need to rescue them, then share them amongst the population who could feed them and conceal them. Young Spanish Sailors would then make friendships with young local ladies with the inevitable results.
..... Ten years after the Armada, it would be almost impossible to send Spanish sailors home by legal means. Even getting a message to the Spanish authorities asking them to come and collect their people would be difficult and transporting the men home would be incredibly risky, as no British ship would want try to sail into a Spanish port. I imagine that most crew members got home eventually, but the long delays and relationship developments probably caused some crew members (Mr. Cordiner, Mr. Philips and Mr. Stephen?) to stay in Aberdeenshire. Even the Armada origin myth probably dated from the very early days, as this would be the easiest way to explain why Spanish men were living in Aberdeenshire.
..... Regards, Adrian.
 

[Forfarian]

..... Ten years after the Armada, it would be almost impossible to send Spanish sailors home by legal means. Even getting a message to the Spanish authorities asking them to come and collect their people would be difficult and transporting the men home would be incredibly risky, as no British ship would want try to sail into a Spanish port.

Are you forgetting that this is before the Union of the Crowns (1630) and well before the Union of Parliaments (1707) and that there was no such thing as a 'British' ship? The Armada set out to attack England, and it's not inconceivable that there were some Scots who would have seen aiding stray enemies of the Auld Enemy as a Good Thing.

[hdw]

Quite right, but the Union of the Crowns was 1603, not 1630.

Harry