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The Spanish Galleons

© Cindy Vallar

The Ark Royal, commissioned by Sir Walter Raleigh circa 1580, possessed a length of 140 feet with a hundred-foot keel, a beam of thirty-seven feet, and four masts. She weighed five hundred tons and carried thirty-eight guns: twenty-two culverins and sixteen demi-culverins. Her crew numbered 320 sailors and one hundred soldiers. She was steered by means of a whipstaff--a long lever attached to a gooseneck hinge that moved the tiller.

The internal structure of Spanish galleons included a series of braces, knees, and decks as evidenced in The Fragments of Ancient Shipwrightry by the English shipwright, Matthew Baker. These allowed for more than one deck of guns aboard ships for the first time. The heaviest gun found aboard a galleon was approximately ten feet long and fired shot weighing thirty-two pounds. Yet, the most suitable gun for use on this vessel was the demi-culverin. Some Spanish galleons carried as many as thirty-six guns: sixteen culverins on the lowerdeck, twelve demi-culverins on the upper deck, and eight sakers.

Spain eventually built much larger, more elaborate galleons with the combined purpose of carrying cargo and soldiers. More than two thousand trees--pine, cedar, oak, and mahogany--were required to build the largest of these, some of which became the warships that guarded the flota, or fleet, of vessels bound for Spain from the New World with holds laden with riches. A typical galleon weighed five hundred tons, but the largest were 1,200 tons. The high superstructure, which clearly identified a Spanish galleon, made the ship clumsy and slow. While larger in size, though, life aboard the galleon was no better for mariners than previously designed ships. Wealthy or influential passengers plus their servants could put the total number of people aboard a galleon at two hundred soldiers and sailors and up to fifty civilians, which made for very cramped quarters.

A typical Spanish galleon had a number of decks: forecastle, upper or weatherdeck, main deck, lower or orlop deck, poop deck, and quarterdeck. The crew's quarters were in the bow while the officers and passengers lived in cramped cabins in the waist or center section of the galleon. Provisions were stowed near the galley. Larger galleons also had a surgeon aboard. In addition to the sailors and soldiers that made up the crew, there were also the carpenter, sailmaker, cook, and cooper.