Pirates, Ports, and Plunder

The seafaring Pirates of the Caribbean relied on various different ports within the Spanish Main to plunder for treasure. However, because of this, these ports became heavily guarded fortress’ so that the pirates can’t plunder them. This was because many of these ports became gold deposits where trains left gold that had been mined for transport back to Europe.

The most notable of these ports include the likes of Darien, Portobello (both located in the area of present day Panama) and Cartagena (located in present day Venezuela).

For many of the Pirate, attacking these ports was an absolutely terrible idea, because of how well guarded they were. Of course, they still did attack these fortress’ as many would happily risk their lives to steal from the Spanish.

Image result for portobello port pirates"It was not a secret in which how these ports were guarded. The shores were protected by large cannons, that were so big that a majority of ships weren’t prepared enough to match them. As well as if pirates were out of range of their canons they had Galleons on hand to welcome the not so kind folk to the port.

The weak spot, however, is that many of these ports were only protected on the seaside. The Spanish assumed that the large jungles bracketing in the ocean on the other side was enough to protect them from attacks.

Many people knew the many different ways that Spaniards would move and protect the gold. However, even with the Pirates attempts, near no one was a success in plundering these ports, because the Spaniards knew better than to split their forces when attacking invaders tried to draw their soldiers away from the port.


With many things, there is, of course, an exception to this. Sir Henry Morgan famously plundered the Port of Portobello. One of the main reasons that he was able to accomplish such a feat was because of the fact that this happened during his time as a Privateer and was backed up in his attack by a large fleet of English ships.

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