Once known as the 'Wickedest City on Earth,' Port Royal on the island of Jamaica was one of the largest

towns in the English colonies during the late 17th centu ry. It was a haven for privateers and pirates, such as the famed Sir Henry Morg an, due to its excellent geographic location in the middle of the Caribbean. Fr om Port Royal, these buccaneers preyed upon and plundered the heavily laden trea sure fleets departing from the Spanish Main. After 1670, the importance of Port Royal and Jamaica to England was increasingly due to trade in slaves, sugar, and raw materials. It soon became the mercantil e center of the Caribbean area, with vast amounts of goods flowing in and out of the port through an expansive trade network. The History of Port Royal: Port Royal is a town on the southern coast of Jamaica. It was originally coloniz ed by the Spanish, but attacked and captured by the English in 1655. Because of its good natural harbor and key position, Port Royal quickly became a major have n for pirates and buccaneers, who were made welcome because of the need for defe nders. It soon became apparent that Port Royal was the perfect place for privates and p rivateers. It had a great deepwater natural harbor for protecting ships at ancho r and it was close to Spanish shipping lanes and ports. Once it started to gain fame as a pirate haven, the town quickly changed: it filled up brothels, taverns and drinking halls. Merchants who were willing to buy goods from pirates soon s et up shop. Before long, Port Royal was the busiest port in the Americas, largel y run and operated by pirates and buccaneers. Port Royal Thrives: The booming business done by pirates and privateers in the Caribbean soon led to other industries. Port Royal soon became a trading center for slaves, sugar and raw materials such as wood. Smuggling boomed, as Spanish ports in the New World were officially closed to foreigners but represented a huge market for African slaves and goods manufactured in Europe. Because it was a rough-and-tumble outpo st, Port Royal had a loose attitude towards religions, and soon was home to Angl icans, Jews, Quakers, Puritans, Presbyterians and Catholics. By 1690, Port Royal was as large and important a town as Boston and many of the local merchants wer e quite wealthy. It's no secret that rampant drinking and prostitution gave Port Royal its wicked reputation. It has been said that there was one tavern for every ten residents of the town, and if that's true, it's no wonder that so much drunken debauchery and whoring ensued. The majority of Port Royal's food was imported and expensive , but that mattered little to pirates whose goal it was to spend all of their bo oty on wenches and anything from inexpensive home-brewed alcohol to lethal rum c oncoctions. The illicit practices of Port Royal may not have shocked the majority of its pop ulation, but it certainly did give many individuals cause for concern. One minis ter who arrived at Port Royal with the intention of staying quickly left, but no t before famously calling the port the Sodom of the New World and stating, Since th e majority of its population consists of pirates, cutthroats, whores and some of the vilest persons in the whole of the world, I felt my permanence there was of no use. Port Royal had all that the thirsting souls of the seventeenth century needed. During the golden years of piracy from 1672 - 1725, Port Royal had all the wench es, liquor, food and gold and fun to top it off that anyone desired. It was home base for the infamous and fearless pirate Sir Henry Morgan, who later became a

Lieutenant Governor of evil was found in Port u name it. In a matter tle - "the richest and

Jamaica. Port Royal was not all about fun; all manner of Royal - from murders to rape, from theft to blackmail, yo of a few years, Port Royal, Jamaica earned the dreaded ti the wickedest city on earth."

Port Royal provided a safe harbour initially for privateers and subsequently for pirates plying the shipping lanes to and from Spain and Panama. Buccaneers foun d Port Royal appealing for several reasons. Its proximity to trade routes allowe d them easy access to prey, but the most important advantage was the port's prox imity to several of the only safe passages or straits giving access to the Spani sh Main from the Atlantic.[4] The harbour was large enough to accommodate their ships and provided a place to careen and repair these vessels. It was also ideal ly situated for launching raids on Spanish settlements. From Port Royal, Henry M organ attacked Panama, Portobello, and Maracaibo. Roche Brasiliano, John Davis ( buccaneer), and Edward Mansveldt (Mansfield) also came to Port Royal.

An 18th-century pirate flag (Calico Jack Rackham). Since the English lacked sufficient troops to prevent either the Spanish or Fren ch from seizing it, the Jamaican governors eventually turned to the pirates to d efend the city. By the 1660s, the city had gained a reputation as the Sodom of the New World whe re most residents were pirates, cutthroats, or prostitutes. When Charles Leslie wrote his history of Jamaica, he included a description of the pirates of Port R oyal: Wine and women drained their wealth to such a degree that... some of them becam e reduced to beggary. They have been known to spend 2 or 3,000 pieces of eight i n one night; and one gave a strumpet 500 to see her naked.[7] They used to buy a pipe of wine, place it in the street, and oblige everyone that passed to drink. The taverns of Port Royal were known for their excessive consumption of alcohol such that records even exist of the wild animals of the area partaking in the de bauchery. During a passing visit, famous Dutch explorer Jan van Riebeeck is said to have described the scenes: The parrots of Port Royal gather to drink from the large stocks of ale with jus t as much alacrity as the drunks that frequent the taverns that serve it. There is even speculation in pirate folklore that the infamous Blackbeard met a howler monkey while at leisure in a Port Royal alehouse whom he named Jefferson and formed a strong bond with during the expedition to the island of New Provide nce. Port Royal benefited from this lively, glamorous infamy and grew to be one of the two largest towns and the most economically important port in the English colonies. At the height of its popularity, the city had one drinking house for every ten residents. In July 1661 alone, forty new licenses were granted to tave rns. During a twenty-year period that ended in 1692, nearly 6,500 people lived i n Port Royal. In addition to prostitutes and buccaneers, there were four goldsmi ths, forty-four tavern keepers, and a variety of artisans and merchants who live d in 2000 buildings crammed into 51 acres (21 ha) of real estate. 213 ships visi ted the seaport in 1688. The city s wealth was so great that coins were preferred for payment rather than the more common system of bartering goods for services. Following Henry Morgan s appointment as lieutenant governor, Port Royal began to c hange. Pirates were no longer needed to defend the city. The selling of slaves t ook on greater importance. Upstanding citizens disliked the reputation the city had acquired. In 1687, Jamaica passed anti-piracy laws. Instead of being a safe haven for pirates, Port Royal became noted as their place of execution. Gallows Point welcomed many to their death, including Charles Vane and Calico Jack, who

were hanged in 1720. Two years later, forty-one pirates met their death in one m onth