Sir Francis Drake (c. 1540–1596) was an English sea captain, privateer, naval officer, and 🏷️#explorer of the Elizabethan era, best known as the first Englishman to circumnavigate the globe, a voyage he completed between 1577 and 1580. Queen Elizabeth I knighted him aboard his ship the Golden Hind in 1581, rewarding both his navigation and the plunder he brought home.
Born near Tavistock in Devon, Drake spent decades raiding Spanish ports and treasure fleets across the Atlantic and Pacific, earning the nickname "El Draque" from the Spanish, who regarded him as a pirate and set a bounty on his life. He served as vice admiral of the English fleet that repelled the Spanish Armada in 1588, and he died of dysentery in January 1596 while anchored off Portobelo, Panama, during a final Caribbean expedition. Beyond the historical record, Drake's name endures through a widely circulated prayer-poem — "Disturb us, Lord" — traditionally ascribed to him, though its authorship is unverified and likely of far later origin.
Drake is in my library for one reason: the prayer that carries his name — 📝The Prayer of Sir Francis Drake — which 📝Geoffrey von Maltzahn read to the MIT Class of 2026 at their commencement.