Port Royal - Economy

Economy

In addition to being unable to retake their land, Spain was no longer able to provide their colonies in the New World with manufactured goods on a regular basis. The progressive irregularity of annual Spanish fleets, combined with an increasing desperation by colonies for manufactured goods, allowed Port Royal to flourish. Merchants and privateers worked together in what is now referred to as forced trade. Merchants would sponsor trading endeavors with the Spanish while also sponsoring privateers to attack Spanish ships and rob Spanish coastal towns. While the merchants most certainly had the upper hand, it was the privateers who were an integral part of the operation. Nuala Zahedieh, a lecturer at The University of Edinburgh, wrote “Both opponents and advocates of so-called ‘forced trade’ declared the town’s fortune had the dubious distinction of being founded entirely on the servicing of the privateers’ needs and highly lucrative trade in prize commodities.” She wrote further “A report that the 300 men who accompanied Henry Morgan to Portobello in 1668 returned to the town with a prize to spend of at least £60 each (two or three times the usual annual plantation wage) leaves little doubt that they were right.”

The forced trade became almost a way of life in Port Royal. Michael Pawson and David Busseret wrote “...one way or the other nearly all the propertied inhabitants of Port Royal seem to have an interest in privateering.” Forced trade was rapidly making Port Royal one of the wealthiest communities in the English territories of North America, far surpassing any profit made from the production of sugar cane. Zahedieh wrote “The Portobello raid alone produced plunder worth £75,000, more than seven times the annual value of the island’s sugar exports, which at Port Royal prices did not exceed £10,000 at this time.”