Henry Morgan: Pirate King of the Caribbean and his Mysterious Demise

Henry Morgan didn't die like most pirates.

No hanging. No shooting. No knife fight in a tavern. The Caribbean's most feared privateer died in his bed on August 25, 1688. He was fifty-three years old. Decades of alcoholism had destroyed his liver, his body was swollen with dropsy, but his wealth was intact.

And Jamaica gave him a royal farewell.

To understand how extraordinary this was, it's important to first understand who Henry Morgan was.

Born in Wales around 1635, Morgan arrived in the Caribbean sometime in his twenties—how remains a mystery. By the 1660s, he had become one of the Spanish's most destructive raiders. Operating under a Letter of Marque from the English Crown (technically making him a privateer, not a pirate), Morgan built fleets of pirates and launched attacks that became legendary.

In 1668, he captured Porto Bello, the most heavily fortified city on the Spanish Main. The attack was so daring that the Spanish couldn't believe it could have happened. Morgan's men used captured Catholic priests and nuns as human shields to reach the fortress walls. When the city fell, the ransom was exorbitant.

A year later, he attacked Maracaibo, Venezuela. The Spanish sent a fleet to trap him in the lake. Morgan turned one of his own ships into a floating bomb and rammed it into the Spanish flagship. The ship was destroyed in the ensuing wall of fire, and Morgan escaped.

But his greatest achievement was Panama.

In 1671, Morgan crossed the jungles of the Isthmus with over a thousand pirates. Battling hunger and disease, they reached Panama City—the richest city in the Americas, where all the gold and silver from Peru to Spain was collected.  The city burned. The amount of plunder was unimaginable. Morgan became the world's most famous privateer.

There was just one problem.

Morgan was unaware that a peace treaty had been signed between England and Spain. The attack on Panama was technically piracy. He was summoned to London for trial.

Instead of a trial, he received a knighthood.

The Crown realized that while the timing was inconvenient, Morgan's attacks had cemented English dominance in the Caribbean. In November 1674, King Charles II gave him the title "Sir Henry Morgan" and sent him back to Jamaica—not in chains, but as Lieutenant Governor.

Piracy had become law.

For the next ten years, Morgan served in the Jamaican government. He sat in the Assembly. He served as acting governor three times in the governor's absence. He cracked down on piracy—a deeply ironic move considering his past. He invested in sugar plantations. He married well—his wife, Mary Elizabeth, was the daughter of a former deputy governor. He became one of the island's wealthiest and most influential men.

And he drank. Constantly. Excessively.

His physician, Hans Sloane—who would later establish the British Museum—examined him in his final months and recorded a picture of self-destruction: "lean, sallow complexion, slightly yellow eyes, protruding belly... a heavy drinker and a late-night owl."

Sloane ordered him to give up alcohol.

Morgan ignored him.

On August 25, 1688, at Lawrencefield Estate, near modern-day Port Maria, the old privateer died.  He was fifty-three years old. He left behind an estate worth over five thousand pounds (about twelve million pounds today), three sugar plantations, and 131 slaves. He had no children.

What followed was extraordinary.

Jamaica's governor, Christopher Monck, the Duke of Albemarle, ordered a state funeral. Morgan's body was brought to Port Royal and placed in King's House—the seat of the colonial government—for the public to pay their last respects.

Then the governor announced a pardon.

For one day, any pirate or privateer in the Caribbean could come to Port Royal without fear of arrest. They could attend the funeral of the man who had once led them, who had made their profession both fearsome and noble. Old charges were cancelled. Old warrants were forgotten. The king of pirates was dead, and even those who lived outside the law deserved a farewell.

They came.

Merchants and murderers. Government officials and innkeepers.  Prostitutes and plantation owners. Some wept. It's said some even spat. But everyone came.

Morgan's body was placed in a lead coffin and carried through the streets of Port Royal on a decorated horse-drawn carriage. The procession arrived at St. Peter's Church, where the priest delivered the last rites. From there, the coffin was taken to Palisadoes Cemetery, on the sandy shore of the harbor.

As the coffin was lowered into the ground, ships anchored in the harbor fired cannons.

Twenty-two cannons.

This honor was usually only bestowed upon kings.

The era of buccaneers had ended.

For four years, Henry Morgan lay in repose in the sandy soil of Palisadoes, overlooking the very harbor he once ruled.

Then on June 7, 1692, God—or something like that—came to Port Royal.

At 11:43 a.m., the ground didn't shake, it started moving.  Eyewitnesses said the earth swayed like ocean waves. Buildings didn't collapse, but sank—sinking into soil that had suddenly become liquid. The sand, soaked with seawater, could no longer bear the weight. Roads disappeared. Houses, along with their people inside, sank into the earth. Fountains of water erupted from the ground.

Then came the tsunami.

By the end of it all, two-thirds of Port Royal—thirty-three acres—had sunk beneath the harbor. Two thousand people were killed instantly. Thousands more died from injuries and disease in the following days. The cemetery where Morgan was buried also slid into the sea.

The sea took the pirate back.

His lead coffin, his bones, his legacy—all were swept away. His body was never found. Some said it was divine punishment for the wickedness of Port Royal—“the most wicked city in Christendom.” Others considered it simply a work of geography.

Whatever the case, there's a strange poetry to it.

Henry Morgan drew from the sea all his life. He made his fortune on the trade routes that connected ships, ports, and empires. He died rich, honored, a man who had traveled from criminal to official.

And in the end, the sea took him back.

Today, the remains of old Port Royal lie forty feet underwater. Divers have uncovered sunken streets, collapsed buildings, and traces of what was once the Caribbean's wealthiest port. Somewhere beneath, perhaps, lie the remains of the Palisadoes Cemetery.

Somewhere beneath, too, lies Henry Morgan.

Still beyond the reach of all laws.

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