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Voyage of Magellan – Epilogue: Sailor of Eternal Fame

Pedro Alfonso was entirely correct when he told Captain Espinosa what his sentence would be if he was captured by his countrymen. The last the rest of the crew of the Trinidad saw of him was when he was being bundled away in chains by Admiral Brito’s men, quaking with fear.

The priest’s letter set some slow-grinding diplomatic gears in motion, and at last, in July of 1526, Espinosa and two other sailors — the last of the 52 men who had remained on Tidore after the Victoria’ s departure in December of 1521 — were delivered to Lisbon by a Portuguese trader, an event that marked the completion of their own, decidedly circuitous circumnavigation of the world. (Public Domain)The reign of the young King Charles was still beset with problems here in Europe: the religious rebellion that Martin Luther was fomenting in his easterly lands, his ongoing precariousness on his throne here in Spain, and now worsening relations with France that would soon lead to a general continental war. Like them, his memory shines down upon the world his voyage opened, illuminating it from infinity to eternity.” But of course the Strait of Magellan abides as well, not as the trans-continental nautical superhighway its namesake wished it could have been — we have the Panama Canal for that purpose now — but as one of the most strange and beautiful waterways a person can visit, a place to feel humbled before the majesty of one’s chosen god, whoever or whatever that may be.

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