as a boy, and sent to be a slave in Barbadoes. That he could descend to
rank dishonesty was shown when, returning from his extraordinary and
successful assault on the city of Panama in 1670, to Chagres, he left most
of his faithful followers behind, without ships or food, while he slipped
off in the night with most of the booty to Jamaica. No doubt, young Morgan
came to Jamaica with good credentials from his uncle, the Colonel, for the
latter was held in high esteem by Modyford, then Governor of Barbadoes,
who describes Colonel Morgan as "that honest privateer."

Colonel Morgan did not live to see his nephew reach the pinnacle of his
success, for in the year 1665 he was sent at the head of an expedition to
attack the Dutch stronghold at St. Eustatius Island, but he was too old to
stand the hardships of such an expedition and died shortly afterwards.

By this time Morgan had made his name as a successful and resolute
buccaneer by returning to Port Royal from a raiding expedition in Central
America with a huge booty.

In 1665 Morgan, with two other buccaneers, Jackman and Morris, plundered
the province of Campeachy, and then, acting as Vice-Admiral to the most
famous buccaneer of the day, Captain Mansfield, plundered Cuba, captured
Providence Island, sacked Granada, burnt and plundered the coast of Costa
Rica, bringing back another booty of almost fabulous wealth to Jamaica. In
this year Morgan married a daughter of his uncle, Colonel Morgan.

In 1668, when 33 years of age, Morgan was commissioned by the Jamaican
Government to collect together the privateers, and by 1669 he was in
command of a big fleet, when he was almost killed by a great explosion in
the _Oxford_, which happened while Morgan was giving a banquet to his
captains. About this time Morgan calmly took a fine ship, the _Cour
Volant_, from a French pirate, and made her his own flagship, christening
her the _Satisfaction_.

In 1670 the greatest event of Morgan's life took place--the sacking of
Panama. First landing a party which took the Castle of San Lorenzo at the
mouth of the Chagres River, Morgan left a strong garrison there to cover
his retreat and pushed on with 1,400 men in a fleet of canoes up the river
on January 9th, 1671. The journey across the isthmus, through the tropical
jungle, was very hard on the men, particularly as they had depended on
finding provisions to supply their wants on the way, and carried no food
with them. They practically st