A Day the Wickedest City on Earth Sank Into the Sea, 1692
You Are There - Graphic History Series
You Are There… Graphic History Series.
Historical Backdrop
Port Royal, Jamaica in 1692 was the busiest English port in the Americas — a sun-baked sandbar crammed with brick warehouses, taverns, brothels, and the gold of buccaneers like Henry Morgan. Built carelessly on a spit of loose sand jutting into Kingston Harbour, it was a city living on borrowed time. Our subject is Reverend Emmanuel Heath, the Anglican rector of St. Paul’s Church. A sober, middle-aged Englishman in dusty black clerical robes, Heath had just shared a glass of wormwood wine with the acting governor, John White, in a tavern moments before the ground began to roll. This is his real account of that day.
June 7, 1692 — 6:15 a.m. — Reverend Heath’s lodgings above St. Paul’s Church, Lime Street, Port Royal
You rise in the small upper room before the sun fully clears the harbor. Mosquitoes whine at the muslin over your window. You splash brackish water from a pewter basin onto your face, dress in your black cassock, and read morning prayer aloud to the empty room. Outside, a rooster crows and a cooper’s hammer rings against a barrel. The air already smells of fish guts, tar, sugar smoke, and the privy in the yard below.
June 7, 1692 — 7:30 a.m. — High Street, Port Royal
You walk to the market past stumbling sailors still drunk from the night before. A Black enslaved woman balances a basket of plantains on her head. The cobbles are slick with last night’s spilled rum and chamberpot waste. Church bells from St. Paul’s ring the hour behind you. A Spanish merchant argues in broken English with a customs officer over cocoa duty. You nod to a parishioner and tip your hat to two prostitutes lounging in a tavern doorway who laugh and call you “Father.”
June 7, 1692 — 9:00 a.m. — St. Paul’s Church, interior
You stand at the altar going over your Sunday sermon notes. The church is empty but for a single old widow praying in the back pew. Sunlight streams through plain glass windows. You hear gulls and the distant clatter of a windlass on the quay. You feel uneasy, though you cannot say why — a low, dull pressure in your chest. You close the book and decide to call on the Governor before the day grows hotter.
June 7, 1692 — 11:30 a.m. — Littleton’s Tavern, near the Fish Market
You sit across from acting Governor John White at a scarred oak table. Between you stand a pewter pitcher of canary wine and two small green-glass cups. He complains of the Council, the price of slaves, the heat. You sip slowly. The tavern keeper carries a tray of pickled tongue past you. Through the open door, you watch a teamster lash a mule pulling a sledge of sugar barrels. You take out your watch — it is nearly eleven forty-three.
June 7, 1692 — 11:43 a.m. — Stepping out into the street outside the tavern
