Includes bibliographical references (p. 309-312) and index.

Introduction : The lost city -- "I offer a new world" -- The tomb at the Escorial -- Morgan -- Into the past -- Sodom -- The art of cruelty -- Portobelo -- Rich and wicked -- An amateur English theatrical -- Black clouds to the east -- The isthmus -- City of fire -- Aftermath -- Apocalypse.

The real story of the pirates of the Caribbean. Henry Morgan, a twenty-year-old Welshman, crossed the Atlantic in 1655, hell-bent on making his fortune. Over the next three decades, his exploits in the Caribbean as a privateer in the service of the English became legendary. His daring attacks on the mighty Spanish Empire on land and at sea determined the fates of kings and queens, and his victories helped shape the destiny of the New World. Morgan gathered disaffected European sailors and soldiers, hard-bitten adventurers, runaway slaves, and vicious cutthroats, and turned them into the most feared army in the Western Hemisphere. They terrorized Spanish merchant ships and devastated the cities where great riches in silver, gold, and gems lay waiting. His last raid, a daring assault on the fabled city of Panama, helped break Spain's hold on the Americas forever.--From publisher description.