Hawkins, Sir John
Hawkins, Sir John (1532–95). Hawkins began his career as an overseas navigator and trader as an ally of the Spanish, to whose West Indies and South American colonies he carried west African slaves in expeditions between 1562 and 1569. Drake was with him when relations with Spain became hostile on the last expedition. He was subsequently an MP and comptroller of the Navy, which he significantly developed. Further active commands followed—against the Armada, on an expedition to Portugal in the following year, and the disastrous association with Drake on the West Indies anti-Spanish expedition of 1595, when he died off Puerto Rico. Although as originator of England's long involvement in the slave trade his reputation must be to some degree dubious, Hawkins was one of the most important of the men who brought about the close involvement of the English state with overseas activity.
Roy C. Bridges