When it comes to historical accuracy, historical shows and dramas tend to focus more on the drama than on real history — which makes sense, considering most historical shows are works of fiction. There are not many shows that balance out history with storytelling. Black Sails, the 2014 Starz historical action-adventure series, juggles drama, action, and fiction with the real history of the era. While Black Sails does serve as something of a prequel to Robert Louis Stevenson's 1883 novel Treasure Island, it also depicts treasure-hunting pirates from history. There are even some events in the 18th century that the show covers — like the sinking of the Urca de Lima, although Black Sails puts a rather adventurous twist on what happened to her.
Image via Starz
Black Sails' version of the Urca de Lima is very different from the real-life ship. In the show, she was constructed sometime before 1715 to transport the King of Spain's treasure from the Spanish Main to Spain. She was the flagship of the fleet and carried the most gold out of the entire armada. Despite being a heavily armed treasure galleon, the Urca de Lima also had two smaller ships to protect her from any attackers, given that her stores contained about five million Spanish dollars worth of gold! The first season of Black Sails, as a result, revolves around Captain James Flint's (Toby Stephens) hunt for the Urca de Lima and the gold she carries.
It's not until Black Sails' second season that fans see the treasure of the Urca de Lima stranded on Florida shores, with the surviving Spanish sailors and soldiers establishing a camp there to watch over the gold. After that, Flint has a plan to recover the treasure in exchange for a pardon for his crimes. Alas, he is unsuccessful, as the gold from the Urca de Lima is stolen by the pirate Jack Rackham (Toby Schmitz) and his crew, all of whom return to the Bahamas with the treasure after a bloody fight with the Spanish soldiers.
What Was the Real Treasure of the Urca de Lima?
The real Urca de Lima was a wooden-hulled sailing ship that was part of the 1715 Treasure Fleet, one of manySpanish fleets that sailed between Spain and its colonies to the Americas. The Urca de Lima also did not carry gold and silver like her Black Sails counterpart. Since this ship was part of a fleet bearing goods, things like vanilla, chocolate, and incense were being transported. While there were no huge amounts of treasure, the real Urca de Lima did carry chests of private silver along with the goods. Unfortunately, the fleet ran into a hurricane after departing from Havana. The storm steered them towards the Florida coast, ultimately sinking or grounding all the ships except one: the Urca de Lima. She was the only ship of the fleet that became grounded on the sandbank of Fort Pierce mostly intact, her treasure completely safe.
Related
At some point, the Spanish salvaged whatever goods and silver remained on the ship before burning her hull to the waterline, intending to mask her location from English pirates and privateers. The Urca de Lima's location didn't stay hidden for long. In December 1715, pirates Henry Jennings and Charles Vane captured the Spanish salvage camp, stealing the treasure, and the rest is history — until 1928, when the Urca de Lima was rediscovered by William J. Beach. For the next fifty years, the wreckage of the ship was heavily salvaged. In the 1980s, the state of Florida ceased issuing salvage permits and opened her to the public. Since then, the Urca de Lima has been located within the state's Underwater Archaeological Preserve, which is open to the public year-round.
The real Urca de Lima may not be as impressive as Black Sails makes her out to be, but she was an important part of world history, the only surviving shipwreck from the 1715 fleet, and is still being kept in good condition as well in her environment deep under the sea. That still seems pretty extraordinary — even if she didn't carry the same exact treasure that Captain Flint wanted from her fictional counterpart.
You can currently stream Black Sails on Netflix in the U.S.
Image via Starz 
:quality(85):upscale()/2024/10/22/748/n/49351773/91b7c9cd6717d96c4691b3.90797788_.png)
English (US) ·