- Chagres
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Chagres in about 1739
Chagres, a village of the Republic of Panama in the Colón Province. It has a harbour from 10 to I ~ ft. deep, which is difficult to enter. The port was discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1502, and was opened for traffic with Panama, on the Pacific coast, by way of the Chagres River, in the 16th century. With the decline of Porto Bello in the 18th century Chagres became the chief Atlantic port of the Isthmus, and was at the height of its importance during the great rush of goldhunters across the Isthmus to California in 1849 and the years immediately following.[1]
With the completion of the Panama Railway in 1855, however, travel was diverted to Colón, and Chagres soon became a village of miserable huts. On a high rock at the mouth of the river stands the castle of Lorenzo, which was destroyed by Sir Henry Morgan when he captured the town in 1671, but was rebuilt soon afterwards by the Spaniards. Chagres was again captured in 1740 by British forces under Admiral Edward Vernon.
In fiction
Chagres features prominently in The Adventures & Brave Deeds Of The Ship's Cat On The Spanish Maine: Together With The Most Lamentable Losse Of The Alcestis & Triumphant Firing Of The Port Of Chagres, a children's book by Richard Adams.
References
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
- ^ John David Borthwick, Three years in California pg. 11 at Internet Archive
Categories:- Panama geography stubs
- Populated places in Panama
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