Silent Sails: The Last Galleon

Just when they thought they’ve learned all there is about the Galleon Trade, Carmina and Patch discover there was more. In this episode, they revisit the contribution of the Galleon Trade to Filipino-American history, explore the reasons for its end, and why it was actually a boon for the Philippines. Listen in as they discuss the true beneficiaries of the trade (spoiler alert: it wasn’t the Filipinos!), how its demise led to the rise of the Filipino middle class, and fascinating obscure tidbits that will be sure to pique curiosity.  

Learn more: The Manila Galleons & Trans-Pacific Trade: What Did They Carry?, The Manila Galleon Trade, The Economics of the Manila Galleon, Instagram: Tuba in Mexico,  Filipinos in Nueva España: Filipino-Mexican Relations, Mestizaje, and Identity in Colonial and Contemporary Mexico, Our Mexican connection, After the Galleons by Benito J. Legarda Jr., Today in Philippine History, September 14, 1815, the galleon trade between the Philippines and Mexico ended, Philippines - Colonialism, Revolution, Independence | Britannica, and Trading Treasures and Curiosity: The Fascinating History of Manila Galleons.

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Transcript

Welcome to FilTrip, a podcast where we explore everything fun, weird and in between about the Philippines. 

Hi Patch.

Hi Carmina.

Is it weird that I was very excited about our topic today?

Yes.

I mean, we've talked about the Galleon Trade before, right? And many contributions that it made to, I don't know if it really was to us, it did have some downstream impact to the Filipinos. I'm not going to say economically, but historically, it allowed Filipinos to basically travel the world in a weird way.

And it had so much impact on our culture, obviously, history. So, we always reference the Galleon Trade, and it's been like a running joke for us that we're forever trapped in the Galleon Trade conversation, right?

Yeah, because almost every facet of colonial history was influenced by it. So, okay, let's start talking about it really substantively. But first, of all this time that we've been talking about it, I've always wondered why “galleon?” Like, why was it called the Galleon? Did you ever think about that? 

No. What did you find out? Why is it called the Galleon Trade?

It meant armed merchant ship, and it apparently evolved from multiple languages, French, Italian and Spanish. It was originally derived from the word galley, which was synonymous with war vessels. I was like, war vessel? So it had this characteristic beaked prow. And now that I'm thinking about it, every picture I've ever seen, it's really got a unique look. That beak served a very important function in the original war vessel form. It rammed enemy ships to break their oars. And when the oars broke, it crippled the ability of the enemy ship to maneuver. During the Galleon Trade, it was mainly retained for symbolic reasons and even perhaps intimidation, right? Because at that time, that would have been a very distinctive feature at the high seas.

And they had to be intimidating, right? Because as we know, during those times, there was always the threat of pirates. You know, we talked about the existence of the Galleon Trade.

But I was also curious how the Philippine economy was before the Galleon Trade.

Mmm, yeah.

Before the Spaniards, we all know that there was already trade that was very active in the Philippine economy, right? The Chinese, the Muslim, the Persians and the Arab traders were already actively trading with Filipinos. Communities called the barangays farmed, made crafts and exchanged local goods like beeswax and gold and even slaves for items from overseas, like porcelain, silks and metals.

They took advantage of our already existing very rich trading with other countries. So just to list some of the luxury items that were already circulating in the Philippines, porcelain, lacquerware and ivory from China, textiles such as gauzes, velvets, Cantonese crepes, heavy brocades, flowered silks, taffeta, and specific items like silk bed coverings, silk stocking, silk shawls, kimonos because we were already trading with Japan too, tapestries and Chinese rugs. And there were also the jewelry, the pearls, the semi-precious stones and cotton cloth. Those primarily came from India. There were diamonds and spices from Ceylon, pepper from Sumatra and Java, wool carpets from Persia and from the Philippines, gold, like you said, hardwood, spices, iron, and beeswax and oils. So no wonder when the Spaniards arrived, and it's very well chronicled, they arrived to a very rich community.

When Spain colonized the Philippines, the islands became part of an even massive global trading network. Let's put it at that, right? It opened it up.

Manila became the hub of the Galleon trade that linked to Mexico, specifically Acapulco and Asia for 250 years, Carmina. It was that long. It's very striking to see that number.

So ships carried primarily Mexican silver to the Philippines, right? Which was then sent onward to China in exchange for Chinese goods. A number of those you've already enumerated, but I think the most popular was silk.

And because silver was valued more in China than in Europe or Mexico, traders made huge profits, sometimes reaching up to 300%. That's an astounding number. And the Chinese merchants were also very crucial in providing food supplies and skilled labor to the Philippines.

But one aspect, it really didn't benefit the Filipinos a lot, right?

That's right. That's right.

We were really just, and I didn't even know this word before, it was called the trans-shipping port. So the analogy that I found was it's like taking a flight with a layover. So we're the layover because the final destination really is Acapulco in Mexico. It didn't develop anything in the Philippines because of that reason, because the Spaniards were just trying to take advantage of all of these luxury goods and weren't really looking inward to the Philippines to see of what of the Filipino products they could be exporting too. I mean, it happened, but very incidentally.

Patch, I was curious what the route took, and I found a really great summary. So as we already said, right, we were already experiencing a lot of very productive trade with a lot of countries before the Spaniards even came. So Chinese junks, and by the way, that's another word that I never knew what it meant. Because when I thought of junk, I thought of trash.

Trash.

Yeah, right. But it had nothing to do with that. So apparently that word was adopted by Portuguese sailors from the Malay or Javanese term, jong, which meant ships or large vessels. And so the Portuguese started calling it jongko. And we already listed some of the luxury items that these Chinese junks had. The Chinese had the more massive junks, but all of the other trading partners that we had had their own version of it. Then the Galleon ships would wait on Manila. It initially sailed annually, then later biannually from Manila to Acapulco. And then it returned.

The westbound journey from Acapulco took about 3 to 4 months. And the eastbound return from Manila took 6 to 9 months because of the currents and the winds. The Asian products that were shipped to the Spanish colonists in the New World eventually ended up in Spain. So in Acapulco, when a Galleon arrived from Manila, a huge fair was held to distribute a portion of the cargo. And the remaining goods, supposedly about 80%, were transported to Mexico City by mule train. And then on to Veracruz on the Gulf Coast, where annual flotas, which were Spanish treasure fleet systems, carried them on the last leg of the voyage to Cadiz, Spain.

That's so fascinating. 

So, as you said, Patch, it lasted 250 years between 1565 and 1815. And it connected the economies of Asia, the Americas, and Europe for those two and a half centuries. And during those 250 years, there were so many historical events, both documented and anecdotal, that happened to us as a people. We talked about them in previous episodes, right? So the first one is the landing in Morro Bay in 1587, which marks the first Asians arriving in the future America.

We also had an episode when we talked about St. Malo, which Filipinos were actually the first Asian immigrants that settled in Louisiana. And I think we were saddened a little bit at the end of that episode to discover that a lot of that history has been erased. So that also was a significant part of the Galleon trade.

Yeah, there's also evidence of Filipinos establishing communities in Acapulco. Even today, people there use Tagalog words, right? Like tuba, and they even learned how to make tuba.

And even some of their food take inspiration from our food. And they have convenience stores that have Filipino names. And there was even a scholar who went there, I think in 2004, who said that the people there in that particular area that she visited looked more like us than Mexicans.

Did you know that our words for mother and father actually came from Mexican language?

No, Nanay and Tatay?

Yes. So, Tatay came from the word Tata, which means father, and then Nanay came from the word Nana, meaning mother. Then there's the obvious ones also that we're very familiar with, like the names for food, right? Like achuete, sayote, and then chikamas, sinkamas, and all of that. So, so much cultural exchange happened. And this was one of the most enjoyable part of learning about the whole Galleon trade. It's fascinating that our history is tied to theirs. I think we can go on and on about the Galleon trade.

And also, maybe one of our episodes in the future, we can talk about Mexico and really explore it. So, as great as all this is, let's talk about who this really enriched.

Yes.

Because I've always been curious whether there were any documentation of concrete numbers about how much it really enriched Spain. I was able to find some, at least some estimated numbers. I'll just rattle off the beneficiaries of the Galleon Trade.

So, of course, the very first was Spain. Some estimate that Spain gained purchasing power and what would be equivalent to about 20 to 40 billion in today's dollars. And at its peak year trade, it would have earned approximately 60 to 120 million in today's dollars.

Wow.

Of course, the second beneficiary are the Spanish colonial administrators who, as we know, were really governing the Philippines from Mexico. It was through the Spanish administrators who were located in Mexico. They collected taxes and fees, both legal and illegal. And then, of course, the Chinese merchants and all of the other merchants who supplied the goods.

But also, they imported Chinese skilled workers to work on the ship building and everything that surrounds that industry.

And we also talked about the art, right? Like the black Nazarene and all of these artifacts, religious artifacts that we suspect that we see in Europe. Okay, so the other beneficiary were the Mexican silver mine owners whose silver was in high demand in Asia. And then, lastly, the European consumers who bought these Asian luxury goods. Nowhere on that list is the Filipino.

Right. As per usual.

I'm so bitter about it. Anyway, the final Galleon voyage was on September 14, 1815. That's why we're talking about it in our September episode.

And the Galleon named either Magallanes or San Fernando departed Manila for the last time. I don't know why there's dispute about which one or what the name was, but that was the date.

So speaking of the final voyage, we should talk about this particular time in history that finally ended the Galleon trade. By the 19th century, the economic conditions that made the Manila Galleon trade profitable were no longer as favorable. So before this, Europe traded with Asia via the Americas due to the limitations on direct routes, mainly because of the need to avoid certain territories or deal with dangerous sea routes.

So what changed? First of all, technological and economic shifts. By the 19th century, the British Empire had better maritime technology, more efficient trade routes, and most importantly, the Industrial Revolution.

Britain could produce goods like textiles and porcelain at a much lower cost and reducing the demand for Asian goods, in particular goods from China. Also, Europe began embracing free trade policies, which made the tightly controlled trade systems like the Manila Galleon trade obsolete. By the late 18th century, Spain was under pressure to open the trade to routes other than what was the usual Manila to Acapulco.

This opened up and freed up commerce. They created other venues, for example, the Royal Company of the Philippines in 1785, which was really to promote more Asian trade with Europe.

I also read that the Dutch too were big competitors at that time.

Yes, yes.

So it wasn't really profitable anymore towards the end.

Correct.

And then the very immediate trigger was the Mexican War of Independence. It broke out in 1810 and ended in 1821.

Right.

So Patch, I got my hands on a book titled After the Galleons by an author named Benito J. Legarda Jr. It tracked the progress of Philippine foreign trade in the 19th century from the end of the Galleon trade to the Philippine Revolution. What I got from his book was that one could say that it was actually beneficial for the Philippines that it ended.

According to the book, there was a great increase in the value of our domestic exports, and by the mid-1830s, Manila was declared by Spain as an open city to foreign merchants. So because of that, there was an increased demand for Philippine sugar and abaca or hemp, textiles and other crops. And the volume of exports to Europe expanded even more after the Suez Canal was completed in 1869.

The end of the Galleon Trade forced Spain or the Spanish authorities to seek other ways to generate income in the colonies, right? And that's what led to these economic reforms, opening up the Philippines to world trade. As you mentioned, these crops like sugar, abaca and even tobacco really replaced Galleon-oriented economic activities.

And I also read that any improvement that we had in our agricultural landscape didn't really come from Spain. It came from foreign merchants. They introduced all sorts of innovations to the agricultural machinery so we could increase our production of these products that we mentioned.

They're really the ones who spent for those rather than Spain.

As a result of that, there was some form of economic modernization that happened, right? You mentioned the machineries that had to be introduced, but also in line with that infrastructure as well. So I'm sure this had long term impact in the economy, more than what the Galleon Trade ever offered.

What was life like in the Philippines when this free trade happened? Wow. I mean, I can't even imagine all of the different nationalities, like all of the different industries, right, that catered to this. And so, Patch, you were mentioning changes in the Filipino society because of these new economic opportunities. The first major change is the rise of the Chinese mestizos.

They dominated trading and they gained economic power during this time. And as we said in previous episodes, they had a huge social and political impact because they were critical to the formation of the Filipino middle class. And it was that Filipino middle class that really agitated for reforms.

And this is when the Ilustrado class also surged, and it was their increased educational opportunities abroad that led to their exposure to these liberal ideologies. This was also what created the legacy of land-based wealth. It created the land-owning classes that persist today.

And all of these factors led to the weakening of Spain's hold on us. Okay, Patch, to end the episode, I found a few interesting tidbits.

Okay.

Like I said earlier, right, before this, we had been governed by Spain through Mexico. And we were essentially a subsidiary of New Spain, which was what they called Mexico. After the Mexican Revolution, we were governed directly from Madrid.

So, as you can imagine, administrative chaos ensued, because this was a massive change. The next one, okay, the last ship to reach Manila arrived empty.

Oh, why? Were they the pirates?

No, the Mexicans. The Mexican Revolutionary seized the cargo.

Oh, okay.

And when it left, it was literally sailing into a war zone. I mean, I don't know why we're laughing, but it's just ironic, because, you know, the Galleons represented treasure, right? So for it to be empty, I guess it was just so ironic.

The next one that I found, speaking of irony, so I was saying earlier, right, that the name of the last Galleon was either San Fernando or Magallanes. And it's Magallanes that's ironic because...

Oh, yeah.

It was named after Ferdinand Magellan, who, as we've said in previous episodes, was the first explorer who connected the Philippines to Spain. And also doubly ironic that it was a Filipino who killed him. That's what you get.

That's what you get. Oh, my God, why are we laughing? 

I know.

It's so inappropriate, but, you know, sorry, Ferdi. You mentioned the massive shipbuilding infrastructure. There was actually one at Cavite, and that was developed to build and maintain these enormous ships.

It suddenly became obsolete, and the skilled workers there, both Filipino and Chinese, suddenly lost their livelihoods. And then, this last piece of tidbit was the most fascinating to me, and spurred another industry. The Galleon Trade left a trail of sunken treasure, because close to a hundred of them sank over those two and a half centuries.

So, roughly one in every five to six were lost at sea.

So, there's the industry of treasure hunting. I wonder how many they've recovered, and how many more to discover.

Right.

Not that I have any interest in treasure hunting. What is the final lesson, at least for me? The ending of the Galleon Trade, ultimately made the Philippines more globally integrated.

It also planted the seeds of economic growth, and although it didn't improve the conditions of the Filipinos all at once, eventually it did lead to the modernization of the Philippine economy.

I just wish that we could have sustained it, if not for other historical interferences.

Right, right. But it was a lot of cultural growth also happened during that time that we are very thankful for.

So with that, Patch, that's our episode. We hope you join us on our next trip.

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