Today in History, July 31st
On July 31, 1715, a hurricane sank a Spanish treasure fleet off Florida. Plus the first lunar rover drive and Fidel Castro handing power to Raúl.
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July 31 is best known for 1715, when a hurricane off Florida’s east coast sank a Spanish treasure fleet loaded with gold and silver. The date also saw Apollo 15 astronauts take the first drive in a lunar rover in 1971 and Fidel Castro hand power to his brother Raúl in 2006.
The big story: A hurricane sinks Spain’s treasure fleet off Florida (1715)
Spain’s American colonies sent their wealth home across the Atlantic by ship. On July 24, 1715, one such fleet sailed out of Havana bound for Europe, carrying tons of gold and silver coins worth roughly 14 million pesos. One ship, the Nuestra Señora de la Regla, held 120 tons of coins by itself. As was the custom, the Spanish captains kept close to the Florida shore. A French ship traveling with them, the Grifon, stayed farther out to sea. That choice made all the difference. About a week into the voyage, a hurricane struck. On July 31, ten Spanish ships went down along the coast between Cape Canaveral and Fort Pierce, and somewhere between 700 and 1,000 people died. The Grifon rode out the storm, and most of its crew lived. Salvage crews from Havana recovered about 80 percent of the treasure by April 1716. The rest sat on the seafloor for about 250 years until it was recovered in the 1960s.
More events on July 31
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1556 | Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Jesuit order, died in Rome. |
| 1667 | The Treaty of Breda ended the Second Anglo-Dutch War and handed New Netherland to England. |
| 1777 | The Marquis de Lafayette accepted a commission as a major general in the Continental Army, serving without pay. |
| 1917 | Allied forces opened a new offensive in Flanders, starting the Third Battle of Ypres in World War I. |
| 1941 | Nazi leader Hermann Göring ordered Reinhard Heydrich to draw up plans for the so-called “final solution” of the Jewish question. |
| 1946 | Norma Jean Dougherty, the future Marilyn Monroe, signed her first movie contract, with Twentieth Century-Fox, for $150 a week. |
| 1948 | President Harry Truman dedicated Idlewild Airport as New York International Airport. |
| 1964 | NASA’s unmanned Ranger 7 probe sent back 4,308 close-up pictures of the moon before crashing into its surface. |
| 1971 | Apollo 15 astronauts David Scott and James Irwin became the first people to explore the moon using the Lunar Roving Vehicle. |
| 1975 | Former Teamsters boss Jimmy Hoffa was reported missing. |
| 2006 | Cuban leader Fidel Castro, citing health problems, handed provisional power to his brother Raúl. |
| 2012 | Swimmer Michael Phelps won his 19th Olympic medal, helping the U.S. take the 4×200-meter freestyle relay. |
Born on July 31
- 1912: Milton Friedman, free-market economist, born in Brooklyn, New York.
- 1919: Primo Levi, Italian Jewish chemist and writer, born in Turin, Italy.
- 1921: Whitney M. Young Jr., civil rights leader who headed the National Urban League, born in Lincoln Ridge, Kentucky.
- 1965: J.K. Rowling, creator of the Harry Potter books, born in Yate, near Bristol, England.
Sources
- Hurricane sinks Spanish treasure ships, History.com
- This Day in History: July 31, History.com
- On This Day: July 31, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Apollo 15, NASA
- Milton Friedman, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Primo Levi, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Whitney M. Young Jr., Encyclopaedia Britannica
- J.K. Rowling, Encyclopaedia Britannica
