Portobelo Chronicles is a narrative history that tells the remarkably thrilling story of Portobelo Bay located on the Atlantic coast of Panama. This little-trumpeted part of the world is done a great service by author, Patricia A. McGehee. The reader of Portobelo Chronicles will absorb many fascinating facts without realizing it. Particulars like the origin of the hammock, the building of the Panama Canal, the pirate culture, Spanish conquistadores, hidden treasure, and more take on a dimension not commonly found in history-based texts. Portobelo Chronicles reads like a really good but totally unbelievable story. The epic journey of a magical place is richly festooned with thrills and chills that are sometimes too fantastic to be possible, but the book is factually based. The author allows the reader to be a fly on the wall, omnipresent across the ages as peaceful natives of the area engage in bartering, canoe building, fishing, and farming while also defending against increasingly threatening explorers that happen upon them. This richly storied history of two of the most important ports of call in the colonial New World takes a tumultuous journey as mid-sixteenth-and-seventeenth-century accounts list one shipwreck after another. Each sunken wreck made it more precarious and dangerous for the next ship to navigate; the Spanish abandoned Nombre de Dios, a shallow harbor, for the deep, superior harbor of Portobelo. Portobelo Chronicles illustrates, in addition to battling the elements and excesses of the monarchy, a most infamous and intriguing aspect of the times that added to the dangers of immigrating to the New World. Pirates from Spain's enemies-England, France, and Holland hijacked wealthy merchant fleets. The author explains in vivid detail how many seamen were sent to their demise along with precious cargo. Ship by ship, fleet by fleet, vessels of the Spanish monarchy suffered storms, shipwreck and pirate attack as colonists struggled to reach the shores of what was then known as Castillo del Oro. The book explores how Portobelo developed, how colonial rule flourished and how Spanish emigrants increased in numbers. When the native indios were nearly annihilated by disease and cruelty, the Spanish crown imported enslaved Africans to perform the arduous work of colonization. This fostered the lucrative but despicable slave trade in the New World. African slaves built the forts and government buildings in Portobelo that can still be seen. One can literally touch the walls of history by visiting the town today. Portobelo Chronicles is, on its surface, a historical retelling, while underneath a deeper substance emerges-that of man's inhumanity to man and the regretful but integral role these injuries had in our own modern history. The book makes use of many valuable antique and modern texts from notable document collectors, historians, and journal writers.
Patricia A. McGehee is a retired theatrical stage costumer. After retirement she and her husband cruised on a sailboat, giving her time to develop her skills as a freelance writer. Her work has appeared in several major publications including Cruising World magazine. Convinced of the importance of preserving Portobelo's history, Pat and her husband, Dick, funded a corporation in 1991 to help promote the town and preserve the unique history of the pivotal New World port. . The corporation established a workshop and library and collected artifacts and documents related to the town's history. After 10 years of investigation, Patricia compiled a vast store of knowledge into a comprehensive and engaging narrative, Portobelo Chronicles. Original copies of the book were self-published and hand bound beginning in 1991. Now the book is being revamped to reach a wider audience. In 2008, Patricia and her husband sold their property in Portobelo and returned to Tampa, Florida where she now resides.
