28 
gable mouth of the Chagres River. Rut it remained foi 
Henry Morgan, almost a hundred years later in 1671, to 
lead his reckless adventurers _ right across the Isthmus, 
capture and burn the capital city itself. 
After Morgan sailed away, leaving smoking ruins behind 
him, the Spaniards decided to rebuild seven miles away, 
on a rocky promontory that stretched into the sea from 
the base of Ancon Hill. Many stone buildings which had 
withstood the pirate onslaught were now demolished to 
afford building materials for the new city. Moss-covered 
and century-stained, the beautiful Ruins of Old Panama, 
modern Panama’s chief tourist attraction, are all that 
remain today of the once glorious city. 
The new city proved safe from further attack, protected 
by strong walls from land and sea. But the pirate menace 
increased as Spain’s sun gradually sank, eclipsed by the 
rising naval strength of a lusty young England. Pirates 
infested both oceans. At times they would base for 
months on end on Taboga and other neaib^ islands. 
They also lived on the mainland, consorting with escaped 
African and Indian slaves who were called “cimarrones, 
and whose familiarity with the land and desire for revenge 
were cleverly employed against their formei masters. 
In 1734 Admiral Vernon of the British Navy repeated 
Drake’s earlier exploit and took both Fort San Lorenzo and 
Porto Bello. George Washington’s elder brother, Law¬ 
rence Washington, was a young officer on this expedition, 
and afterwards named his home Mount Vernon in honor 
of his former admiral. 
Bv the beginning of the 19th century, when Napoleon 
temporarily ended Spain’s independence by placing his own 
brother on the Spanish throne, Panama, like all the 
colonies, was sadly decadent. And in 1821, profiting by 
the heroism of the armies of the South American patriots, 
Bolivar and San Martin, she 
pendence without firing a shot. 
Afraid to stand alone in a hostile world, Panama decided 
to join Gran Colombia, which included piesent day 
Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela. This voluntary act 
was soon bitterly regretted. Split by factions, Ecuador 
and Venezuela promptly seceded, and Colombia and 
Panama together formed a new country known as New 
29 
Granada. The history of New Granada in the 19th 
century is a sorry tale of civil strife. The chief argument, 
inherited from its Independence leaders, Bolivar and 
Santander, was whether there should be a strong central 
government, or a loose federation of semi-independent 
states, and it took a hundred years of turmoil to settle in 
favor of the former. 
The Panamanians bitterly complained during this 
troublous time that although they were taxed and their 
men drafted to fight in the wars, little was done to pro¬ 
vide them with schools, roads, or other civic benefits. 
Therefore, in addition to the political strife, there were 
rebellions instigated by local patriots in an attempt at 
secession. 
This same eventful century, which saw “Liberal” 
arrayed against “Conservative,” and Panamanian against 
Colombian, also witnessed the building of the Panama 
Railroad, the march of the Forty-niners across the Isthmus 
to the goldfields of California and the epic attempt of the 
French Canal Company to build a Panama canal. 
The Twentieth Century brought a New Deal to Panama. 
It brought a successful bid for independence from Colombia, 
achieved on November 3, 1903. It brought a Treaty with 
the United States which guaranteed the independence of 
this newest nation in return for the right to build the 
Panama Canal. This right included granting a strip of 
land in perpetuity which became known as the Canal 
Zone. Ten years of concentrated effort resulted in open¬ 
ing the Canal to world traffic on August 15, 1914. 
Panama’s Constitution, similar to that of the United 
States, calls for a President, a Cabinet, one Chamber of 
Deputies in place of a Senate and House of Representatives, 
and a nonpolitical Supreme Court. Although economic 
and political crises have been as severe here as in other parts 
of the world, only one actual revolution has rocked the 
Republic, on January 2, 1931. On October 9, 1941, a 
bloodless exchange of power took place when President 
Arnulfo Arias, absent in Cuba, was deposed by proc¬ 
lamation and Ricardo Adolfo de la Guardia was peacefully 
chosen as his successor. 
As in the first World War, Panama has today joined the 
United States as an ally, and political relations between 
