North-East Passage to Muscovy

Stephen Borough and the First Tudor Explorations

North-East Passage to Muscovy

England has a rich heritage of overseas exploration the names of Francis Drake and Walter Raleigh immediately spring to mind but the first of the great Tudor explorations took place when Drake was just a boy of thirteen. The full story of these expeditions is told for the first time in North-East Passage to Muscovy.

A group of London merchants was determined to expand overseas trade, and they set up the expeditions, in 1553 and 1556, to find a north-east passage to China and the riches of the Orient. Stephen Borough, a Devon-born sea captain, was a crucial figure in both the expeditions, which were dogged by storms, ice, fog and shipwreck and hampered by the lack of geographical knowledge. In the first voyage, the two ships accompanying Stephen were separated from him in a sudden gale. Despite taking shelter for the