A prince promised riches – but his tropical paradise was too good to be true.
In 1820, a new king ruled over the growing British Empire. And a new royal appeared in London promising riches for investors.
He called himself Gregor the First, the Prince of Poyais. But Poyais didn’t exist, and Gregor MacGregor was a con artist.
Gregor MacGregor left Scotland to find his fortune in the Americas. He returned with a royal title––according to him. National Galleries Scotland
Who was Gregor MacGregor?
Who, exactly, was the mysterious royal making his London debut? His full name was Gregor MacGregor. Originally from Scotland, Gregor sailed across the Atlantic at 25 years old to make a name for himself. And he did. After meeting Simon Bolivar, MacGregor earned a rank in Venezuela’s army and helped the Liberator fight for independence.
Before he turned 30, MacGregor earned a promotion to the title of general. He fought in several key battles and earned praise from a growing number of admirers.
When the Spaniards finally retreated, MacGregor did not stop fighting. Instead, he led his own private force against Spanish outposts in the Caribbean. In Panama, he seized Porto Bello, the rich outpost that Captain Morgan and Francis Drake had ambushed.
General MacGregor went from outlaw to conman royal, and he made a fortune in the process. National Portrait Gallery
After years of outlaw conquests, MacGregor found himself in a desolate area known as the mosquito coast, located in present-day Nicaragua and Honduras. The English had tried to colonize the territory generations earlier but found it uninhabitable.
MacGregor renamed the territory Poyais and declared himself the prince.
The Dream of Poyais
With his invented title in hand, MacGregor sailed back to England ready to further enrich himself. Poyais was unsuitable for colonization, he knew, but MacGregor’s charms might reel in more ignorant men.
MacGregor arrived at the perfect time to win followers. Britain had only recently found peace after two decades of fighting on the continent. The British were depleted and their coffers low. The lure of fortune in the Americas proved more powerful than even MacGregor could have anticipated.
In London, MacGregor weaved a story about the majestic land of Poyais. He described Poyais as a paradise where food sprung from the earth with little labor. Mountain peaks framed the land, which had rich natural resources like redwood forests and outcrops of gold. There was no need for hard labor in Poyais, where a man armed with a simple hand-ax could find a fortune’s worth of gold. Precious stones tumbled down the hillsides, waiting for eager hands to grasp them.
The plantations of Poyais produced the most valuable raw materials, including coffee, indigo, and sugar. Colorful parrots filled the skies and wild fruits kept settlers with full bellies.
MacGregor’s fanciful tale also invented a capital city with European architecture and wide, tree-lined streets. There was, of course, an opera house near his royal palace. And the bustling port exported a fortune of goods every day.
It seems unimaginable that so many in Britain would fall for MacGregor’s con. A paradise like Poyais certainly would have already attracted attention long before the 1820s. But eager Europeans fell into the mirage of MacGregor’s utopia.
In reality, the “Prince of Poyais” invented his alluring tales to convince Londoners to invest in his colony. He sold tracts of land at the high price of four shillings per acre.
MacGregor’s daring stretched to unimaginable heights. He sent a letter to King George IV that “extended the greeting of a brother sovereign.”
The Poyais Scam Blows Up
Reality chased MacGregor across the Atlantic when the first group of settlers sailed for Poyais. Soon, everyone would realize MacGregor had conned them––there was no utopia on the mosquito coast.
Before the ship set sail, MacGregor asked each settler to exchange their British coins for paper currency issued by the Bank of Poyais.
Even more daring, MacGregor petitioned a bank for a massive loan to the government of Poyais. He landed a loan worth £200,000, or more than $30 million in today’s currency.
MacGregor made these shrewd financial transactions as the first ship crossed the ocean. Of course, when the settlers landed and searched for the impressive bridges and domes of the capital city, they found nothing. No one lived on the mosquito coast, other than the newly arrived 250 men and women.
As they unloaded the ships, hoping to find the city inland from the coast, a hurricane swept through. Two ships were carried away, stranding the settlers. As starvation loomed, many succumbed to malaria and yellow fever.
“Not one,” confessed survivor Edward Lowe, “was able to assist another out of such a number, and many of those who had newly come from Scotland were well advanced in years and had come here to end their days in peace and comfort.”
MacGregor sold stock in his invented country, conning even more people out of their money.
In total, over 175 settlers died before Britain’s nearby colonies learned of the disaster and sent aid.
The first settlers would soon be followed by more, tempted by MacGregor’s utopian vision. The British sent out ships to intercept the hopeful settlers and turn them back. The hoax sent seven ships teeming with emigrants to a desolate strip of land.
Outrunning the Poyais Scam
As disaster unfolded in the Caribbean, MacGregor moved his operation to France, where he found more willing rubes. Soon, French expeditions set out for Poyais. And MacGregor won an even larger £300,000 loan from another London bank, promising to repay the loan with gold from the Poyais mines.
The next time MacGregor stepped on British soil, he was arrested and thrown in prison. Somehow, MacGregor’s charm carried the day and he was soon released.
MacGregor ultimately abandoned the Poyais hoax and instead lived off of the wealth he’d extracted from those he scammed.
After running out of people to con in Europe, MacGregor crossed the Atlantic once more. He applied for a pension from Venezuela to compensate for his service during the war. And he lived out his final days in Caracas, a free man.
For Gregor MacGregor, inventing a royal title paid off, to the tune of several million dollars in wealth. And, somehow, the Scotsman escaped justice for his hoax.
Can’t get enough about royals, real and fake? Pick up Bruce Wilson’s Royal Life: Daring Kings, Tragic Queens, and the History of Royalty. And for more strange and fascinating stories from history, check out Bruce Wilson’s book Strange but True Stories: Fascinating Facts, Astonishing Trivia, and Conversation Starters from History, available in ebook, paperback, or audiobook.