This poem was written by
Edgar Allan Poe about
Sir Walter Raleigh's 1616 venture to
South America.
Upon his return in 1618,
James I excecuted him for his failure to find it (which he called "
treason".)
Sir Walter Raleigh was a favourite of
Elizabeth I, for his
Spanish Armada battles with the
French Hugenots, but when she died in 1606, James I imprisoned him and his family in the
Tower of London until 1616 when he went on the failed venture to find El
Dorado.