Chapter IV: Ancient Florida (2)

Stubborn in his pride, Soto, on the 14th of November, marched northward; and traversing the land of Pafallaya (now Clarke, Marengo, and Greene counties), passed the town of Taliepatua and reached Cabusto, identified by Pickett with the site of the modern town of Erie, on the Black Warrior. Here a series of battles with the natives occurred; but Soto fought his way through hostile tribes to the little town of Chicaça, with its two hundred houses clustered on a hill, probably on the western bank of the Yazoo, which he reached in a snow-storm on the 17th of December. The cacique Miculasa received Soto graciously, and the Spanish commander won him by sending part of his force to attack Sacchuma, a hostile town. Having thus propitiated this powerful chief, Soto remained here till March; when, being ready to advance on his expedition in search of some wealthy province, he demanded porters of the cacique. The wily chief amused the invader with promises for several days, and then suddenly attacked the town from four sides, at a very early hour in the morning, dashing into the place and setting fire to the houses. The Spaniards, taken by surprise, were assailed as they came out to put on their armor and mount their horses. Soto and one other alone succeeded in getting into the saddle; but Soto himself, after killing one Indian with his spear, was thrown, his girths giving way.

The Indians drew off with the loss of this one man, having killed eleven Spaniards, many of their horses, and having greatly reduced their herd of swine. In the conflagration of the town, Soto’s force lost most of their remaining clothing, with many of their weapons and saddles. They at once set to work to supply the loss. The woods gave ash to make saddles and lances; forges were set up to temper the swords and make such arms as they could; while the tall grass was woven into mats to serve as blankets or cloaks.

They needed their arms indeed; for on the 15th of March the enemy, in three divisions, advanced to attack the camp. Soto met them with as many squadrons, and routed them with loss.

When Soto at last took up his march on the 25th of April, the sturdy Alibamo, or Alimamu, or Limamu, barred his way with a palisade manned by the painted warriors of the tribe. Soto carried it at the cost of the lives of seven or eight of his men, and twenty-five or six wounded; only to find that the Indians had made the palisade not to protect any stores, but simply to cope with the invaders.[844]

At Quizquiz, or Quizqui, near the banks of the Mississippi, Soto surprised the place and captured all the women; but released them to obtain canoes to cross the river. As the Indians failed to keep their promise, Soto encamped in a plain and spent nearly a month building four large boats, each capable of carrying sixty or seventy men and five or six horses. The opposite shore was held by hostile Indians; and bands of finely formed warriors constantly came down in canoes, as if ready to engage them, but always drawing off.

The Spaniards finally crossed the river at the lowest Chickasaw Bluff, all wondering at the mighty turbid stream, with its fish, strange to their eyes, and the trees, uprooted on the banks far above, that came floating down.[845] Soto marched northward to Little Prairie in quest of Pacaha and Chisca, provinces reported to abound in gold. After planting a cross on St. John’s Day[846] at Casqui, where the bisons’ heads above the entrances to the huts reminded them of Spain, he entered Pacaha June 29, as Oviedo says. These towns were the best they had seen since they left Cofitachiqui. Pacaha furnished them with a booty which they prized highly,—a fine store of skins of animals, and native blankets woven probably of bark. These enabled the men to make clothing, of which many had long been in sore want. The people gradually returned, and the cacique received Soto in friendly guise, giving him his two sisters as wives.

While the army rested here nearly a month, expeditions were sent in various directions. One, marching eight days to the northwest through a land of swamps and ponds, reached the prairies, the land of Caluça, where Indians lived in portable houses of mats, with frames so light that a man could easily carry them.[847]

Despairing of finding his long-sought El Dorado in that direction, Soto marched south and then southwest, in all a hundred and ten leagues, to Quiguate, a town on a branch of the Mississippi. It was the largest they had yet seen. The Indians abandoned it; but one half the houses were sufficient to shelter the whole of Soto’s force.

On the first of September the expedition reached Coligua,—a populous town in a valley among the mountains, near which vast herds of bison roamed. Then crossing the river again,[848] Soto’s jaded and decreasing force marched onward. Cayas, with its salt river and fertile maize-lands, was reached; and then the Spaniards came to Tulla, where the Indians attacked them, fighting from their housetops to the last. The cacique at last yielded, and came weeping with great sobs to make his submission.

Marching southeast, Soto reached Quipana; and crossing the mountains eastward, wintered in the province of Viranque, or Autiamque, or Utianque, on a branch of the Mississippi, apparently the Washita.[849] The sufferings of the Spaniards during a long and severe winter were terrible, and Ortiz, their interpreter, succumbed to his hardships and died. Even the proud spirit of Soto yielded to his disappointments and toil. Two hundred and fifty of his splendid force had left their bones to whiten along the path which he had followed. He determined at last to push to the shores of the Gulf, and there build two brigantines, in order to send to Cuba and to New Spain for aid.

Fac-simile of an engraving in Herrera (1728), iv. 21.]

Passing through Ayays and the well-peopled land of Nilco, Soto went with the cacique of Guachoyanque to his well-palisaded town on the banks of the Mississippi, at the mouth of the Red River, arriving there on Sunday, April 17, 1542. Here he fell ill of the fever; difficulties beset him on every side, and he sank under the strain. Appointing Luis de Moscoço as his successor in command, he died on the 21st of May. The _Adelantado_ of Cuba and Florida, who had hoped to gather the wealth of nations, left as his property five Indian slaves, three horses, and a herd of swine. His body, kept for some days in a house, was interred in the town; but as fears were entertained that the Indians might dig up the corpse, it was taken, wrapped in blankets loaded with sand, and sunk in the Mississippi.[850]

Muscoço’s first plan was to march westward to Mexico. But after advancing to the province of Xacatin, the survivors of the expedition lost all hope; and returning to the Mississippi, wintered on its banks. There building two large boats, they embarked in them and in canoes. Hostile Indians pursued them, and twelve men were drowned, their canoes being run down by the enemy’s _periaguas_. The survivors reached the Gulf and coasted along to Pánuco.[851]

The expedition of Soto added very little to the knowledge of the continent, as no steps were taken to note the topography of the country or the language of the various tribes. Diego Maldonado and Gomez Arias, seeking Soto, explored the coast from the vicinity of the Mississippi nearly to Newfoundland; but their reports are unknown.

Notwithstanding the disastrous result of Soto’s expedition, and the conclusive proof it afforded that the country bordering on the Gulf of Mexico contained no rich kingdom and afforded little inducement for settlements, other commanders were ready to undertake the conquest of Florida. Among these was Don Antonio de Mendoza, the viceroy of New Spain, who sought, by offers of rank and honors, to enlist some of the survivors of Soto’s march in a new campaign. In a more mercantile spirit, Julian de Samano and Pedro de Ahumada applied to the Spanish monarch for a patent, promising to make a good use of the privileges granted them, and to treat the Indians well. They hoped to buy furs and pearls, and carry on a trade in them till mines of gold and silver were found. The Court, however, refused to permit the grant.[852]

Yet as a matter of policy it became necessary for Spain to occupy Florida. This the Court felt; and when Cartier was preparing for his voyage to the northern part of the continent,[853] Spanish spies followed his movements and reported all to their Government. In Spain it was decided that Cartier’s occupation of the frozen land, for which he was equipping his vessels, could not in any way militate against the interests of the Catholic monarch; but it was decided that any settlement attempted in Florida must on some pretext be crushed out.[854] Florida from its position afforded a basis for assailing the fleets which bore from Vera Cruz the treasures of the Indies; and the hurricanes of the tropics had already strewn the Florida coast with the fragments of Spanish wrecks. In 1545 a vessel laden with silver and precious commodities perished on that coast, and two hundred persons reached land, only to fall by the hands of the Indians.[855]

* * * * *

The next Spanish attempt to occupy Florida was not unmixed with romance; and its tragic close invests it with peculiar interest. The Dominicans, led by Father Antonio de Montesinos and Las Casas,—who had by this time become Bishop of Chiapa,—were active in condemning the cruelties of their countrymen to the natives of the New World; and the atrocities perpetrated by Soto in his disastrous march gave new themes for their indignant denunciations.[856]

One Dominican went further. Father Luis Cancer de Barbastro, when the Indians of a province had so steadily defied the Spaniards and prevented their entrance that it was styled “Tierra de Guerra,” succeeded by mild and gentle means in winning the whole Indian population, so that the province obtained the name of “Vera Paz,” or True Peace. In 1546 this energetic man conceived the idea of attempting the peaceful conquest of Florida. Father Gregory de Beteta and other influential members of his Order seconded his views. The next year he went to Spain and laid his project before the Court, where it was favorably received. He returned to Mexico with a royal order that all Floridians held in slavery, carried thither by the survivors of Soto’s expedition, should be confided to Father Cancer to be taken back to their own land. The order proved ineffectual. Father Cancer then sailed from Vera Cruz in 1549 in the “Santa Maria del Enzina,” without arms or soldiers, taking Father Beteta, Father Diego de Tolosa, Father John Garcia, and others to conduct the mission. At Havana he obtained Magdalen, a woman who had been brought from Florida, and who had become a Christian. The vessel then steered for Florida, and reaching the coast, at about 28°, on the eve of Ascension Day, ran northward, but soon sailed back. The missionaries and their interpreter landed, and found some of the Indians fishing, who proved friendly. Father Diego, a mission coadjutor, and a sailor, resolved to remain with the natives, and went off to their cabins. Cancer and his companions awaited their return; but they never appeared again. For some days the Spaniards on the ship endeavored to enter into friendly relations with the Indians, and on Corpus Christi Fathers Cancer and Garcia landed and said Mass on shore. At last a Spaniard named John Muñoz, who had been a prisoner among the Indians, managed to reach the ship; and from him they learned that the missionary and his companions had been killed by the treacherous natives almost immediately after reaching their cabins. He had not witnessed their murder, but declared that he had seen the missionary’s scalp. Magdalen, however, came to the shore and assured the missionaries that their comrade was alive and well.

It had thus become a serious matter what course to pursue. The vessel was too heavy to enter the shallow bays, the provisions were nearly exhausted, water could not be had, and the ship’s people were clamoring to return to Mexico. The missionaries, all except Father Cancer, desired to abandon the projected settlement, but he still believed that by presents and kindness to the Indians he could safely remain. His companions in vain endeavored to dissuade him. On Tuesday, June 25, he was pulled in a boat near the shore. He leaped into the water and waded towards the land. Though urged to return, he persevered. Kneeling for a few minutes on the beach, he advanced till he met the Indians. The sailors in the boat saw one Indian pull off his hat, and another strike him down with a club. One cry escaped his lips. A crowd of Indians streamed down to the shore and with arrows drove off the boat. Lingering for awhile, the vessel sailed back to Vera Cruz, after five lives had thus rashly been sacrificed.[857]

On the arrival of the tidings of this tragic close of Cancer’s mission a congress was convened by Maximilian, King of Bohemia, then regent in Spain; and the advocates of the peace policy in regard to the Indians lost much of the influence which they had obtained in the royal councils.[858]

The wreck of the fleet, with rich cargoes of silver, gold, and other precious commodities, on the northern shore of the Gulf of Mexico in 1553, when several hundred persons perished, and the sufferings of the surviving passengers, among whom were several Dominicans, in their attempt to reach the settlements; and the wreck of Farfan’s fleet on the Atlantic coast near Santa Elena in December, 1554,—showed the necessity of having posts on that dangerous coast of Florida, in order to save life and treasure.[859]

The Council of the Indies advised Philip II. to confide the conquest and settlement of Florida to Don Luis de Velasco, viceroy of New Spain, who was anxious to undertake the task. The Catholic monarch had previously rejected the projects of Zurita and Samano; but the high character of Velasco induced him to confide the task to the viceroy of Mexico. The step was a gain for the humanitarian party; and the King, on giving his approval, directed that Dominican friars should be selected to accompany the colonists, in order to minister to them and convert the Indians. Don Luis de Velasco had directed the government in Mexico since November, 1550, with remarkable prudence and ability. The natives found in him such an earnest, capable, and unwavering protector that he is styled in history the Father of the Indians.

The plans adopted by this excellent governor for the occupation of Florida were in full harmony with the Dominican views. In the treatment of the Indians he anticipated the just and equitable methods which give Calvert, Williams, and Penn so enviable a place in American annals.[860]

The occupation was not to be one of conquest, and all intercourse with the Indians was to be on the basis of natural equity. His first step was prompted by his characteristic prudence.[861] In September, 1558, he despatched Guido de Labazares, with three vessels and a sufficient force, to explore the whole Florida coast, and select the best port he found for the projected settlement. Labazares, on his return after an investigation of several months, reported in favor of Pensacola Bay, which he named Felipina; and he describes its entrance between a long island and a point of land. The country was well wooded, game and fish abounded, and the Indian fields showed that Indian corn and vegetables could be raised successfully.[862] On the return of Labazares in December, preparations were made for the expedition, which was placed under the command of Don Tristan de Luna y Arellano. The force consisted of fifteen hundred soldiers and settlers, under six captains of cavalry and six of infantry, some of whom had been at Coça, and were consequently well acquainted with the country where it was intended to form the settlement. The Dominicans selected were Fathers Pedro de Feria, as vicar-provincial of Florida, Dominic of the Annunciation, Dominic de Salazar, John Maçuelas, Dominic of Saint Dominic, and a lay brother. The object being to settle, provisions for a whole year were prepared, and ammunition to meet all their wants.

The colonists, thus well fitted for their undertaking, sailed from Vera Cruz on the 11th of June, 1559; and by the first of the following month were off the bay in Florida to which Miruelo had given his name. Although Labazares had recommended Pensacola Bay, Tristan de Luna seems to have been induced by his pilots to give the preference to the Bay of Ichuse; and he sailed west in search of it, but passed it, and entered Pensacola Bay. Finding that he had gone too far, Luna sailed back ten leagues east to Ichuse, which must have been Santa Rosa Bay. Here he anchored his fleet, and despatched the factor Luis Daza, with a galleon, to Vera Cruz to announce his safe arrival. He fitted two other vessels to proceed to Spain, awaiting the return of two exploring parties; he then prepared to land his colonists and stores.[863] Meanwhile he sent a detachment of one hundred men under captains Alvaro Nyeto and Gonzalo Sanchez, accompanied by one of the missionaries, to explore the country and ascertain the disposition of the Indians. The exploring parties returned after three weeks, having found only one hamlet, in the midst of an uninhabited country.[864] Before Luna had unloaded his vessels, they were struck, during the night of September 19,[865] by a terrible hurricane, which lasted twenty-four hours, destroying five ships, a galleon and a bark, and carrying one caravel and its cargo into a grove some distance on land. Many of the people perished, and most of the stores intended for the maintenance of the colony were ruined or lost.

The river, entering the Bay of Ichuse, proved to be very difficult of navigation, and it watered a sparsely-peopled country. Another detachment,[866] sent apparently to the northwest, after a forty days’ march through uncultivated country, reached a large river, apparently the Escambia, and followed its banks to Nanipacna, a deserted town of eighty houses. Explorations in various directions found no other signs of Indian occupation. The natives at last returned and became friendly.

Finding his original site unfavorable, Tristan de Luna, after exhausting the relief-supplies sent him, and being himself prostrated by a fever in which he became delirious, left Juan de Jaramillo at the port with fifty men and negro slaves, and proceeded[867] with the rest of his company, nearly a thousand souls, to Nanipacna, some by land, and some ascending the river in their lighter craft. To this town he gave the name of Santa Cruz. The stores of Indian corn, beans, and other vegetables left by the Indians were soon consumed by the Spaniards, who were forced to live on acorns or any herbs they could gather.

The Viceroy, on hearing of their sufferings, sent two vessels to their relief in November, promising more ample aid in the spring. The provisions they obtained saved them from starvation during the winter, but in the spring their condition became as desperate as ever. No attempt seems to have been made to cultivate the Indian fields, or to raise anything for their own support.[868]

In hope of obtaining provisions from Coça, Jaramillo sent his sergeant-major with six captains and two hundred soldiers, accompanied by Father Dominic de Salazar and Dominic of the Annunciation, to that province. On the march the men were forced to eat straps, harnesses, and the leather coverings of their shields; some died of starvation, while others were poisoned by herbs which they ate. A chestnut wood proved a godsend, and a fifty days’ march brought them to Olibahali (Hatchet Creek), where the friendly natives ministered to their wants.[869]

About the beginning of July they reached Coça, on the Coosa River, then a town of thirty houses, near which were seven other towns of the same tribe. Entering into friendly intercourse with these Indians, the Spaniards obtained food for themselves and their jaded horses. After resting here for three months, the Spaniards, to gain the good-will of the Coosas, agreed to aid them in a campaign against the Napochies,—a nation near the Ochechiton,[870] the Espiritu Santo, or Mississippi. These were in all probability the Natchez. The Coosas and their Spanish allies defeated this tribe, and compelled them to pay tribute, as of old, to the Coosas. Their town, saved with difficulty from the flames, gave the Spaniards a supply of corn. On their return to Coça, the sergeant-major sent to report to Tristan de Luna; but his messengers found no Spaniard at Nanipacna, save one hanging from a tree. Tristan de Luna, supposing his men lost, had gone down to Ochuse Bay, leaving directions on a tree, and a buried letter.[871] Father Feria and some others had sailed for Havana, and all were eager to leave the country.[872] Tristan de Luna was reluctant to abandon the projected settlement, and wished to proceed to Coça with all the survivors of his force. His sickness had left him so capricious and severe, that he seemed actually insane. The supplies promised in the spring had not arrived in September, though four ships left Vera Cruz toward the end of June. Parties sent out by land and water found the fields on the Escambia and Mobile[873] forsaken by the Indians, who had laid waste their towns and removed their provisions. In this desperate state George Ceron, the _maestro de campo_, opposed the Governor’s plan,[874] and a large part of the force rallied around him. When Tristan de Luna issued a proclamation ordering the march, there was an open mutiny, and the Governor condemned the whole of the insurgents to death. Of course he could not attempt to execute so many, but he did hang one who deserted. The mutineers secretly sent word to Coça, and in November the party from that province with the two missionaries arrived at Pensacola Bay.[875] Don Tristan’s detachment was also recalled from the original landing, and the whole force united. The dissensions continued till the missionaries, amid the solemnities of Holy Week, by appealing to the religious feelings of the commander and Ceron, effected a reconciliation.[876]

At this juncture Angel de Villafañe’s fleet entered the harbor of Ichuse. He announced to the people that he was on his way to Santa Elena, which Tristan de Luna had made an ineffectual effort to reach. All who chose were at liberty to accompany him. The desire to evacuate the country where they had suffered so severely was universal. None expressed a wish to remain; and Tristan de Luna, seeing himself utterly abandoned, embarked for Havana with a few servants. Villafañe then took on board all except a detachment of fifty or sixty men who were left at Ichuse under Captain Biedma, with orders to remain five or six months; at the expiration of which time they were to sail away also, in case no instructions came.

Villafañe, with the “San Juan” and three other vessels and about two hundred men, put into Havana; but there many of the men deserted, and several officers refused to proceed.[877]

With Gonzalo Gayon as pilot, Villafañe reached Santa Elena—now Port Royal Sound—May 27, 1561, and took possession in the name of the King of Spain. Finding no soil adapted for cultivation, and no port suitable for planting a settlement, he kept along the coast, doubled Cape Roman, and landing on the 2d of June, went inland till he reached the Santee, where he again took formal possession. On the 8th he was near the Jordan or Pedee; but a storm drove off one of his vessels. With the rest he continued his survey of the coast till he doubled Cape Hatteras. There, on the 14th of June, his caravel well-nigh foundered, and his two smaller vessels undoubtedly perished. He is said to have abandoned the exploration of the coast here, although apparently it was his vessel, with the Dominican Fathers, which about this time visited Axacan, on the Chesapeake, and took off a brother of the chief.[878]

Villafañe then sailed to Santo Domingo, and Florida was abandoned. In fact, on the 23d of September the King declared that no further attempt was to be made to colonize that country, either in the Gulf or at Santa Elena, alleging that there was no ground to fear that the French would set foot in that land or take possession of it; and the royal order cites the opinion of Pedro Menendez against any attempt to form settlements on either coast.[879]

As if to show the fallacy of their judgment and their forecast, the French (and what was worse, from the Spanish point of view, French Calvinists) in the next year, under Ribault, took possession of Port Royal,—the very Santa Elena which Villafañe considered unfitted for colonization. Here they founded Charlesfort and a settlement, entering Port Royal less than three months after the Spanish officers convened in Mexico had united in condemning the country.

Pedro Menendez de Aviles had, as we have seen, been general of the fleet to New Spain in 1560, and on his return received instructions to examine the Atlantic coast north of the very spot where the French thus soon after settled. In 1561 he again commanded the fleet; but on his homeward voyage a terrible storm scattered the vessels near the Bermudas, and one vessel, on which his only son and many of his kinsmen had embarked, disappeared. With the rest of his ships he reached Spain, filled with anxiety, eager only to fit out vessels to seek his son, who, he believed, had been driven on the Florida coast, and was probably a prisoner in the hands of the Indians. At this critical moment, however, charges were brought against him; and he, with his brother, was arrested and detained in prison for two years, unable to bring the case to trial, or to obtain his release on bail.

When Menendez at last succeeded in obtaining an audience of the King, he solicited, in 1564, permission to proceed with two vessels to Bermuda and Florida to seek his son, and then retire to his home, which he had not seen for eighteen years. Philip II. at last consented; but required him to make a thorough coast-survey of Florida, so as to prepare charts that would prevent the wrecks which had arisen from ignorance of the real character of the sea-line. Menendez replied that his Majesty could confer no higher boon upon him for his long and successful services on the seas than to authorize him to conquer and settle Florida.

Nothing could be in greater accordance with the royal views than to commit to the energy of Menendez[880] the task which so many others had undertaken in vain. A patent, or _asiento_, was issued March 20, 1565, by the provisions of which Menendez was required to sail in May with ten vessels, carrying arms and supplies, and five hundred men, one hundred to be capable of cultivating the soil. He was to take provisions to maintain the whole force for a year, and was to conquer and settle Florida within three years; explore and map the coast, transport settlers, a certain number of whom were to be married; maintain twelve members of religious Orders as missionaries, besides four of the Society of Jesus; and to introduce horses, black cattle, sheep, and swine for the two or three distinct settlements he was required to found at his own expense.[881] The King gave only the use of the galleon “San Pelayo,” and bestowed upon Menendez the title of _Adelantado_ of Florida, a personal grant of twenty-five leagues square, with the title of Marquis, and the office of Governor and Captain-General of Florida.

While Menendez was gathering, among his kindred in Asturias and Biscay, men and means to fulfil his part of the undertaking, the Court of Spain became aware for the first time that the Protestants of France had quietly planted a colony on that very Florida coast. Menendez was immediately summoned in haste to Court; and orders were issued to furnish him in America three vessels fully equipped, and an expeditionary force of two hundred cavalry and four hundred infantry. Menendez urged, on the contrary, that he should be sent on at once with some light vessels to attack the French; or, if that was not feasible, to occupy a neighboring port and fortify it, while awaiting reinforcements. The Government, by successive orders, increased the Florida armament, so that Menendez finally sailed from Cadiz, June 29, with the galleon “San Pelayo” and other vessels to the number of nineteen, carrying more than fifteen hundred persons, including farmers and mechanics of all kinds.

The light in which Spaniards, especially those connected with commerce and colonies, regarded the Protestants of France was simply that of pirates. French cruisers, often making their Protestantism a pretext for their actions, scoured the seas, capturing Spanish and Portuguese vessels, and committing the greatest atrocities. In 1555 Jacques Sorie surprised Havana, plundered it, and gave it to the flames, butchering the prisoners who fell into his hands. In 1559 Megander pillaged Porto Rico, and John de la Roche plundered the ships and settlements near Carthagena.[882]

It seems strange, however, that neither in Spain nor in America was it known that this dreaded and hated community, the Huguenots of France, had actually, in 1562, begun a settlement at the very harbor of Santa Elena where Villafañe had taken possession in the name of the Spanish monarch a year before. Some of the French settlers revolted, and very naturally went off to cruise against the Spaniards, and with success; but the ill-managed colony of Charlesfort on Port Royal Sound had terminated its brief existence without drawing down the vengeance of Spain.

When the tidings of a French occupancy of Florida startled the Spanish Court, a second attempt of the Huguenots at settlement had been made,—this time at the mouth of St. John’s River, where Fort Caroline was a direct menace to the rich Spanish fleets, offering a safe refuge to cruisers, which in the name of a pure gospel could sally out to plunder and to slay. Yet that settlement, thus provoking the fiercest hostility of Spain, was ill-managed. It was, in fact, sinking, like its predecessor, from the unfitness of its members to make the teeming earth yield them its fruits for their maintenance. René Laudonnière, the commandant, after receiving some temporary relief from the English corsair Hawkins,[883] and learning that the Spaniards meditated hostilities, was about to burn his fort and abandon the country, when John Ribault arrived as commandant, with supplies and colonists, as well as orders to maintain the post. His instructions from Coligny clearly intended that he should attack the Spaniards.[884]

The two bitter antagonists, each stimulated by his superiors, were thus racing across the Atlantic, each endeavoring to outstrip the other, so as to be able first to assume the offensive. The struggle was to be a deadly one, for on neither side were there any of the ordinary restraints; it was to be a warfare without mercy.

After leaving the Canaries, Menendez’ fleet was scattered by storms. One vessel put back; the flagship and another were driven in one direction, five vessels in another. These, after encountering another storm, finally reached Porto Rico on the 9th of August, and found the flagship and its tender there.[885]

The other ships from Biscay and Asturias had not arrived; but Menendez, fearing that Ribault might outstrip him, resolved to proceed, though his vessels needed repairs from the injuries sustained in the storm. If he was to crush Fort Caroline, he felt that it must be done before the French post was reinforced; if not, all the force at his disposal would be insufficient to assume the offensive. He made the coast of Florida near Cape Cañaveral on the 25th of August; and soon after, by landing a party, ascertained from the natives that the French post was to the northward. Following the coast in that direction, he discovered, on the 28th, a harbor which seemed to possess advantages, and to which he gave the name of the great Bishop of Hippo, Augustine, who is honored on that day. Sailing on cautiously, he came in sight of the mouth of the St. John’s River about two o’clock in the afternoon of the 4th of September. The ten days he had lost creeping along the coast were fatal to his project, for there lay the four vessels of Ribault, the flagship and its consort flinging to the breeze the colors of France.

Menendez’ officers in council were in favor of running back to Santo Domingo till the whole force was united and ready to assume the offensive; but Menendez inspired them with his own intrepidity, and resolved to attack at once. A tremendous thunderstorm prevented operations till ten at night, when he bore down on the French, and ran his ship, the “Pelayo,” between the two larger vessels of Ribault. To his hail who they were and what they were doing there, the reply was that John Ribault was their captain-general, and that they came to the country by order of the King of France; and the French in return asked what ships they were, and who commanded them. To quote his own words, “I replied to them that I was Peter Menendez, that I came by command of the King of Spain to this coast and land to burn and hang the French Lutherans found in it, and that in the morning I would board his ships to know whether he belonged to that sect; because if he did, I could not avoid executing on them the justice which his Majesty commanded. They replied that this was not right, and that I might go without awaiting the morning.”

[This sketch-map of the scene of the operations of the Spanish and the French follows one given by Fairbanks in his _History of St. Augustine_. Other modern maps, giving the old localities, are found in Parkman, Gaffarel etc.—ED.]]

As Menendez manœuvred to get a favorable position, the French vessels cut their cables and stood out to sea. The Spaniards gave chase, rapidly firing five cannon at Ribault’s flagship,—which Menendez supposed that he injured badly, as boats put off to the other vessels. Finding that the French outsailed him, Menendez put back, intending to land soldiers on an island at the mouth of the river and fortify a position which would command the entrance; but as he reached the St. John’s he saw three French vessels coming out, ready for action.

[After a map in Fairbanks’s _History of St. Augustine_; but his view of the site is open to question.—ED.]]

His project was thus defeated; and too wily to be caught at a disadvantage by the returning French vessels, Menendez bore away to the harbor of St. Augustine, which he estimated at eight leagues from the French by sea, and six by land. Here he proceeded to found the oldest city in the present territory of the United States.

[This view of Pagus Hispanorum, as given in Montanus and Ogilby, represents the town founded by Menendez at a somewhat later period, if it is wholly truthful of any period. The same view was better engraved at Leide by Vander Aa.—ED.]]

Two hundred mail-clad soldiers, commanded by Captain John de San Vicente and Captain Patiño, landed on the 6th of September, 1565. The Indians were friendly, and readily gave the settlers the large house of one of the caciques which stood near the shore of the river. Around this an intrenchment was traced; and a ditch was soon dug, and earthworks thrown up, with such implements as they had at hand, for the vessel bearing their tools had not yet arrived.

(_From the_ PAGUS HISPANORUM _in Montanus_.)]

The next day three of the smaller vessels ran into the harbor, and from them three hundred more of the soldiers disembarked, as well as those who had come to settle in the country,—men, women, and children. Artillery and munitions for the fort were also landed. The eighth being a holiday in the Catholic Church,—the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin,—was celebrated with due solemnity. Mass was offered for the first time at a spot ever after held in veneration, and where in time arose the primitive shrine of Nuestra Señora de la Leche.

Then the work of debarkation was resumed; one hundred more persons landed; and great guns, precious stores of provisions, and munitions were brought to the new fort.

(_Lemoyne, in De Bry._)

[Two pictures of Fort Caroline accompany the _Brevis narratio_ of Lemoyne,—one the beginning of work upon it, and the other the completed structure, “a more finished fortification than could possibly have been constructed, but to be taken as a correct outline,” as Fairbanks (p. 54) presumes. The engraving of the completed fort is reproduced in Fairbanks’s _St. Augustine_, Stevens’s _Georgia_, etc. Another and better view of it, called “Arx Carolina—Charlesfort sur Floride,” was engraved at Leide by Vander Aa, but it is a question if it be truthful. No traces of the fort have ever been recorded by subsequent observers, but Fairbanks places it near a place called St. John’s Bluff, as shown in the accompanying map. Others have placed it on the Bell River (an estuary of the St. Mary’s River), at a place Called Battle Bluff. Cf. Carroll’s _Hist. Coll._, i. p. xxxvi.—ED.]]

Amid all this bustle and activity the Spaniards were startled by the appearance of two large French vessels[886] in the offing, evidently ready for action. It was no part of Menendez’ plan to engage them, and he waited till, about three in the afternoon, they bore away for the St. John’s. Then he prepared to land in person. As his boat left the vessel with banners unfurled, amid the thunder of cannon and the sounds of warlike music, Mendoza Grajales, the first priest of St. Augustine, bearing a cross, went down at the head of those on shore to meet the _adelantado_, all chanting the Te Deum. Menendez proceeded at once with his attendants to the cross, which he kissed on bended knee.

Formal possession of the land was then taken in the name of Philip II., King of Spain. The captains of the troops and the officers of the new colony came forward to take the oath to Peter Menendez de Aviles as governor, captain-general, and _adelantado_ of Florida and its coasts under the patents of the Spanish King. Crowds of friendly Indians, with their chieftains, gathered around.

From them the Spanish commander learned that his position was admirably taken, as he could, at a short distance, strike the river on which the French lay, and descend it to assail them. Here then he resolved to make his position as strong as possible, till the rest of his armament arrived. His galleon “San Pelayo,” too large to enter the port, rode without, in danger from the sudden storms that visit the coast, and from the French. Putting on board some French prisoners whom he had captured in a boat, he despatched her and another vessel to Santo Domingo. He organized his force by appointing officers,—a lieutenant and a sergeant-major, and ten captains. The necessity of horses to operate rapidly induced him to send two of his lighter vessels to Havana to seek them there; and by this conveyance he addressed to Philip II. his first letter from Florida.[887]

The masts of his vessels could scarcely have vanished from the eyes of the Spanish force, when the French vessels appeared once more, and nearly captured Menendez himself in the harbor, where he was carrying to the shore, in the smaller vessels that he had retained, some artillery and munitions from the galleons. He escaped, however, though the French were so near that they called on him to surrender. And he ascribed his deliverance rather to prayer than to human skill; for, fierce seaman as he was, he was a man of deep and practical religious feeling, which influenced all his actions.

Menendez’ position was now one of danger. The force at his command was not large, and the French evidently felt strong enough, and were determined to attack him. He had acknowledged his inability to cope with them on the ocean, and could not have felt very sanguine of being able to defend the slight breastworks that had been thrown up at St. Augustine.

Fortune favored him. Ribault, after so earnestly determining to assume the offensive, fatally hesitated. Within two days a tremendous hurricane, which the practised eye of Menendez had anticipated, burst on the coast. The French were, he believed, still hovering near, on the lookout for his larger vessels, and he knew that with such a norther their peril was extreme. It was, moreover, certain that they could not, for a time at least, make the St. John’s, even if they rode out the storm.

This gave him a temporary superiority, and he resolved to seize his opportunity. Summoning his officers to a council of war, he laid before them his plan of marching at once to attack Fort Caroline, from which the French had evidently drawn a part of their force, and probably their most effective men. The officers generally, as well as the two clergymen in the settlement, opposed his project as rash; but Menendez was determined. Five hundred men—three hundred armed with arquebuses, the rest with pikes and targets—were ordered to march, each one carrying rations of biscuit and wine. Menendez, at their head, bore his load like the rest. They marched out of the fort on the 16th of September, guided by two caciques who had been hostile to the French, and by a Frenchman who had been two years in the fort. The route proved one of great difficulty; the rain poured in torrents, swelling the streams and flooding the lowlands, so that the men were most of the time knee-deep in water. Many loitered, and, falling back, made their way to St. Augustine. Others showed a mutinous disposition, and loudly expressed their contempt for their sailor-general.

On the 29th, at the close of the day, he was within a short distance of the French fort, and halted to rest so as to storm it in the morning. At daybreak the Spaniards knelt in prayer; then, bearing twenty scaling-ladders, Menendez advanced, his sturdy Asturians and Biscayans in the van. Day broke as, in a heavy rain, they reached a height from which their French guide told them they could see the fort, washed by the river. Menendez advanced, and saw some houses and the St. John’s; but from his position could not discover the fort. He would have gone farther; but the Maese de Campo and Captain Ochoa pushed on till they reached the houses, and reconnoitred the fort, where not a soul seemed astir. As they returned they were hailed by a French sentinel, who took them for countrymen. Ochoa sprang upon him, striking him on the head with his sheathed sword, while the Maese de Campo stabbed him. He uttered a cry; but was threatened with death, bound, and taken back. The cry had excited Menendez, who, supposing that his officers had been killed, called out: “Santiago! at them! God helps us! Victory! The French are slaughtered! Don Pedro de Valdes, the Maese de Campo, is in the fort, and has taken it!”

The men, supposing that the officers were in advance with part of the force, rushed on till they came up with the returning officers, who, taking in the situation, despatched the sentry and led the men to the attack. Two Frenchmen, who rushed out in their shirts, were cut down. Others outside the fort seeing the danger, gave the alarm; and a man at the principal gate threw it open to ascertain what the trouble was. Valdes, ready to scale the fort, saw the advantage, sprang on the man and cut him down, then rushed into the fort, followed by the fleetest of the Spanish detachment. In a moment two captains had simultaneously planted their colors on the walls, and the trumpets sounded for victory.

The French, taken utterly by surprise, made no defence; about fifty, dashing over the walls of the fort, took to the woods, almost naked, and unarmed, or endeavored in boats and by swimming to reach the vessels in the stream. When Menendez came up with the main body, his men were slaughtering the French as they ran shrieking through the fort, or came forward declaring that they surrendered. The women, and children under the age of fifteen, were, by orders of the commander, spared. Laudonnière, the younger Ribault, Lemoyne, and the carpenter Le Challeux, whose accounts have reached us, were among those who escaped.

Menendez had carried the fort without one of his men being killed or wounded. The number of the French thus unsparingly put to the sword is stated by Menendez himself as one hundred and thirty-two, with ten of the fugitives who were butchered the next day. Mendoza Grajales corroborates this estimate. Fifty were spared, and about as many escaped to the vessels; and some, doubtless, perished in the woods.

The slaughter was too terrible to need depicting in darker colors; but in time it was declared that Menendez hung many, with an insulting label: “I do not this to Frenchmen, but to Heretics.” The Spanish accounts, written with too strong a conviction of the propriety of their course to seek any subterfuge, make no allusion to any such act; and the earliest French accounts are silent in regard to it. The charge first occurs in a statement written with an evident design to rouse public indignation in France, and not, therefore, to be deemed absolutely accurate.

No quarter was given, for the French were regarded as pirates; and as the French cruisers gave none, these, who were considered as of the same class, received none.

The booty acquired was great. A brigantine and a galiot fell into the hands of the Spaniards, with a vessel that had grounded. Another vessel lay near the fort, and Spanish accounts claim to have sunk it with the cannon of the fort, while the French declare they scuttled it. Two other vessels lay at the mouth of the river, watching for the Spaniards, whose attack was expected from the sea, and not from the land side. Besides these vessels and their contents, the Spaniards gained in the fort artillery and small-arms, supplies of flour and bread, horses, asses, sheep, and hogs.[888] Such was the first struggle on our soil between civilized men; it was brief, sanguinary, merciless.

Menendez named the captured fort San Mateo, from its capture on the feast of St. Matthew (September 21). He set up the arms of Spain, and selected a site for a church, which he ordered to be built at once. Then, leaving Gonçalo de Villaroel in command, with a garrison of three hundred men, he prepared to march back to St. Augustine with about one hundred, who composed the rest of the force which had remained with him till he reached Caroline. But of them all he found only thirty-five able or willing to undertake the march; and with these he set out, deeming his presence necessary at St. Augustine. Before long, one of the party pushed on to announce his coming.

The Spaniards there had learned of the disaster which had befallen Ribault’s fleet from a Frenchman who was the sole survivor of one small vessel that had been driven ashore, its crew escaping a watery death only to perish by the hands of the Indians. The vessel was secured and brought to St. Augustine. The same day, September 23, a man was seen running toward the fort, uttering loud shouts. The priest, Mendoza Grajales, ran out to learn the tidings he bore. The soldier threw his arms around him, crying: “Victory! Victory! the French fort is ours!” He was soon recounting to his countrymen the story of the storming of Caroline. Toward nightfall the _adelantado_ himself, with his little party, was seen approaching. Mendoza in surplice, bearing a crucifix, went forth to meet him. Menendez knelt to kiss the cross, and his men imitated his example; then they entered the fort in procession, chanting the Te Deum.[889]

Menendez despatched some light boats with supplies to San Mateo; but the fort there took fire a few days after its capture, and was almost entirely destroyed, with much of the booty. He sent other light craft to Santo Domingo with prisoners, and others still to patrol the coast and seek any signs of the galleon “San Pelayo,” or of the French. Then he turned his whole attention to work on his fort and town, so as to be in readiness to withstand any attack from Ribault if the French commander should return and prove to be in a condition to assail him while his forces were divided. He also cultivated friendly intercourse with the neighboring chiefs whom he found hostile to the French and their allies.

On the 28th, some of the Indians came to report by signs that the French were six leagues distant, that they had lost their ships, and that they had reached the shore by swimming. They had halted at a stream which they could not cross,—evidently Matanzas inlet. Menendez sent out a boat, and followed in another with some of his officers and Mendoza, one of the clergymen. He overtook his party, and they encamped near the inlet, but out of sight. On the opposite side, the light of the camp-fires marked the spot occupied by the French. The next day, seeing Menendez, a sailor swam over, and stated that he had been sent to say that they were survivors of some of Ribault’s vessels which had been wrecked; that many of their people had been drowned, others killed or captured by the Indians; and that the rest, to the number of one hundred and forty, asked permission and aid to reach their fort, some distance up the coast.

[This is the only cartographical result of the French occupation. It is also reproduced in Gaffarel’s _Floride Française_, and in Shipp’s _De Soto and Florida_. It was literally copied by Hondius in 1607, and not so well in the Mercator-Hondius _Atlas_ of 1633. Lescarbot followed it; but in his 1618 edition altered for the worse the course of the St. John’s River; and so did De Laet. Cf. Kohl, _Maps in Hakluyt_, p. 48, and Brinton, _Floridian Peninsula_, p. 80, who says (p. 86) that De Laet was the first to confine the name Florida to the peninsula; but Thevet seems nearly to do so in the map in his _Cosmographia_, which he based on Ortelius, a part of which is given in fac-simile in Weise’s _Discoveries of America_, p. 304; and it seems also to be the case in the earlier Mercator gores of 1541. The map accompanying Charlevoix’ narrative will be found in his _Nouvelle France_, i. 24, and in Shea’s translation of it, i. 133.—ED.]]

Menendez told him that he had captured the fort and put all to the sword. Then, after asking whether they were Catholics or Lutherans, and receiving the reply, the Spaniard sent the sailor to his companions, to say that if they did not give up their arms and surrender, he would put them all to the sword. On this an officer came over to endeavor to secure better terms, or to be allowed to remain till vessels could be obtained to take them to France; but Menendez was inexorable. The officer pleaded that the lives of the French should be spared; but Menendez, according to Mendoza, replied, “that he would not give them such a pledge, but that they should bring their arms and their persons, and that he should do with them according to his will; because if he spared their lives he wished them to be grateful to him for it, and if he put them to death they should not complain that he had broken his word.” Solis de Meras, another clergyman, brother-in-law of Menendez, and in St. Augustine at the time, in his account states that Menendez said, “That if they wished to lay down their colors and their arms, and throw themselves on his mercy, they could do so, that he might do with them what God should give him the grace to do; or that they could do as they chose: for other truce or friendship could not be made with him;” and that he rejected an offer of ransom which they made.