USA > Maine > A history of the discovery of Maine > Part 21
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t See Garcilasso de la Vega's work upon De Soto, lib. 1, chap. 2; and Barcia's "Ensayo Chronologico," p. 2. Madrid, 1723.
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244 SPANISH EXPEDITIONS IN FLORIDA, 1492-1520.
attention of enterprising Spaniards more than any other region. The great naval expeditions of Cordova, 1517; Grijalva, 1518; and Cortes, 1519, were directed to that medi- terranean sea of North America. The east coast was neg- lected for nine years after Ponce de Leon's voyage in 1513. But from these gulf expeditions there proceeded a voyage, which exerted an important influence upon the exploration of this east coast.
Cortes,-having obtained on his cruise along the coast of New Spain some favorable accounts from the interior, and built the fortress of Vera Cruz, and wishing now to send reports of his successful progress to the king of Spain, by the shortest possible route,-despatched, in a fast-sailing vessel, his skillful pilot, Antonio de Alaminos. He, as has been said, had been the chief pilot of De Leon, in 1513 ; and had conducted, in this capacity, the subsequent expedi- tions of Cordova, Grijalva, and Cortes to the Gulf of Mexico, and had thereby acquired great knowledge and experience of those waters.
Alaminos knew the east coast of Florida as high as 30° N., and had observed with De Leon the strong northern current along that coast. He did not know with certainty what was the state of things beyond this point to the east, on the route to Spain. No one, probably, except perhaps Sebastian Cabot in 149S, had sailed in that direction, and he, probably, only as far south as 36º N., in about the latitude of Gibraltar. It could not, therefore, be known at that time, whether the islands which appeared on the map of Cosa so plentifully scat- tered over those waters as high up as 40º N.,* might not be barred with reefs and banks ; or whether the passage in that direction might not be blocked by some peninsula, projecting from the northern continent far to the south and the east.
* See Cosa's Chart, our No. 5.
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EXPEDITION OF DE AYLLON, 1520.
But Alaminos, having observed the strong currents in the Bahama Channel, did not think it possible that such obstruc- tions could exist. "He thought," says Herrera, "that these currents would conduct him somewhere into deep and open water." Accordingly he made trial of a passage through the Bahama Channel, and floated down the Gulf-stream into the broad Atlantic Ocean ; thereby proving the existence of a navigable passage in this direction, from Cuba and the Gulf of Mexico to Spain.
. The exact latitudes of Alaminos' track are nowhere re- ported. We are only told, that, in sailing through the Bahama Channel, " he put himself to the north " (fue meti- endo se al norte), and that in this direction he found the broad ocean (hallo el espacioso mar) ; and that in pursuing his voyage he touched the island of Terceira .*
From this it is evident, that he sailed along a great section of the Gulf-stream, and may be considered as the real dis- coverer of this current, running along the entire east coast of North America, and exerting an important influence on its commercial, as well as geographical and political history. He probably passed near the Bermudas, though he is not known to' have seen them. In this manner he completed the dis- covery of the section of the ocean lying between the tracks of Cabot, Columbus, and Ponce de Leon, which, until his voyage, had remained untraversed and unknown.
5. THE FIRST SPANISH EXPEDITION OF LUCAS VASQUEZ DE AYLLON TO CHICORA (THE COAST OF CAROLINA), 1520.
The Spanish slave-trading voyages to the Lucayan Archi- pelago, in the beginning of the sixteenth century, had depopu-
* See Bernal Diaz, Historia Verdadera, cap. 54-36; and Herrera, Dec. II, lib. 5, cap. 14.
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EXPEDITION OF DE AYLLON, 1520.
lated one island after another. As the demand for laborers in the mines and plantations of Hayti and Cuba continued, the slave-traders sought other countries not yet visited, and at last extended their search to the coast of the "Northern Indies."
In the year 1520, several wealthy planters of St. Domingo fitted out two vessels in the harbor of La Plata, and de- spatched them to the Lucayan islands, for the purpose of "procuring hands." Among these owners or adventurers (armadores), were the Spanish civil officers Diego Caballero, Ortiz de Matienço, and Lucas Vasquez de Ayllon ; the last a literary man, a graduate (licenciado) and judge (oidor).
The judge Ayllon, apparently the most wealthy and active in the company, with the help of his associates, paid all the expenses of the expedition. The name of the commander we do not learn, only occasionally a Captain Jordan is mentioned as the commander of one of the ships. He may have been the commander of both ships, and the expedition may, there- fore, properly be called " Captain Jordan's voyage."*
The chief pilot of the expedition was Diego Miruelo, the same who has already been mentioned as having made recon- noitering expeditions on his own account to the north, in 1513 and 1516, and who was therefore well acquainted with the navigation of the Lucayan islands and with parts of Florida.
The two vessels sailed from St. Domingo some time in 1520. They touched at several Lucayan islands ; but finding them depopulated, and determining "not to return with empty ships," they directed their course further north, to try
" The only Spanish author who makes Ayllon himself go with the expe- dition, is Barcia, 1723. The older authorities, Gomara, Oviedo, Herrera, do not mention him.
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247
EXPEDITION OF DE AYLLON, 1520.
their fortune on the coasts discovered by Ponce de Leon, whose track they followed .*
In this direction they fell in with a coast "in 32º N.," according to Gomara and Herrera, or " in 33º N.," accord- ing to Oviedo. And going on shore, they called a cape in the neighborhood " Cabo de Santa Helena" (cape of St. Helena), because they had discovered it on the day of that saint, the 18th of August. A river, which was near, was called " Rio Jordan," after the above-mentioned Captain Jordan. The country, as they understood from the aborigi- nes, was called " Chicora."
I will not examine here the doubtful points connected with these dates and names. This belongs to a special history of the coast of Carolina. I will only state, that we shall find several of these names on charts hereafter introduced, and shall use them as waymarks.
Ayllon's men do not appear to have given much time to exploration. Their voyage was nothing but a slave-hunting expedition. They remained for that purpose in the harbor where they had come to anchor, went on shore, caught some of the natives, to whom they gave European trinkets, and dresses made in the Castilian fashion ; who were then dismissed among their countrymen as decoys.
Many poor Indians, upon this, came on board the ships in cheerful groups, to receive similar presents ; and when the decks were covered with them, the treacherous Spaniards un- furled their sails, and turned their prows toward the south. But this crime was unprofitable ; and was finally avenged on the cruel perpetrators. One of the returning ships foundered at sea, and the guilty and guiltless perished together,-the first
* Herrera, I. c., "navegaron por la noticia que se tenia de la navigacion de Juan Ponce de Leon." "Some will have it," says Herrera further " that they were only carried away to the north by a storm."
248
EXPEDITION OF DE AYLLON, 1520.
shipwreck, probably, on the coast of Carolina. The greater part of the Indians on board the other ship died from sorrow and grief,* sickness and hunger, refusing to eat what the Spaniards offered them. However, one young Indian at least remained alive, to whom the Spaniards gave the name, " Francisco Chicora." He acquired the Spanish language, and afterwards related to Ayllon many wonderful things of the beauty and riches of Chicora. Ayllon, whose imagination was inflamed by these reports, and who was now desirous to try the conquest of this country, carried his Indian to Spain, t with the design of proposing to the government to undertake an expedition on a grander scale.
But these transactions and the preparations for this new expedition occupied several years ; and meanwhile this east coast, in its northerly section, had been reached and explored by the Spanish expedition of Gomez in 1525, as well as by the French expedition of Verrazano in 1524, of which I shall treat in the following chapter.
* "-de tristeza y pesadumbre."
t Peter Martyr, I. c. Dec. III, cap. 2, has a most interesting chapter on this Indian from Carolina. Once he had him and his master Ayllon at his table in Seville, and communicates to his readers the conversation which ne then held with them about "Chicora." Among other things, he men- tions, probably for the first time, the sweet potatoes (" Batatas") of that region.
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CHAPTER VIII.
EXPEDITIONS TO . THE EAST COAST OF NORTH AMERICA UNDER THE FRENCH, BY VERRAZANO,-THE SPANIARDS, BY GOMEZ,-AND THE ENGLISH, BY RUT.
1. EXPEDITION OF GIOVANNI DA VERRAZANO IN 1521.
No exploring expeditions had been undertaken to the new world officially by the French government prior to 1523. All had been left to private enterprise. But in that year, the first French voyage for " the discovery of the new coun- tries " was commenced, under the patronage of Francis I, the brilliant, enlightened, and powerful sovereign of France.
Four ships were fitted out, under the command of Gio- vanni da Verrazano,* a citizen of the same nationality, which had furnished commanders for the Spanish and English expe- ditions to the new world,-an Italian of Florence. He had previously navigated the eastern parts of the Mediterra- nean,-the same waters in which Columbus had gained his experience ; and having entered the service of the king of France, he had been employed at times in cruising against the Spaniards.
The expedition of 1524 appears to have been partly des- tined as a hostile cruise against the Spaniards. But explora-
* I write this name here as it is written in the work of Ramusio, though Italians, Tiraboschi, for instance, write it Verrazani. To adapt the name to the English reader, we shall in the following pages call him John Verra- zano.
250
EXPEDITION OF VERRAZANO, 1524.
tion and discovery, more particularly the search for a passage to Cathay, were the principal objects of the royal commission then received by Verrazano, as he himself says, in his letter to the king .* In this letter we regret that we have not a more full account of the instructions or orders given to him by Francis I.t
From several circumstances soon to be mentioned, it ap- pears probable, that at first he sailed from France in the autumn of 1523. The expedition seems to have met with unfavorable weather, and to have encountered great tem- pests on the northern coasts (nelle spiagge settentrionale). Two ships were separated from the fleet ; and what became of them we are not informed. With the two other ships, "La Dauphine " and " La Normande," in a damaged condi- tion, Verrazano entered a port of Brittany to repair. What " northern coasts " these were is not clear. Some think that this first attempt was designed for a long exploring expedi- tion, and that " the northern coasts" were some northern part of America already reached by Verrazano in 1523. Ver- razano says, in his letter to the king, that he had made a
* Ramusio, vol. 3, p. 420 seq. Venetia, 1565. Verrazano speaks of the four ships which were sent by the orders of the king across the ocean, to discover new lands (li quattro legni che vostra Maesta mando per oceano a discoprir nuove terre); and further says (in the appendix to the copy of his letter, lately discovered in the Magliabecchian library in Florence, edited by G. Cogswell, Esq., in the collections of the Historical Society of New York, second series, vol. 1, p. 52 (New York, 1841), that it was his inten- tion " to reach in this voyage Cathay on the extreme coast of Asia."
t Herrera (Dec. III, lib. 6, cap. 9) says, that Francis I, the rival of Charles V, had a desire to emulate him also in respect to western discov- ery. He relates, that Francis had uttered the expression, that " he did not think God had created those new countries for the Castilians alone." Herrera thinks, also, that the expedition was sent out especially for the discovery of a north-west passage, and of a route to the Molnecas; " a sub- jeet which at that time occupied the cosmographers and navigators of all sea-faring nations."
251
EXPEDITION OF VERRAZANO, 1524.
report to him on this first unfortunate attempt at exploration ; but this report has unhappily not come down to us.
After having repaired his vessels, Verrazano sailed again, well equipped for a cruise along the coasts of Spain .*
He went as far south as the island of Madeira. From this place he resolved to proceed to the west, but with only one of his vessels, " La Dauphine." As to what became of " La Normande," we have no account.
On board the " Dauphine " he had fifty, probably picked, men ; and she had provisions for an eight months' cruise, " arms and other warlike munitions and naval stores."
On the 17th of January, 1524, he parted from the " Islas desiertas," a well-known little group of islands near Ma- deira, and sailed at first westward, running in twenty-five days five hundred leagues, f with a light and pleasant easterly breeze along the northern border of the trade winds, in about 30° N. His track was consequently nearly like that of Co- lumbus on his first voyage.
On the 14th of February, ; he met " with as violent a hur- ricane as any ship ever encountered." But he weathered it, and pursued his voyage to the west, " with a little deviation to the north ;" when, after having sailed twenty-four days and four hundred leagues, he descried a new country which, as he supposed, had never before been seen either by modern or ancient navigators. The country was very low.
From the above description it is evident, that Verrazano came in sight of the east coast of the United States about
* Herrera (Dec. III, lib. 6, cap. 9) says, that he sailed from Dieppe on the 17th of Jannary, which probably is not correct.
t Ramnsio, I. c .; Herrera, I. c .; and also Haklnyt, in his " Divers Voy- ages," edited by the Hakluyt Society, London, 1850.
# So the Magliabecchian Manuscript (I. c. p. 56) has it. Ramusio and the "Divers Voyages" have the 20th of February, which appears less probable.
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252
EXPEDITION OF VERRAZANO, 1524.
the 10th of March, 1524. He places his land-fall in 34º N.,* which is the latitude of Cape Fear, a prominent peninsula projecting, with its islands and banks, far into the ocean, and was probably the first land seen by him.
He first sought a harbor for water and to repair his ship, and for this purpose sailed to the south along the coast " for about fifty leagues " t from the point of his land-fall. But he could find no port in this direction.
Seeing the coast trending still further south in the same manner, he reversed his course, and returned north ; but finding no suitable port, he came to anchor near the coast,; and sent some of his men on shore to look at the country and communicate with the inhabitants.
This landing-place must have been somewhat north of his land-fall in 34º N., perhaps not far from Cape Lookout. A section of low coast, sixty to seventy leagues in length, stretches along there, in which Verrazano could find no port ; and this corresponds with the character of the coast between Capes Lookout and Romain. There are long uniform tracts of low country without any estuary or port whatever, which might well have discouraged a weather-beaten and port- seeking navigator. The few inlets or ports existing there, lie behind sandy promontories, and might be easily overlooked.
South of Cape Romain are the harbor of Charleston, St. Helena Sound, the inlet of Port Royal, Savannah River, and other open channels on the coast of South Carolina and Geor- gia, as far down as the harbor of St. Augustine. The coast of Florida south of St. Augustine is destitute of any good
* See the Appendix to his letter in the Magliabecchian Manuscript, 1. c. P. 52.
t Twenty French marine leagues, probably meant here, make one de- gree of latitude.
# Ramusio, l. c. p. 420 A.
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253
EXPEDITION OF VERRAZANO, 1524.
harbor. As it is quite certain that Verrazano did not sail as far south as St. Augustine, it is evident that he could not have gone much south of Cape. Romain. We may there- fore, with some degree of probability, put down this cape as the southern terminus of his voyage. This cape is only about thirty French marine leagues from Cape Fear,-his land-fall. But Verrazano may have meant " fifty leagues," coming and going. At all events, his " fifty leagues," if we reckon them strictly, bring him on the coast of Carolina, and still north of Port Royal and St. Helena Sound. I therefore do not agree with the American author, who thinks "that he sailed at least as far as the southern part of the State of Georgia." * The important discovery of that more southern coast, so rich in harbors, belongs to another, a Spaniard,- Lucas Vasquez de Ayllon.
Those who hold that Verrazano's southern terminus was near the peninsula of Florida, have so thought, because he mentions the palm tree as among the productions of the coun- try, while this tree is not found north of Georgia."+ But even should this be true, we need not lay mnuch stress upon these "palm trees " of Verrazano. It is well known that the old navigators in these western countries very often saw what they wished to see. Verrazano says also, that " the country, being so near to the east (of Asia), would probably not be destitute of the medicinal and aromatic drugs of the Orient," and he thinks also that the country might contain gold, which he thought was " denoted by the color of the ground." So he may easily have thought, that he saw "palm trees " in some other trees resembling them.
From these considerations I infer, that Verrazano saw
* Rev. S. Miller, D. D., in New York Historical Society's Collections, vol. 1, p. 24. New York, 1811.
+ Dr. Miller, I. c.
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EXPEDITION OF VERRAZANO, 1524.
little of the coast of South Carolina, and nothing of that of Georgia, and that in these regions he can, at most, be called the discoverer only of the coast of North Carolina. Verrazano, who gives us. the oldest description known of this country, thus represents it: " The first line of the coast is sandy ; has behind it small rivers and arms of the sea that enter at cer- tain creeks, washing the shore on both sides. Beyond this appears a country rising in height above the sandy shore, with many fair fields and plains, and full of mighty woods. . ... The shore is shoal and without harbors, but it is free from rocks, and deep, so that within four or five feet of the shore, there are twenty feet of deep water, the depth increasing in a uniform proportion ; and there is very good riding at sea."
Verrazano wrote this account probably at the place where he, for the first time, anchored and went on shore. It is a truthful description of the coast of Onslow Bay in North Carolina, north-east of Cape Fear. From this we may infer, that his anchorage was near New River Inlet, in the center of this bay.
These considerations lead us to the conclusion, that the first land made by Verrazano was Cape Fear, in 34º N., which is in the very center of a harborless coast. And the correctness with which he gives this latitude tends further to convince us of the general accuracy of his observations of latitude, and especially of the accuracy of those latitudes which he afterwards mentions.
From the center of Onslow Bay Verrazano sailed on toward the east and north. Like the Cabots, who were at the same point thirty years before him, he probably feared that, in going further south, he should encounter the Span- iards, who had already discovered the coast of Carolina in the expedition of Ayllon in 1520, and at this very time were preparing to send this same navigator from St. Do-
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EXPEDITION OF VERRAZANO, 1524.
mingo, on a second expedition to the same regions, and with the same object of finding a north-west passage to Cathay.
" The coast," as he says, "stretched at first to the east,* and then turned to the north." Before coming to this north- ern land, Verrazano sent again some of his men on shore, probably in Raleigh Bay, where happened that hospitable and kind treatment so often related, which the wild inhabitants gave to a French boy, whom the waves had thrown on their shores.
Departing thence, we suppose he rounded Cape Hatteras, and at a distance of about fifty leagues, came to another shore, where he anchored and spent several days.}
While riding at anchor "on the coast for want of harbo- roughs," he explored the country, and found it full of im- mense forests a few leagues from the coast. Here he had an interview with the Indians, and brought one of their boys on board his ship, and kept him there.
This was the second principal landing-place of Verrazano. If we reckon fifty leagues from Cape Hatteras, it would fall somewhere upon the east coast of Delaware, in latitude 38º N., where, by some authors, ¿ it is thought to have been. But if, as appears to me most likely, Verrazano reckoned his dis- tance here, as he did in other cases, from his last anchoring, and not from Cape Hatteras, we must look for his second landing somewhere south of the entrance to Chesapeake Bay, and near the entrance to Albemarle Sound. And this better agrees with the " sail of one hundred leagues," which Verra- zano says he made from his second to his third landing-place in New York Bay. From the Peninsula of Delaware, in
Ramusio.
t Magliabecchian report: " sequendo sempre il lito que tornava verso settentrione, pervennimo in spazio di leghe 50 a una altra terra."
#J. W. Jones, in note to p. 61 of the " Divers Voyages."
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EXPEDITION OF VERRAZANO, 1524.
38° N., to New York harbor, it could scarcely be called " a sail of one hundred leagues." In a direct line, it is only fifty leagues.
Though Verrazano sailed from his second station "always in sight of the coast during the daytime, and always carefully coming to anchor in the night," still the large and beautiful entrance of Chesapeake Bay is not mentioned by him. Ilis second landing-place could not have been near this entrance, because he says, that at this station he was "riding on the coast for want of harboroughs." All the country was sandy and low, and for the space of two hundred leagues which he ran, "he never saw a stone of any sort." These "two hundred leagues of sandy, stoneless shores," probably desig- nate the coast from his southern terminus, Cape Romain, to his third landing-place, New York harbor, which is about two hundred French marine leagues.
After this sail of one hundred leagues from his second station, he found " a very pleasant place among some small. prominent hills, in the midst of which ran down to the sea a great body of water (una grandissima fiumara),* which was so deep at its mouth, that any heavily laden vessel might pass into it.
This is the first time that Verrazano mentions "hills" as having been seen by him. And there can be scarcely a doubt, that the Highlands of Neversink are here intended. They are the first hills of any importance found on the whole coast, from Florida north ; and the sight of them would natu- rally make a strong and agreeable impression on a navigator coming from that quarter. Near the capes of Virginia, at the entrance of Chesapeake Bay, some hills are observed ; but they have an elevation of not more than a hundred and
* Ramusio.
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EXPEDITION OF VERRAZANO, 1524. 257
thirty feet, while the Highlands of Neversink rise to an ele- vation of more than three hundred feet .*
It is further to be observed, that Verrazano does not speak here exactly of a river (fiume). That name would hardly seem appropriate to designate that great mass of water which passes out between Sandy Hook and Long Island. Verrazano calls it a "fiumara," f which, according to the dictionary of the Academia della Crusca, is more than a river (piu che un fiume), and is defined as a " congeries aqua- rum." This is a very appropriate term for the broad outlet of New York Bay, and corroborates the supposition, that the mouth of this bay is here intended. And this supposition is further confirmed by Verrazano's description of the coast.
So far as this point, the coast, he says, ran for a long distance from the south, but that afterwards "it trended for fifty leagues and more toward the east." This describes exactly the situation of the bay, in the north-west corner of the great triangular gulf of New York.
He found at this third landing station an excellent berth. where he came to anchor "well-protected from the winds " (in luogo ben coperto da venti), ¿ and from which he ascended the river in his boat into the interior. He found the shores very thickly settled, and as he passed up half a league further, he discovered a most beautiful lake (bellissimo lago), of three leagues in circumference. Here, more than thirty canoes came to him with a multitude of people (con infinite gente), who seemed very friendly, and showed him the best places for landing.
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