USA > Maine > A history of the discovery of Maine > Part 35
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The "exact description of St. Mary's Bay," to which I allude, is that given by Don Pedro Menendez Marques, who, in 1573, made a very minute survey of the coast of Florida, and after describing its more southern capes and inlets, comes to " Bahia de St. Maria," of which he speaks in the following terms : " This bay has at its entrance a breadth of three leagues," which is exactly the distance between the two well-known capes at the entrance of Chesapeake Bay .* " You enter into St. Mary's Bay toward the north-north- west;" which is in fact the trending of the main body of Chesapeake Bay. " At the entrance of St. Mary's Bay on the south side, near the land, are found soundings from nine to thirteen fathoms ; but on the north side, only from five to seven fathoms." Our modern surveys show that the south- ern Cape Henry has deeper soundings than the northern Cape Charles. "But two leagues out to sea, you find the same depth and soundings, both north and south, and more sandy bottom than within the bay. Passing through the channel you have from nine to thirteen fathoms, and on both sides, within the bay, are numerous rivers and ports, where ships can be moored." This needs no comment ; the whole description, and particularly that of the soundings, leaves no doubt that Chesapeake Bay, and no other, can be here intended.
* See Barcia, "Ensayo Cronol.," etc., p. 146 seq. Madrid, 1723.
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401
EXPEDITION OF AYLLON TO CHICORA, 1526.
Both the latitudes of St. Mary's Bay given in the fore- going description, "37° N." and "37° 30' N.,"* apply to Chesapeake Bay, but the former is more correct.
In the course of my examination, I shall have occasion to make use of this result, and to speak more at large on the interesting survey of Menendezin 1573. I will now return to Ayllon and his unfortunate crew, whom we left at their anchorage in S. Miguel de Gualdape (Cape Fear River).
Want of provisions soon forced them to make further ex- cursions into the country. Autumn was wearing away, and winter was drawing near. Many Spaniards sickened and died, and among them, Oct. 18, 1526, Ayllon himself, the chief commander.
One of the officers, Francisco Gomez, succeeded him in the command of the army and fleet, but was not . acknowledged by some of the officers. Disobedience, dissensions, and re- volts followed. Some of the soldiers disbanded, marched into the interior of the country, and lost their lives in battle with the Indians, who defended their homes against their assaults.t
At last, only one hundred and fifty men, out of the five hundred which had set out on this enterprise, remained alive ; and these, discouraged and exhausted, returned to S. Do- mingo, where they arrived in a miserable condition, after a stormy and dangerous passage.
The widow and son of Ayllon afterwards solicited the Spanish government to continue to them the grant made to him ; but we do not know that they effected anything for the continuance of the enterprise.$
* See Barcia, I. c. pp. 119 and 148.
t Herrera relates (1. c.) that on one occasion not less than two hundred Spaniards were slain by the Indians.
# Barcia, I. c. p. 9, says, that the son of Ayllon tried to do something for a new expedition to Chicora, but was not able to raise the necessary funds, and died in despair.
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402
EXPEDITIONS OF DE SOTO, 1538-1543.
2. THE EXPEDITIONS OF FERNANDO DE SOTO, DIEGO MAL- DONADO, AND GOMEZ ARIAS, 1538-1543.
After the discovery of Florida by Ponce de Leon in 1512, many thought that this country was only a large island. When, in 1519, the exciting news of the conquest of Mexico by Cortes reached the Spanish governors and settlers of the Antilles, several " conquistadors " and adventurers hastened to the northern shores of the Gulf of Mexico, to seek there for a country similar to the realm of Montezuma.
In 1519, Alonzo Alvarez Pineda, in the service of Fran- cisco de Garay, governor of Jamaica, surveyed a great part of this northern coast, and in 1520, Pamfilo de Narvaez was sent out on the track of Cortes by Velasquez, governor of Cuba, with eighteen vessels. In the same year Pineda sailed again to Panuco, in the north of Mexico. And in 1521, the old governor of Porto Rico, Ponce de Leon, once more undertook an expedition to his government of Florida, where unhappily he lost his life, leaving a son his heir and successor, who did not, however, follow the career of his father.
By all these expeditions, principally however by those of Pineda, it was proved, that Florida was not an island, but a peninsula joined to a great continent in the north, and that there 'existed no passage from the Gulf of Mexico either in the north-east or north-west. The same fact was also proved in the search on the shores of the Atlantic by Ayllon ; who, on his second expedition, in vain sought a strait to the west as high north as Chesapeake Bay.
When it was ascertained that the Gulf of Mexico was a closed basin, Cortes, who was now the governor of all these regions, and assumed to be the head of all enterprises con- nected with them and the north of Florida, now directed his
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403
EXPEDITIONS OF DE SOTO, 1538-1543.
attention to the subject of a north-west passage. In a letter dated Oct. 15, at the ctiy of Temistitan, he wrote to the Em- peror Charles,* that he was quite certain that a strait existed between the Atlantic and the South Sea, and that he was de- termined to solve the problem. "Though expenses crowded upon him," he says, "though he thought the enterprise would cost him more than 11,000 ducats ; still he had given orders to fit out several vessels, some to cruise along the Pacific shore to the north, and others concurrently along the coast of Florida to the Bacallaos. This grand exploring scheme of Cortes embraced, accordingly, a search of the coast of New England, which, however, was never carried into effect. For Cortes, soon after 1524, found urgent occu- pation in the south. The search along the Pacific was undertaken, and resulted in the discovery of the rocky penin- sula of California, and its long gulf, sometimes named after him " the Sea of Cortes."
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Though Pineda did not bring home very encouraging ac- counts from the northern coast of the Gulf of Mexico, where he saw nothing but sandy islands and shores, still it was thoughit by some enterprising Spanish captains, that there might be found, in the interior of the country, another Mexico or Peru. And hence two expeditions were undertaken in that direction ; one under Pamfilo de Narvaez, in 1528; the other and most important, under Fernando de Soto in 1538- 1543.
The expedition of Narvaez was most unfortunate, and pro- ductive of no good results. It was confined wholly to the Gulf of Mexico, and ended in the loss of his own life and that of most of his companions.
The expedition of De Soto in 1538-1513 was more exten- sive and more interesting. But before proceeding to a par-
* See this letter in Ramusio, vol. 3, fol. 204. Venetia, 1556.
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EXPEDITIONS OF DE SOTO, 1538-1543.
ticular narrative of it, I will give a brief account of some expeditions which were made during the period of more than twelve years between the voyages of Ayllon and De Soto.
It is not impossible, that during this period some parts of our coast may have been descried and sailed along by Span- ish vessels. Nay, it is scarcely credible that it should not have been so. Soon after the discovery of the Gulf-stream navigation by Alaminos, in 1519, many Spanish vessels sailed on the track of this navigator. On the one side, in the south, the commerce and navigation of Havana, on the coasts of the Bahama channel, had begun to be flourishing. On the other side, in the north, the Spaniards, after the time of Gomez, had begun to take a large share in the cod-fisheries of the Banks of Newfoundland. "These banks," says Asher, very ap- propriately,* " were at a moderate distance from the Spanish colonies in the West Indian Archipelago. It is therefore but natural for us to imagine, that the Spaniards sometimes included both points in the same voyage." It is also very probable, that some of those vessels, sailing along the east coast of North America, may have been occasionally forced out of their way, and driven upon our shores. If we were better acquainted with the history of Spanish shipwrecks, we should probably learn, that the connection of Spanish navigation with our coast was not wholly interrupted during this period.
I may also remind the reader of the sentiment expressed by Gomara, who incidentally remarks, " that many voyages of discovery had been made to the Western Indies, particu- larly to the north, of which we have received no record." + It must, however, be confessed, that we know nothing for
* See Asher, Henry Hudson, Introduction, p. C.
t See this observation in Gomara, Historia General de las Indias, fol. 20. Saragossa, 1553.
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DISCOVERY OF BERMUDA.
certain regarding such expeditions. Not a single log or jour- . nal of any Spanish vessel, sailing through our waters during this period, has been preserved. And it is also worth the mention, that Oviedo, who wrote his history of Spanish ship- wrecks in the West Indies in the year 1535, does not mention any shipwreck as having happened on our coasts .*
From our only happening sometimes to hear incidentally of similar disasters, even in later times when the published re- ports respecting our coast were more numerous and complete, we can easily explain how these early events may have failed to have reached these general historians. In the year 1584, when Sir Walter Raleigh's captains, Amadas and Barlow, came to the shores of Virginia, they learned from the In- dians, that about twenty years before (1564), a great vessel, belonging to a Christian- nation, had been wrecked on the coast. And again, in the year 1607, when the English cap- tains Popham and Gilbert arrived on the coast of Maine, the Indians of this country came out to them " in a Spanish shallop," probably the boat of a Spanish vessel ; that had visited the coast, or had been wrecked there. How many may have been the accidents of this kind, of which no report had ever come to European ears !
There is, however, one event of considerable interest to us, and well ascertained, which occurred during this period, at no great distance from our coasts ; namely, the discovery of the island of Bermuda. This took place probably in about the year 1526,¿ by the Spanish captain Juan Bermudez, from
* See Oviedo, Historia General de las Indias, lib. 20. "De los infortu- nios y naufragios. Sevilla, 1535.
t [Strachey mentions two shallops, Historie of Travaile, p. 165. Edited by R. H. Major. London, 1849. A " Biscay shallop" and articles of Eu- ropean clothing are mentioned in Archer's account of Gosnold's voyage, at "Savage Rock" (C. Neddoc), in 1602, Mass. Hist. Coll., 3d series, vol. 8, p. 73 .- ED.]
# The exact date of this discovery is given neither by Herrera, nor, so far as I know, by any other Spanish author.
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DISCOVERY OF BERMUDA.
whom it received its name, though it was also called by the Spaniards, " La Garça."
Soon after this island was discovered, the king of Spain desired to plant a colony there ; and in 1527, Hernando Camelo, a Portuguese from the Azores, offered to make a settlement. He concluded with the Spanish government a contract, by which he engaged to carry over to the Bermu- das cattle, seeds, plants, and men, and to establish, within four years, a settlement of Portuguese and Spaniards ; and in consideration of this service, he received the appointment of governor of the Bermudas.
The reason for this anxiety of the king of Spain, that a plantation should be. effected at the Bermudas, is given by Herrera as follows : "That nearly all his West Indian fleets passed the vicinity of uninhabited islands, and that it would be a great advantage for them to have a hospitable station on their route. He hoped, also, that by the cultivation of the Bermudas, the swamps on them might disappear, which were considered to be a cause of the bad weather and of the great gales usually prevailing about those islands." Had such a Spanish colony been established at the Bermudas, growing out of the colonies at the Azores and Canaries, it would probably have given rise to another Spanish planta- tion on our coast. But Herrera, who tells us all this, adds, that "notwithstanding all the promises of Camelo, and all the advantages conceded to him by the king, no colonization of the island was effected ; and that up to his time, 1600, he could find no record of any renewal of the attempt."* And as for the Bermudas' gales, they of course were not done away with.
How intimately the Bermudas are connected by their po- sition with the history of the discovery of our coast, became
* Herrera, Dec. IV, lib. 2, cap. 6.
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407
. DE SOTO'S EXPEDITION, 1558-1543.
still more evident at a later time, when they were rediscov- ered by the English on their expedition to Virginia; and then planted by an English colony.
On the chart of Ribero, only three years after their dis- covery, the Bermudas are placed in their true latitude, 32º N., and nearly at their true distance from our coast. They may be used sometimes as a way-mark, in examining the po- sition of certain localities on our coast.
I now return to the expedition of De Soto, 1538-1543. In the course of three years he marched over a large portion of our southern country, exploring and taking possession of it for the crown of Spain. From his landing-place on the west coast of Florida, he proceeded first to the north-east, : and came to that part of the east coast which Ayllon had visited in 1526, and among the Indians of the region now known as South Carolina found Spanish arms and iron im- plements. Some of his companions suggested the reasonable idea, that a settlement might be made on this part of the coast for the benefit of Spanish navigation and commerce. But De Soto's imagination was occupied with schemes which he thought more profitable, and much grander. A conqueror of Peru, he could not descend to so small a matter as found- ing a colony for merchants. He thought of the conquest of another Peru, and another Atabalipa, to be accomplished in the interior of North America. Leaving, therefore, the oceanic route and the sea-shore, he marched into the interior, at first in a north-north-western direction, probably along the Savan- nalı River. On this route he came to a great mountain-range, running parallel with the coast. He and his company were the first Europeans who had seen this range of mountains in its southern section ; the northern section, on the northern frontier of Maine, had been seen at a distance by Cartier in
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DE SOTO'S EXPEDITION, 1538-1543.
1535. De Soto gave them the name of "mountains of Apalache," which found a place on the maps of the middle of the sixteenth century .* The obstructions which he found in the passes of these mountains turned him toward the south- west and the Gulf of Mexico, where he had left his fleet under his captain, Diego Maldonado. His most northern ter- minus on the Alleghany range, may be put in about 30° 40' N., not far from Clayton. ¡
From the Gulf of Mexico, De Soto set out again with fresh courage in a north-western direction; and after trav- ersing a large part of the present States of Alabama and Mississippi, reached the banks of the " Great River of Flor- ida " (the Mississippi), at some point in its interior section, which was then seen for the first time by Europeans, though its mouth had been known to the Spaniards since the expe- dition of Pineda in 1519, under the name of "Rio del Es- piritu Santo." De Soto explored this river to a point as high as about the mouth of the Ohio; and having experienced great hardships there, and encountered many perils in con- flict with the savage tribes, and performed many gallant ex- ploits, this heroic conqueror died without having gained the objects of his enterprise, and was buried in the waves of the great river which he had discovered. A part of his company, after many other adventures, and after a toilsome and ardu- ous march still further west to the "country of the wild cows," at last sailed down the Mississippi to the gulf, and pro- ceeded to Mexico, where the miserable remnant of this ill- fated expedition arrived in the summer of 1543, after an ab- sence of five years. De Soto appears to have gone as far north as 38°; and in this space, though he had failed to find
* See our map of Mercator, No. 22.]
t [In Georgia, at the base of the Blue Ridge, about 180 miles from Mil- ledgeville .- ED.]
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MALDONADO'S EXPEDITION, 1541.
the salt-water of the South Sea, had made a discovery almost as grand in the magnificent River Mississippi. As he saw its great affluents pouring in on one side and on the other, he must have become impressed with the idea, that they could come only from the territory of an immense conti- nent, extending to high northern latitudes. In like manner the discoverer of the St. Lawrence must have become im- pressed with the vastness of the continent in which its tribu- tary rivers had their origin. And thus both Cartier and De Soto must have learned, that the great Western Ocean of which they were in pursuit, must be very far distant; and that, contrary to the former views and the delineations of the old maps, the western half of North America must have the vast dimensions which they are now known to possess ; thus securing to the States on the east coast a spacious and ade- quate back-ground.
The names introduced by De Soto, and the information imparted by him in the reports of his discoveries, furnished the ground-work of the geography of the whole south of the United States, and the principal source of knowledge regard- ing these regions, for more than a hundred years.
The closing expedition of De Soto gave rise to extensive voyages, which, reaching as far as the New England coasts, are specially interesting to us, although unhappily we have but little information regarding them. These expeditions were undertaken by his wife, the accomplished Isabella de Bobadilla. During the absence of her husband, she resided at Havana, and had charge of the government of Cuba. Her anxiety for the safety of her husband, kept her continually on the watch for him ; and at last, troubled and distressed by his long absence, she fitted out an expedition under command of De Soto's faithful captain, Diego Maldonado, to go in search of him. The principal account of this voyage is given
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410
MALDONADO'S EXPEDITION, 1541.
by Garcilasso de la Vega, who says that Maldonado, in 1540, having explored the coast of the Gulf of Mexico for his ab- sent chief without success, extended his search in 1541, with his companion Gomez Arias, along the eastern coast as far as the country of Bacallaos .*
This short and meagre report of Garcilasso is adopted by Herrerat as well as by Barcia ; # and though they add noth- ing to our information regarding it, we can, with such author- ities in its support, scarcely doubt its truth. And if the truth of this voyage of Maldonado is admitted, it is obvious from its object as a searching expedition, that it must have required a very close inspection of our coasts. Maldonado is reported to have said " that he could not think the land had devoured his chief and master De Soto and his compan- ions, and that somewhere something must be found of them." In searching for this "something" of the remains of a lost expedition, he would not be satisfied with a general observa- tion in looking after these castaways on the broad ocean, but would closely inspect every cape on which a distressed crew might have left some signs, and every harbor and inlet where they might be still living, or where he might obtain some information regarding them from the natives.
That this expedition in 1541 " as far as Bacallaos," must have involved a thorough search of our coast, may be also inferred from the circumstance, that Maldonado, in 1542- 1543, returned directly to the gulf without visiting again our east coast. He appears to have thought, that he had done his best in that region, and satisfied himself that De Soto could not have wandered so far away. .
* Garcilasso, 1. c., libro sexto, cap. 20, " no dejaron correr toda la Costa, por la vanda del Oriente hasta la tierra de Baccallaos."
t See Dec. VII, lib. 7, cap. 12.
# Ensayo Cronol. del seel " Anno 1541."
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MALDONADO'S EXPEDITION, 1541.
From all these circumstances we are strongly inclined to the opinion, that Maldonado's voyage was one of the most care- ful and thorough explorations of our east coast ever made by the Spaniards, of which any account has come down to us.
It is, therefore, not a little to be regretted, that we are not favored with his log and journal. Perhaps we may ascribe to him the Spanish names on our coast which we occasionally find mentioned by Spanish historians, geographers, and map- makers of that time, for which we have no other authority.
I also infer from the quiet way in which Cortes * and other writers speak of the voyage from Havana to Baccallaos along our coast, that this may have been a regular track for the Spaniards, instead of an exceptional instance.
The bearing of our examination of these carly Spanish un- dertakings in the southern section of the east coast of the United States, during the long period from Columbus to De Soto, upon the history and geography of our northern sec- tion of the same, may be thus briefly stated :
By these expeditions, while the true outlines and trending of the southern section of this coast became better defined and understood, it necessarily followed, that at the same time new light would be thrown upon the northern section, as con- nected with it.
The entire navigation of the whole east coast was, by these expeditions, made easier and more familiar.
Several localities in the neighborhood of the northern sec- tion of our coasts, as Chesapeake Bay, the Bermudas, and other localities, were either first discovered by these expedi- tions, or had their position more definitely fixed, and have since proved as way-marks for the true interpretation of the old charts of our coast.
* In his above-quoted letter to the emperor in the year 1524.
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MALDONADO'S EXPEDITION, 1541.
In several of the expeditions referred to, occurring during the period in question, our north-eastern coasts were specially had in view, and were distinctly included in their original plan. The scheme of Cortes in 1524, and of Ayllon in 1526, were, equally with that of Gomez in 1525, intended for the discovery of a north-west passage. Once at least, during this period, our northern coast was actually reached in Maldona- do's search for De Soto in 1541.
There is also a probability that some parts of the northern section of the east coast of the United States were frequently, during this period, at least sighted, if not actually visited by the Spaniards, from the circumstance that their vessels and fleets so often followed the course of the Gulf-stream, and also that the Spanish Basques were then accustomed to resort yearly to the Banks of Newfoundland.
CHAPTER XI.
THE EXPEDITIONS UNDER RIBAULT AND LAUDONNIERE TO FLORIDA, AND THE SPANISH AND ENGLISH UNDER- TAKINGS CONNECTED WITH THEM, LV 1562-1574.
1. THE TIME BETWEEN DE SOTO AND RIBAULT, INCLUDING THEVET'S DESCRIPTION OF MAINE.
THE French expeditions to North America, which com- menced soon after the middle of the sixteenth century, were directed to the southern section of our east coast, the early discovery of which we have considered in a former chapter.
These voyages were in several ways connected with the great English expeditions subsequently undertaken to " Vir- ginia " both "Southern " and "Northern." The French captains tried new oceanic routes to our east coast, which were afterwards followed by the English. Their pilots brought to "Virginia" Captain John Hawkins, one of the most fa- mous of English navigators. Their writings and their charts upon the part of the east coast explored by them were car- ried to England, and spread information, and awakened a gen- eral excitement in regard to these countries. Thus the French captains, Ribault, Laudonniere and others, prepared the way for Gilbert, Raleigh, and Grenville, by whom the work of discovery was carried forward, both in the northern and southern sections of our east coast, until it was at length completed in its central portion of New England and New York, by the discoveries of' Gosnold, of Pring, of Wey- mouth, of Hudson, and Smith. It will, therefore, be instruc-
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EXPEDITIONS TO FLORIDA, 1562-1574.
tive to give a short account of these French explorers, who may justly be considered as the precursors of the later Eng- lish adventurers, and to point out the facts in their history which had an influence on the subsequent expeditions of the English to Virginia ; omitting, however, those specialties . which belong exclusively to the history of the Southern States.
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