Hernando De Soto
Hernando De Soto
b. 1500 Barcarrota,
Spain d. 1542 Louisiana
At
the age of 19, De Soto sailed to the New World with Paedrarias Da'vila, the
governor of Darie'n
(now
Panama).
After 13 years of ruthless soldiering and successful horsemanship, he joined
forces with Francisco Pizarro in the campaign to conquer the Incas. A generous
share of the gold taken from
Peru
made him rich, and he went home to
Spain
and married Da'vila's daughter.
De
Soto talked the king of Spain into making him governor of
Cuba
and
Florida.
He recruited an army of between 600 and 1,000 men and paid for their equipment
out of his own fortune, feeling that this was a good investment. Captured
Indians in Peru had told of lands to the north richer than any in
South America.
The expedition left
Havana
in May, 1539, and landed midway up the west coast of
Florida
at Tampa Bay. For three fruitless months De Soto and his men marched into the
new land, swimming across rivers, slogging through swamps, and fighting with
Indians. They then headed northeast in the direction of a great city, said to
be built of gold bricks and ruled by an empress through whose very veins gold
flowed. Finding neither her nor her city of gold, they made their way up into
present-day
Georgia
and the Carolinas
(meaning both
North
and
South
Carolina),
then down through
Alabama
and on into
Mississippi.
When
their supplies ran low, De Soto rallied his men by reminding them of the
riches that surely lay just ahead. All along the route, they exported supplies
from the Indians and tortured them to learn the location of the "gold mines."
In 1541, they reached the area where Memphis lies today and first saw the
Mississippi River.
They built barges and crossed into what is now
Arkansas,
and within sight of the Neosho River in northeastern
Oklahoma.
There they stopped to take bitter stock - there was no gold, their whole trip
had been for nothing.
De Soto
led his group south, but near the junction of the
Mississippi
and the
Red River
he fell ill with
fever and died. His 300 leaderless men wandered about for a year before
deciding to sail from the mouth of the
Mississippi
down the coast to Tampico,
Mexico,
where, they were "Welcomed by the Christians."
Below are links and sites for more information on Hernando De
Soto.
This site was last updated
08/04/2004 08:08 PM -0400