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Juan Garrido Pictured on the far left |
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Juan Garrido |
the Black Conquistador |
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One of the first Black Persons to set foot in the New World. |
.The First Person to Introduce Wheat to the New World
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...One of The first Free Person's of Color in the New World.....
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A Conquistador in Cortez's Army who helped conquer the Aztecs
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Juan Garrido
He crossed the Atlantic as a freedman in the 1510s and participated in the siege of Tenochtitlan.
[He was known as "Handsome John."
He was one of many black freedmen who came from Seville to the Americas.
From the very onset of Spanish activity in the Americas, Africans were present both as voluntary expeditionaries and as involuntary colonists.
Arriving in Santo Domingo in 1502 or 1503, Garrido was among the earliest Africans to reach the Americas. Juan Garrido was neither the only African to participate in the fall of Tenochtitlán, nor the sole black member of Spanish expeditions to the west; he and other Blacks went to Michoacán in the 1520s, and Nuño de Guzmán swept through that region in 1529-30 with the aid of black auxiliaries.
Authentic Appeal to the King of Spain
"I, Juan Garrido, black resident [de color negro vecino] of this city [Mexico], appear before Your Mercy and state that I am in need of making a probanza to the perpetuity of the king [a perpetuad rey], a report on how I served Your Majesty in the conquest and pacification of this New Spain, from the time when the Marqués del Valle [Cortés] entered it; and in his company I was present at all the invasions and conquests and pacifications which were carried out, always with the said Marqués, all of which I did at my own expense without being given either salary or allotment of natives [repartimiento de indios] or anything else.
As I am married and a resident of this city, where I have always lived; and also as I went with the Marqués del Valle to discover the islands which are in that part of the southern sea [the Pacific] where there was much hunger and privation; and also as I went to discover and pacify the islands of San Juan de Buriquén de Puerto Rico; and also as I went on the pacification and conquest of the island of Cuba with the adelantado Diego Velázquez; in all these ways for thirty years have I served and continue to serve Your Majesty--for these reasons stated above do I petition Your Mercy.
And also because I was the first to have the inspiration to sow maize here in New Spain and to see if it took; I did this and experimented at my
Source... wikipedia.co
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 Omouro |
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Spanish Conquistadors...Click to enlarge...See the Turban clad Black Moor at the upper left |
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Everything You need to know about the History of Florida
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And See the Original Manuscriped....... Click Here
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Juan Garrido,
African Conquistador
By Amy Howard
We know quite a bit about Juan Garrido (1487-1547) thanks to his written petition for a pension from the Spanish government. When we add more details from Spanish colonial records, we see a man who led a full and exciting life.We know that Garrido fought for Spain in Hispaniola, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Guadeloupe, Dominica, Florida, and Mexico.
Like the other conquistadors, he was in search of fortune, or at the very least, a comfortable life for his family. He did win some spoils and farmland from conquered natives. He even owned African and Indian slaves. Nevertheless, like most of the treasure-hunting conquistadors, he died poor.Unlike his fellow conquistadors, Juan Garrido appears to be the first free black person in the Americas, and he was the first person to grow wheat in the New World.
Black Conquistadors
Juan Garrido was not alone. Other black Africans found their way into Spanish society rather than slavery. Many joined the Conquest as soldiers, some in exchange for freedom, others for financial compensation. Sometimes they enjoyed rewards like the Spaniards got, including land, official jobs, and pensions.
Often they had to plead their own case in written petitions. The Crown usually acknowledged their petitions, but didn't always grant them. Regardless of Spain's reward to them, they all received their share of the loot taken from the Native Americans.
A Free African-Spaniard
Juan Garrido was born in 1487 on the west coast of Africa and moved to Lisbon, Portugal as a young man. His freedom among slavers is still a mystery. Historian Ricardo Alegria suspects Garrido's father was a king who traded with the Portuguese.
This theoretical African king may have set young Juan up as a commercial liaison, sending him for a Christian and Portuguese education.Other historians presume Garrido was a slave who was granted freedom. This theory comes from the coincidence of his name matching a Spaniard's on his first voyage to the New World.
The fifteen-year-old African boy traveled from Lisbon to Seville, Spain, and in 1503 he joined the convoy to Hispaniola with the island's newly appointed governor. A Spaniard on the ship with him was named Pedro Garrido. Pedro might have been Juan's master and Christian namesake. Either way, Juan's name surely was not Juan in Africa.
Juan Garrido, Ponce de Leon, and Florida
Garrido spent six years at Hispaniola watching explorers pillage the New World. The Spanish government allowed the conquistadors to take land, people, and treasure; it was the Crown's attempt to convert the world to Catholicism. Garrido signed on for the Conquest. In 1508, he joined Juan Ponce de Leon with about fifty conquistadors to look for gold in Puerto Rico.
They found it, and Garrido's life became a thirty-year adventure of exploring, fighting, and looting.Ponce de Leon settled Puerto Rico and became its governor. Garrido settled there too, and fought against the natives when they revolted in 1511. When Ponce lost his position to Diego Columbus in 1513, he took Garrido and other soldiers to look for another treasure island. Instead, they found the huge peninsula of Florida.
They were not equipped to take on the Florida natives. They claimed it, named it, and planned to return later to conquer it.Duty called back in the Caribbean. The Carib Indians were launching ferocious revolts against the Spanish. Garrido scouted the islands with Ponce, "pacifying" (fighting) and enslaving Native Americans. Then it was back to Puerto Rico. Ponce's wife died and he spent time raising his daughters. Meanwhile, Garrido assisted other small expeditions and mined for gold.
Ponce and company finally returned to Florida in 1521 with settlers, livestock, supplies, and weapons to control the natives. Florida's Indians ran the settlers off before they even got settled. Ponce took an arrow shot and rushed to Cuba for medical attention, but Spanish doctors couldn't save him. He died a month later. Garrido had worked for Ponce for thirteen years.
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Juan Garrido, Hernando Cortez, and Mexico City
Cortez's Conquest of Tenochtitilan
Garrido did not hesitate to find a new employer - or a new vehicle for fortune hunting. This time he was able to plant roots. The August after Ponce died, Garrido joined Hernando Cortez to conquer the mighty city of Tenochtitlan (now Mexico City) from the Aztecs. The Spaniards won, but with immense casualties on both sides.
Cortez took over the Aztec fortress and awarded Garrido land near the city gate. There, Garrido built a chapel and buried some of the fallen conquistadors. He later named it "The Martyrs" - perhaps to persuade himself that the conquest was for religious reasons. (Seventy-five years later, the current church "San Hipolito of the Martyrs" was built on that spot.) Faith aside, Garrido's devotion to Spain was finally paying dividends.
Garrido acquired some Indian and African slaves. He farmed the land near the gate of what is now Mexico City. He planted some grains of wheat, and within two years had a plantation exporting commercial quantities of flour. He sold it to Spanish colonies who had reluctantly relied on corn for lack of wheat in their new locales. By all available accounts, Juan Garrido is the first person to grow wheat in the Americas. He was thirty-six years old.
Garrido got married and had children at his plantation. Cortez awarded him a changing stream of paid positions, including doorkeeper, town crier, guardian of the Chapultepec aqueduct, and city manager.
But Juan Garrido was more of an adventurer at heart. In 1527, he and a group of treasure hunters rushed for the gold that was reported in Michoacan. He invested his own money for the trip, and came back penniless within the year. He returned the following year with a slave gang to mine for gold, but again found nothing.
Garrido settled down at his plantation for another five years. But he could barely make ends meet. He was deep in debt when Cortez tempted him for the last time in 1533. Garrido followed Cortez to another legendary island supposedly filled with black women, gold, and pearls. Once again, it turned out to be a barren peninsula: Baja California. He had borrowed money for the trip, and came home penniless two years later. The year was 1535; he submitted his request for pension in 1538.
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Unsigned 16th century engraving of Juan Garrido and Hernando Cortez meeting Aztecs
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Garrido the Poor and Famous
For all his pursuit of fortune and fame, Juan Garrido died poor on his plantation at the age of 67. He left a wife and three children. Actually, this fate was on par with most of the Spanish conquistadors. Nevertheless, Garrido was popular enough to be depicted as an explorer with Hernando Cortez and Ponce de Leon in fresco paintings that same century.
Subsequent Mexican generations, on the other hand, have hailed Juan Garrido as the New World's first wheat sower. In the 1950s, Diego Rivera painted him in a mural of Mexican agriculture on the wall of the National Palace.
Now we're into the next century, and the color of Garrido's skin has become yet another source of fame for him. Since black oppression became a hot historical subject in the United States, Juan Garrido stands out as the first black man to dictate his own life in the Americas, in the United States, and in Florida.
Garrido's Memoir (Petition for Pension)
Garrido's petition for a pension includes a 'probanza,' a proof of merit. In it, he outlines his service to Spain. We call it a 'memoir' because it also outlines his life. Little did he know, people would be reading his letters over four hundred years later.
Juan Garrido's Memoir to Charles V of Spain, 1538
I, Juan Garrido, black resident of this city [Mexico City], appear before Your Mercy and state that I am in need of making a probanza to the perpetuity of the king, a report on how I served Your Majesty in the conquest and pacification of this New Spain, from the time when the Marqués del Valle [Cortez] entered it; and in his company I was present at all the invasions and conquests and pacifications which were carried out, always with the said Marqués, all of which I did at my own expense without being given either salary or allotment of natives or anything else. As I am married and a resident of this city
where I have always lived; and also as I went with the Marqués del Valle to discover the islands which are in that part of the southern sea [the Pacific] where there was much hunger and privation; and also as I went to discover and pacify the islands of San Juan de Buriquén de Puerto Rico; and also as I went on the pacification and conquest of the island of Cuba with the adelantado Diego Velázquez;
in all these ways for thirty years have I served and continue to serve Your Majesty - for these reasons stated above do I petition Your Mercy. And also because I was the first to have the inspiration to sow maize [wheat] here in New Spain and to see if it took; I did this and experimented at my own expense.
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Execellent reading and Good History on Juan Garrido, African Conquistador .....click here
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