Editing Hernando de Soto (section)

=== 1539: Florida ===
[[File:DeSoto-Hernando-1791.jpeg|thumb|[[Library of Congress]]' engraving.<br />The Spanish caption reads:<br />"HERNANDO DE SOTO: Extremaduran, one of the discoverers and conquerors of Peru: he travelled across all of Florida and defeated its previously invincible natives, he died on his expedition in the year 1542 at the age of 42".]]

In May 1539, de Soto landed nine ships with over 620 men and 220 horses in an area generally identified as south [[Tampa Bay]]. Historian Robert S. Weddle has suggested that he landed at either [[Charlotte Harbor (estuary)|Charlotte Harbor]] or [[Charlotte Harbor (estuary)|San Carlos Bay]].<ref name="Weddle">{{cite book|author1=Robert S. Weddle|editor1-last=Galloway|editor1-first=Patricia Kay|title=The Hernando de Soto Expedition: History, Historiography, and "Discovery" in the Southeast|date=2006|publisher=University of Nebraska Press|isbn=978-0-8032-7122-7|page=223|edition=New|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zzGphaI83EUC&q=cHARLOTTE&pg=PA223|access-date=17 February 2017|chapter=Soto's Problems of Orientation}}</ref> He named the land as ''Espíritu Santo'', after the [[Holy Spirit in Christianity|Holy Spirit]]. The ships carried priests, craftsmen, engineers, farmers, and merchants; some with their families, some from Cuba, most from Europe and Africa. Few of the men had traveled before outside of Spain, or even away from their home villages.

Near de Soto's port, the party found [[Juan Ortiz (captive)|Juan Ortiz]], a [[Spanish people|Spaniard]] living with the Mocoso people. Ortiz had been captured by the [[Uzita (Florida)|Uzita]] while searching for the lost [[Narváez expedition]]; he later escaped to [[Mocoso]]. Ortiz had learned the [[Timucua language]] and served as an interpreter to de Soto as he traversed the Timucuan-speaking areas on his way to [[Apalachee]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Hann|first=John H.|title=Indians of Central and South Florida: 1513–1763|year=2003|publisher=University Press of Florida|location=Gainesville|isbn=0-8130-2645-8|page=6}}<br />{{cite book|last=Milanich|first=Jerald T.|title=Handbook of North American Indians: Southeast Vol. 14|year=2004|publisher=Smithsonian Institution|page=213|editor=R. D. Fogelson|chapter=Early Groups of Central and South Florida}}<br />{{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20060507155726/http://www.floridahistory.com/inset444.html DeSoto's Florida Trails]}} – retrieved 5 September 2008</ref>

Ortiz developed a method for guiding the expedition and communicating with the various tribes, who spoke many dialects and languages. He recruited guides from each tribe along the route. A chain of communication was established whereby a guide who had lived in close proximity to another tribal area was able to pass his information and language on to a guide from a neighboring area. Because Ortiz refused to dress as a [[Hidalgo (nobility)|''hidalgo'']] Spaniard, other officers questioned his motives. De Soto remained loyal to Ortiz, allowing him the freedom to dress and live among his native friends. Another important guide was the seventeen-year-old boy ''Perico'', or Pedro, from what is now [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]. He spoke several of the local tribes' languages and could communicate with Ortiz. Perico was taken as a guide in 1540. The Spanish had also captured other Indians, whom they used as [[slave]] labor.{{clarify|reason=this is the first time "slavery" has been mentioned. Not a trivial topic.|date=December 2013}} Perico was treated better due to his value to the Spaniards.

The expedition traveled north, exploring Florida's West Coast, and encountering native ambushes and conflicts along the way. Hernando de Soto's army seized the food stored in the villages, captured women to be used as slaves for the soldiers' sexual gratification, and forced men and boys to serve as guides and bearers. The army fought two battles with Timucua groups, resulting in heavy Timucua casualties. After defeating the resisting [[Timucuan]] warriors, Hernando de Soto had 200 executed, in what was to be called the Napituca Massacre, the first large-scale massacre by Europeans in the current United States.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Sloan |first1=David |last2=Duncan |first2=David Ewing |date=1996 |title=Hernando de Soto: A Savage Quest in the Americas. |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/40030985 |journal=The Arkansas Historical Quarterly |volume=55 |issue=3 |pages=327 |doi=10.2307/40030985 |jstor=40030985 |issn=0004-1823}}</ref> One of Soto's most important battles with the natives, along his conquest of Florida, was a 1539 battle with Chief Vitachuco. Unlike other native chiefs who entered into peace with the Spanish, Vitachuco did not trust them and had secretly plotted to kill Soto and his army, but he was betrayed by interpreters who told Soto the plan. So, Soto struck first and, in the process, killed thousands of natives. Those that survived were surrounded and cornered by woods and water. Thousands were killed during the 3 hours battle and 900 survivors took refuge in the pond, specifically Two-mile Pond in Melrose, where they continued to fight, while swimming.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Florida of the Inca {{!}} Early Americas Digital Archive (EADA) |url=https://eada.lib.umd.edu/text-entries/florida-of-the-inca/ |access-date=2024-10-07 |website=eada.lib.umd.edu}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Noszky |first1=H. von |title=An Indian Battlefield Near Melrose |journal=Florida Historical Quarterly |date=1909 |volume=2 |issue=1 |pages=47-48 |url=https://stars.library.ucf.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1419&context=fhq |access-date=31 October 2024}}</ref> Most eventually surrendered, but after 30 hours in the water, 7 men remained and had to be dragged out of the water by the Spanish. De Soto's first winter encampment was at ''[[Anhaica]]'', the capital of the [[Apalachee]] people. It is one of the few places on the route where archaeologists have found physical traces of the expedition. The chroniclers described this settlement as being near the [[Narváez expedition#Apalachee|"Bay of Horses"]]. The bay was named for events of the 1527 [[Narváez expedition]], the members of which, dying of starvation, killed and ate their horses while building boats for escape by the Gulf of Mexico.