Trickery of Casquin. The
March to Capaha. The Battle and its
Results. Friendly Relations with Capaha. The
Return Journey. The Marsh Southward. Salt
Springs. The Savages of Tula. Their
Ferocity. Anecdote. Despondency
of De Soto.
It is painful to recall the mind from
these peaceful, joy-giving, humanizing scenes of religion,
to barbaric war its crime, carnage, and
misery. It is an affecting comment upon the fall
of man, that far away in this wilderness, among these
tribes that might so have blessed and cheered each
other by fraternal love, war seems to have been the
normal condition. After a residence of nine days
in this village, beneath truly sunny skies, in the
enjoyment of abundance, and cheered by fruits, flowers,
and bird-songs, the Spanish army again commenced its
march in the wild and apparently senseless search for
gold.
The Cacique, Casquin, was about fifty
years of age. He begged permission to accompany
De Soto to the next province, with his whole army
in its best military array, and with a numerous band
of attendants to carry provisions and to gather wood
and fodder for the encampments. De Soto cheerfully
accepted this friendly offer. But he soon found
that it was hatred, not love, which was the impelling
motive; that the chief was incited by a desire to make
war, not to cultivate peace. The chief of the
next province was a redoubtable warrior named Capaha.
His territories were extensive; his subjects numerous
and martial. Time out of mind there had been warfare
between these two provinces, the subjects of each
hating each other implacably.
Capaha had in recent conflicts been
quite the victor, and Casquin thought this a good
opportunity, with the Spaniards for his powerful allies,
to take signal vengeance upon his foe. Of this
De Soto, at the time, knew nothing.
The army commenced its march.
There were five thousand native warriors who accompanied
him, plumed, painted, and armed in the highest style
of savage art. There were three thousand attendants,
who bore the supplies, and who were also armed with
bows and arrows. Casquin, with his troops, took
the lead; wishing, as he said, to clear the road of
any obstructions, to drive off any lurking foes, and
to prepare at night the ground for the comfortable
encampment of the Spaniards. His troops were
in a good state of military discipline, and marched
in well organized array about a mile and a half in
advance of the Spaniards.
Thus they travelled for three uneventful
days, until they reached an immense swamp, extending
back unknown miles from the Mississippi. This
was the frontier line which bordered the hostile provinces
of Casquin and Capaha. Crossing it with much
difficulty, they encamped upon a beautiful prairie
upon the northern side. A journey of two days
through a sparsely inhabited country brought them to
the more fertile and populous region of the new province.
Here they found the capital of the Cacique. It
was a well fortified town of about five hundred large
houses, situated upon elevated land, which commanded
an extensive view of the country around. One
portion of the town was protected by a deep ditch,
one hundred and fifty feet broad. The higher
portion was defended by a strong palisade. The
ditch, or canal, connected with the Mississippi river,
which was nine miles distant.
Capaha, hearing suddenly of the arrival
of so formidable a force, fled down the canal in a
curve, to an island in the river, where he summoned
his warriors to meet him as speedily as possible.
Casquin, marching as usual a mile and a half in advance,
finding the town unprotected, and almost abandoned,
entered and immediately commenced all the ravages
of savage warfare. One hundred men, women and
children, caught in the place, were immediately seized,
the men killed and scalped, the women and boys made
captives. To gratify their vengeance, they broke
into the mausoleum, held so sacred by the Indians,
where the remains of all the great men of the tribe
had been deposited. They broke open the coffins,
scattered the remains over the floor and trampled
them beneath their feet.
It is said that Casquin, would have
set fire to the mausoleum, and laid it and the whole
village in ashes, but that he feared that he might
thus incur the anger of De Soto. When the Governor
arrived and saw what ravages had been committed by
those who had come as his companions, friends and
allies, he was greatly distressed. Immediately
he sent envoys to Capaha on the island, assuring him
of his regret in view of the outrages; that neither
he, nor his soldiers, had in the slightest degree
participated in them, and that he sought only friendly
relations with the Cacique.
Capaha, who was a proud warrior, and
who had retired but for a little time that he might
marshal his armies to take vengeance on the invaders,
returned an indignant and defiant answer; declaring
that he sought no peace; but that he would wage war
to the last extremity.
Again De Soto found himself in what
may be called a false position. The chief Capaha
and his people were exasperated against him in the
highest degree. The nation was one of the most
numerous and powerful on the Mississippi. Should
the eight thousand allies, who had accompanied him
from Kaska, and who had plunged him into these difficulties,
withdraw, he would be left entirely at the mercy of
these fierce warriors. From ten to twenty thousand
might rush upon his little band, now numbering but
about four hundred, and their utter extermination
could hardly be doubtful. Under these circumstances
he decided to attempt to conquer a peace. Still
he made other efforts, but in vain, to conciliate
the justly enraged chieftain. He then prepared
for war. However severely he may be censured for
this decision, it is the duty of the impartial historian
to state those facts which may in some degree modify
the severity of judgment.
A large number of canoes were prepared,
in which two hundred Spaniards and three thousand
Indians embarked to attack Capaha upon his island,
before he had time to collect a resistless force of
warriors. They found the island covered with
a dense forest, and the chief and his troops strongly
intrenched. The battle was fought with great fury,
the Spanish soldiers performing marvellous feats of
bravery, strength and endurance. The warriors
of Capaha, who fought with courage equal to that of
the Spaniards, and struck such dismay into the more
timid troops of Casquin, that they abandoned their
allies and fled tumultuously to their canoes, and
swiftly paddled away.
De Soto, thus left to bear the whole
brunt of the hostile army, was also compelled to retreat.
He did this in good order, and might have suffered
terribly in the retreat but for the singular and, at
the time, unaccountable fact that Capaha withdrew
his warriors and allowed the Spaniards to embark unmolested.
It would seem that the sagacious chieftain, impressed
by the wonderful martial prowess displayed by the
Spaniards, and by the reiterated proffers of peace
and friendship which had been made to him, and despising
the pusillanimity of the troops of Casquin, whom he
had always been in the habit of conquering, thought
that by detaching the Spaniards from them he could
convert De Soto and his band into friends and allies.
Then he could fall upon the Indian army, and glut
his vengeance, by repaying them tenfold for all the
outrages they had committed.
Accordingly, the next morning, four
ambassadors of highest rank visited the Spanish encampment.
De Soto and Casquin were together. The ambassadors
bowed to De Soto with profound reverence, but disdainfully
took no notice whatever of Casquin. The speaker
then said,
“We have come, in the name of
our chief, to implore the oblivion of the past and
to offer to you his friendship and homage.”
De Soto was greatly relieved by the
prospect of this termination of the difficulties in
which he had found himself involved. He treated
the envoys with great affability, reciprocated all
their friendly utterances, and they returned to Capaha
highly pleased with their reception.
Casquin was very indignant. He
did everything in his power to excite the hostility
of De Soto against Capaha, but all was in vain.
The Governor was highly displeased with the trick
Casquin had played upon him, in setting out on a military
expedition under the guise of an honorary escort.
He despised the cowardice which Casquin’s troops
had evinced in the battle, and he respected the courage
which Capaha had exhibited, and the frankness and
magnanimity of his conduct. He therefore issued
orders to his own and the native army that no one
should inflict any injury whatever, either upon the
persons or the property of the natives of the province.
He allowed Casquin to remain in his camp and under
his protection for a few days, but compelled him to
send immediately home the whole body of his followers,
retaining merely enough vassals for his personal service.
The next morning Capaha himself, accompanied
by a train of one hundred of his warriors, fearlessly
returned to his village. He must have had great
confidence in the integrity of De Soto, for by this
act he placed himself quite in the power of the Spaniards.
Immediately upon entering the village, he visited
the desecrated mausoleum of his ancestors, and in
silent indignation repaired, as far as possible, the
injury which had been done. He then proceeded
to the headquarters of De Soto. The Spanish Governor
and Casquin were seated together.
Capaha was about twenty-six years
of age, of very fine person and of frank and winning
manners. With great cordiality he approached De
Soto, reiterating his proffers of friendship, and his
earnest desire that kindly feelings should be cherished
between them. Casquin he treated with utter disdain,
paying no more attention to him than if he had not
been present. For some time the Indian Cacique
and the Spanish Governor conversed together with perfect
frankness and cordiality. A slight pause occurring
in their discourse, Capaha fixed his eyes sternly
for a moment upon Casquin and said, in tones of strong
indignation,
“You, Casquin, undoubtedly exult
in the thought that you have revenged your past defeats.
This you never could have done through your own strength.
You are indebted to these strangers for what you have
accomplished. Soon they will go on their way.
But we shall be left in this country as we were before.
We shall then meet again. Pray to the gods that
they may send us good weather.”
De Soto humanely did everything in
his power to promote reconciliation between the hostile
chieftains. But all was in vain. Though they
treated each other with civility, he observed frequent
interchanges of angry glances.
The Spaniards found, in this town,
a great variety of valuable skins of deer, panthers,
buffalo and bears. Taught by the Indians, the
Spaniards made themselves very comfortable moccasons
of deerskin, and also strong bucklers, impervious
to arrows, of buffalo hide.
After making minute and anxious inquiries
for gold, and ascertaining that there was none to
be found in that direction, De Soto turned his desponding
steps backwards to Kaska. Here he remained for
four days, preparing for a march to the southward.
He then continued his progress nine days down the
western bank of the river, until, on the fourth of
August, he reached a province called Quigate.
His path had led him through a populous country, but
the Indians made no attempt to molest his movements.
It is supposed that Quigate must have been on the White
river, about forty or fifty miles from its mouth.
Here De Soto learned that, faraway in the northwest
there was a range of mountains, and there he thought
might perhaps be the gold region of which he had so
long been in search.
Immediately he put his soldiers in
motion, led by a hope which was probably rejected
by every mind in the army, except his own. A single
Indian guide led them on a weary tramp for many days,
through dreary morasses and tangled forests.
They at length came to a village called Coligoa, which
is supposed to have been upon the banks of White river.
The natives at first fled in terror at their approach,
but as no hostility was manifested by the Spaniards,
they soon gained confidence, and returned with kind
words and presents. But there was no gold there,
and no visions of gold in the distance.
The chief informed De Soto that there
was a very rich and populous province about thirty
miles to the south, where the inhabitants were in
the enjoyment of a great abundance of the good things
of life. Again the Spaniards took up their line
of march in that direction. They found a fertile
and quite thickly inhabited country on their route.
The Indians were friendly, and seemed to have attained
a degree of civilization superior to that of most
of the tribes they had as yet visited. The walls
of the better class of houses were hung with deerskins,
so softly tanned and colored that they resembled beautiful
tapestry. The floors were also neatly carpeted
with richly decorated skins.
The Spaniards seem to have travelled
very slowly, for nine days were occupied in reaching
Tanico, in the Cayas country, which was situated probably
upon Saline river, a branch of the Washita. Here
they found some salt springs, and remained several
days to obtain a supply of salt, of which they were
greatly in need. Turning their steps towards
the west, still groping blindly, hunting for gold,
they journeyed four days through a barren and uninhabited
region, when suddenly they emerged upon a wide and
blooming prairie.
In the centre, at the distance of
about a couple of miles, between two pleasant streams,
they saw quite a large village. It was mid-day,
and the Governor encamped his army in the edge of
the grove, on the borders of the plain. In the
afternoon, with a strong party of horse and foot,
he set out upon a reconnoitering excursion. As
he approached the village the inhabitants, men and
women, sallied forth and attacked him with great ferocity.
De Soto was not a man ever to turn his back upon his
assailants. The Spaniards drew their sabres, and,
all being in armor, and led by charges of the horsemen,
soon put the tumultuous savages to flight, and pursued
them pell-mell into the village.
The natives fought like tigers from
doors, windows, and housetops. The exasperated
Spaniards, smarting with their wounds, and seeing many
of their comrades already slain, cut down their foes
remorselessly. The women fell before their blows
as well as the men, for the women fought with unrelenting
fierceness which the Spaniards had never seen surpassed.
Night came on while the battle still raged, with no
prospect of its termination. De Soto withdrew
his troops from the village, much vexed at having
allowed himself to be drawn into so useless a conflict,
where there was nothing to be gained, and where he
had lost several valuable men in killed, while many
more were wounded.
The next morning De Soto put his whole
army in motion and advanced upon the village.
They found it utterly abandoned. Strong parties
were sent out in all directions to capture some of
the natives, that De Soto might endeavor to enter
into friendly relations with them. But it seemed
impossible to take any one alive. They were as
untamable and as savage as bears and wolves, fighting
against any odds to the last gasp. Both women
and men were exceedingly ill-looking, with shapeless
heads, which were said to have been deformed by the
compression of bandages in infancy. The province
was called Tula, and the village was situated, it
is supposed, between the waters of the upper Washita
and the little Missouri.
The Spaniards remained in the village
four days, when suddenly, in the darkness of midnight,
the war-whoop resounded from three different directions,
and three large bands of native warriors, who had so
stealthily approached as to elude the vigilance of
the sentinels, plunged into the village in a simultaneous
attack. Egyptian darkness enveloped the combatants,
and great was the confusion, for it was almost impossible
to distinguish friend from foe. The Spaniards,
to avoid wounding each other, incessantly shouted
the name of the Virgin. The savages were armed
with bows and arrows and with javelins, heavy, sharp-pointed,
and nine or ten feet in length, which could be used
either as clubs or pikes. Wielded by their sinewy
arms, in a hand-to-hand fight, the javelin proved
a very formidable weapon.
The battle raged with unintermitted
fury till the dawn of the morning. The savages
then, at a given signal, fled simultaneously to the
woods. The Spaniards did not pursue them.
Thoroughly armored as they were, but four of their
number were killed, but many were severely wounded.
It was nearly twenty days before the wounded were so
far convalescent that the army could resume its march.
The following incident illustrates the almost unexampled
ferocity of these barbaric warriors:
The morning after the battle a large
number of the Spanish soldiers, thoroughly armed,
were exploring the fields around the village, on foot
and on horseback. Three foot soldiers and two
mounted men were in company. One of them saw
in a thicket an Indian raise his head and immediately
conceal it. The foot soldier ran up to kill him.
The savage rose, and with a ponderous battle-axe which
he had won from the Spaniards the day before, struck
the shield of the Spaniard with such force as to cut
it in two, at the same time severely wounding his arm.
The blow was so violent and the wound so severe, that
the soldier was rendered helpless. The savage
then rushed upon another of the foot soldiers, and
in the same way effectually disabled him.
One of the horsemen, seeing his companions
thus roughly handled, put spurs to his steed and charged
upon the Indian. The savage sprang to the trunk
of an oak tree, whose low hanging branches prevented
the near approach of the trooper. Watching his
opportunity, he sprang forth and struck the horse
such a terrible blow with his axe as to render the
animal utterly incapable of moving. Just at this
moment the gallant Gonsalvo Sylvestre came up.
The Indian rushed upon him, swinging his battle-axe
in both hands; but Sylvestre warded the blow so that
the axe glanced over his shield and buried its edge
deeply in the ground.
Instantly the keen sabre of Sylvestre
fell upon the savage, laying open his face and breast
with a fearful gash, and so severing his right hand
from the arm that it hung only by the skin. The
desperate Indian, seizing the axe between the bleeding
stump and the other hand, attempted to strike another
blow. Again Sylvestre warded off the axe with
his shield, and with one blow of his sword upon the
waist of the naked Indian so nearly cut his body in
two that he fell dead at his feet.
During the time the Spaniards tarried
in Tula many foraging excursions were sent out to
various parts of the province. The region was
populous and fertile, but it was found impossible to
conciliate in any degree the hostile inhabitants.
Again the soldiers were in motion.
They directed their steps towards the northwest, towards
a province named Utiangue, which was said to be situated
on the borders of a great lake, at the distance of
about two hundred and forty miles. They hoped
that this lake might prove an arm of the sea, through
which they could open communications with their friends
in Cuba, and return to them by water. The journey
was melancholy in the extreme, through a desolate
country occupied by wandering bands of ferocious savages,
who were constantly assailing them from ambuscades
by day and by night.
At length they reached the village
of Utiangue, the capital of the province. It
was pleasantly situated on a fine plain upon the banks
of a river, which was probably the Arkansas.
Upon the approach of the Spaniards the inhabitants
had abandoned the place, leaving their granaries well
stocked with corn, beans, nuts, and plums. The
meadows surrounding the town offered excellent pasturage
for the horses. As the season was far advanced,
De Soto decided to take up his winter quarters here.
He fortified the place, surrounding it with strong
palisades. To lay in ample stores for the whole
winter, foraging parties were sent out, who returned
laden with dried fruits, corn, and other grain.
Deer ranged the forests in such numbers
that large quantities of venison were obtained.
Rabbits also were in abundance. The Cacique,
who kept himself aloof, sent several messengers to
De Soto, but they so manifestly came merely as spies,
and always in the night, that De Soto gave orders
that none should be admitted save in the daytime.
One persisting to enter was killed by a sentinel.
This put an end to all intercourse between De Soto
and the chief; but the Spaniards were assaulted whenever
the natives could take any advantage of them on their
foraging expeditions.
Here the Spaniards enjoyed on the
whole, the most comfortable winter they had experienced
since they entered Florida. Secure from attack
in their fortified town, sheltered from the weather
in their comfortable dwellings, and with a sufficient
supply of food, they were almost happy, as they contrasted
the comforts they then enjoyed with the frightful
sufferings they had hitherto experienced. During
the winter, the expedition met with a great loss from
the death of its intelligent interpreter, Juan Ortiz.
In reference to his services, Mr. Pickett says:
“Understanding only the Floridian
language, he conducted conversations through the
Indians of different tribes who understood each
other and who attended the expedition. In conversing
with the Chickasaws, for instance, he commenced with
the Floridian, who carried the word to a Georgian,
the Georgian to the Coosa, the Coosa to the Mobilian,
and the latter to the Chickasaw. In the same
tedious manner the reply was conveyed to him and
reported to De Soto.”
During the winter at Utiangue, the
views and feelings of the Governor apparently experienced
quite a change. His hopes of finding gold seem
all to have vanished. He was far away in unknown
wilds, having lost half his troops and nearly all
his horses. The few horses that remained, were
many of them lame, not having been shod for more than
a year. He did not hesitate to confess, confidentially
to his friends, his regret that he had not joined
the ships at Pensacola. He now despairingly decided
to abandon these weary and ruinous wanderings, and
to return to the Mississippi river. Here he would
establish a fortified colony, build a couple of brigantines,
send them to Cuba with tidings of safety to his wife,
and procure reinforcements and supplies. It seems
that his pride would not allow him to return himself
a ruined man to his friends.
With the early spring he broke up
his cantonment, and commenced a rapid march for the
Mississippi. He had heard of a village called
Anilco, at the mouth of a large stream emptying into
that majestic river. They followed down the south
side of the Arkansas river for ten days, when they
crossed on rafts to the north or east side. It
was probably the intention of De Soto to reach the
Mississippi nearly at the point at which they had
crossed it before.
Continuing his journey through morasses
and miry grounds, where the horses often waded up
to their girths in water, where there were few inhabitants,
and little food to be obtained, he at length reached
the village of Anilco, and found it to be on the northern
bank of the Arkansas river. Here he learned that,
at the distance of some leagues to the south, there
was a populous and fertile country such as he thought
would be suitable for the establishment of his colony.
Again he crossed the Arkansas river to the south side,
and moving in a southerly direction reached the Mississippi
at a village called Guachoya, about twenty miles below
the mouth of the Arkansas river.