Don lucas vazquez de ayllon biography
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In 1521, he sent Francisco Gordillo to find a Northwest Passage. The contract named Ayllón governor of the colony and granted him a range of privileges in exchange for funding and carrying out this expedition.
Ayllón’s colony did not succeed, but his efforts contributed much to European interest in and knowledge of the southeastern coast of North America.
With an enslaver, Gordillo had captured about seventy American Indian people from various tribes. De Ayllón’s expedition sailed from Hispaniola to South Carolina on two ships, which included African slaves. The rest of the party, now numbering fewer than 150, returned with the one remaining ship to Santo Domingo.
Ayllón was a pioneer in introducing sugar into the New World and with one Francisco de Ceballos built a fine sugar mill on the north coast some forty-five leagues from Santo Domingo, an enterprise that was managed by his heirs after his death.
In the end, the colony failed over a fight over leadership. Despite this failure, the stories Ayllón and his slave, Francisco de Chicora, told about the wonders of this land found their way into the writings of the chronicler Peter Martyr and circulated throughout Europe. The party, including three Hieronymite monks, arrived in the island in 1516.
For several years, Ayllón had no unusual experiences in his position as judge.
They went north and established San Miguel de Guandape. Valona, Ga.: Lower Altamaha Historical Society–Ayllón, 1992.
Hoffman, Paul E. A New Andalucia and a Way to the Orient: The American Southeast during the Sixteenth Century. The American Indian tribes of the area, aware that the newcomers had suffered a setback to the north, attacked almost immediately.
He also discovered Chesapeake Bay and established San Miguel de Guandape, a settlement near what would be Jamestown.
Ayllon sponsored three missions to the New World.
Whether or not Ayllón believed all of Francisco’s tales, he used them to inspire royal interest in the conquest of the southeastern coast of North America. Working as a sugar planter on the Caribbean Island of Hispaniola, he was sent on an expedition to Florida under Francisco Gordillo, who, in June 1521, landed somewhere near Cape Fear in North Carolina.
Continuing to search for the Northwest passage, Ayllon came up from Hispaniola again in 1524 and tried the James River and Chesapeake Bay.
He received from King Charles V a grant of the land he had discovered and, in 1526, founded the settlement of San Miguel de Guandape. Cortés continued to be master of the situation in Mexico.
Ayllón was intrigued by the colorful stories brought to Santo Domingo by Francisco Gordillo, who had sailed along the coast of Florida as far as latitude 33°30'.
Some of the maps drawn after 1526 display the caption “land of Ayllón” in the area of what became South Carolina and Georgia and describe this land and Ayllón’s experiences there. His last mission was in 1525 to 1526.
Ayllon and approximately 500 to 600 colonists (including three monks) sailed to the New World in a convoy of 6 ships.
Francisco, who was from the coast of what later became South Carolina, became Ayllón’s slave and told the judge fantastic stories about his homeland. During this turmoil, the slaves revolted and fled the colony to live among the Cofitachequi tribe. 1480–18 Oct. 1526
Lucas Vásquez de Ayllón, explorer, was the son of Judge Juan Ayllón, head of a noble and rich family of Toledo, Spain, which probably originated in the province of Segovia.