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Pedro Menendez Marquez came to conquer Florida with gifts and power

Source: Situado and Sabana #82

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The true conquest of Florida began in 1577, when Governor Pedro Menendez Marquez set out for Florida, "a land to which all refused to go" (Quiros, 1584), armed with a royal mandate to wage "a war of punishment" on the Indians and clear the coasts once and for all of corsairs. His first step was to send Captain Thomas Bernaldo de Quiros north with orders ''to treat amity with the caciques" and to ransom a Frenchman and a negro in Guale hands, negotiating with a chief named Cazacolo. "One must take Cazacolo seriously," instructed the governor, "for this barbarian is clever... Give the hatchets, hoe and wine to Cazacolo and on my behalf give him many presents, saying that I greatly rejoice that he is well." Quiros was to persuade four of the principal Indians of Guale to visit St. Augustine, if necessary offering himself or the soldier Clemente Vernal as a hostage, and there, "having them prisoner and well-provided with gifts," he should demand that they surrender the Frenchmen in their possession. The king was most anxious to keep Indians and heretics apart (Menendez Marquez, 1578).

As an afterthought, Governor Menendez Marquez instructed Quiros to find and forward to St. Augustine half a dozen Indian women skilled at gathering oysters. Whether the women were to be servants, slaves, units of tribute, wage laborers, or wives, the governor did not say. What was on his mind was pearls. Pedro Menendez had obtained the right to develop a pearl fishery as part of his original contract, and so far the colony had offered little else of concentrated value (Menendez Marquez, 1578).
(Bushnell SS)