Garcia Lopez de Cardenas, discoverer of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado

Much has been written about Hernán Cortés and Francisco Pizarro, conquerors of the two most powerful empires in America, the Aztec and the Inca, but perhaps it is precisely the brilliance and dimension of such feats that have obscured those carried out by other explorers. less intrepid such as Francisco Vázquez Coronado, Fernando de Alarcón, García López de Cárdenas, and José de Solano y Bote who developed their activities north of the Rio Grande exploring the current states of California, Colorado, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Georgia o Florida in North America and Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León and Tamaulipas in Mexico.

Three of them, Coronado, Alarcón and Cárdenas participated in the expedition led by the first that covered a large part of the North American southwest, and within this epic exploration by land and sea it was an almost unknown man, García López de Cárdenas from Extremadura who found a “canyon” through which he could not even go down: the Grand Canyon of the Colorado , a gigantic furrow 446 kilometers long and 1,600 meters deep, carved by the river for millions of years

The Vázquez Coronado expedition

On May 9, 1540, the expedition of Francisco Vázquez Coronado to the American southwest, which was made up of 340 Spaniards and hundreds of allied Indians, as well as cattle. They were accompanied by the friar Marcos de Niza. In addition to the expedition, the viceroy sent another expedition to California in parallel, made up of ships that followed them by sea under the command of Hernando de Alarcón. The expedition would leave the same day and would go along the coast of New Spain into the Gulf of California, to then continue north to Yuma, in present-day Arizona, and finally another smaller expedition by land organized by García López. of Cardenas.

Hernando de Alarcon

Alarcón, following the instructions received, departs from Acapulco (New Spain) in his exploration to the coasts of California and with the intention of meeting Coronado in northern California, and it is there where

“ We found a channel, two leagues from the mainland, eight fathoms deep, through which its two tides entered in twenty-four hours by their order and concert of waxing and waning (…) with such a current (…) that it was something wonderful.”

This is how Hernando de Alarcón described the mouth of the Colorado River in the Gulf of California. This river mouth had been registered a year earlier by Francisco Preciado, senior pilot of the expedition under the command of Francisco de Ulloa. The details of Ulloa’s maritime expedition were preserved thanks to Giovanni Battista Ramusio’s edition, Delle navigationi e viaggi, of 1556.

For their part, the chroniclers Francisco López de Gómara, in his book The Conquest of Mexico (Zaragoza, 1552), and Bernal Díaz del Castillo, in his “True History of the Conquest of New Spain” (sent to Spain for publication in 1575), include these discoveries. The first explorers did not stop at the sites they were discovering and placed more emphasis on reconnaissance of the coasts than on obtaining profits. The truth was that the news that reached Europe recognized Hernán Cortés as the discoverer of the Gulf of California, also known as the “Sea of ​​Cortés.”

Garcia Lopez de Cardenas

Coronado found himself involved in innumerable conflicts with the natives of the area, which prevented him from going to meet Alarcón, but not to wait for the Cárdenas group. The commander despaired because he could not find the cities invented by Niza either, but he got hope again when the natives told him that there were seven other cities called Tusayán, in a northwesterly direction. Vázquez de Coronado sent Captain Pedro de Tovar to that place with 17 horsemen and some infantry. Tusayán was another disappointment, as it turned out to be the habitat of the Moqui Indians (Arizona); seven populations in defensive places, the most important of which was Wolpi. There, Tovar heard the Indians say that to the west of their country there was a great river and when he returned with the news, Vázquez Coronado ordered García López de Cárdenas to take 12 men and go to discover the river and to return to give him news in no more than 80 days. The patrol crossed the desert for 20 endless days until it found it.

Grand Canyon

The encounter with the Grand Canyon occurred at what is now known as the Desert View viewpoint — 40 kilometers from Canyon Village — and is narrated by Captain Jaramillo and the chronicler Pedro de Sotomayor as follows:

Then he dispatched Don García López de Cárdenas, field master, to go from that province of Tuzán to the West and for the round trip of the journey and discovery he appointed eighty days for the round trip, which was thrown before from Tuzán with guides from the natives who said that it was ahead, they had traveled fifty leagues to the west, and they found a ravine of a river that it was impossible on one side or the other to find a descent for horseback, not even for foot, but on one side it was very difficult. , where he had almost two leagues down. The ravine was so steeped in rocks that they could barely see the river, although it is, according to what they say, as much or much larger than that of Seville, from above it looked like a stream; so that although it was searched with great diligence and in many places it is not found, In which they spent many days in dire need of water, they could not find it and the one by the river could not take advantage of it even though they saw it: for this reason Don García López was forced to return to where they found it; this river came from the Northeast and returned to the South Southeast.

This was the place from which the Spanish explorer contemplated for the first time the Colorado River (which they called Tizón) meandering at the bottom of the deep ravine after which, given the impossibility of going down due to the steep orography, the scarcity of water and the brief Given time in the orders received, Cárdenas decided to return to Coronado, to whom he narrated his extraordinary vision.

Later, in Quivira, Coronado heard of another great nearby river (the Missouri), but he considered it unwise to continue his search, since winter was approaching and it was convenient to return to Tigüex before the rivers grew too high and it was impossible to cross them. He was also in a very cold land, where it snowed in winter. If he had continued to the southeast, it is very possible that he would have met the Spanish expedition of Hernando de Soto, which was then on the Mississippi River.

The bitter days of Tiguex

Around the Grand Canyon, Cárdenas, together with Hernando de Alvarado, was commissioned by Coronado to advance with an advance party to the theoretically friendly town of Tiguex in order to prepare the place to spend the winter, but upon arrival they were rejected by indigenous people. armed men who killed some Spaniards and stole horses. Cárdenas tried to talk with them without result and finally received orders from Coronado to attack, so he went to the town with no more than thirty soldiers and when he arrived “despite the pleas of his soldiers” he dismounted and went to talk with the indigenous people. because as he said “he had the greatest desire to bring these Indians to a treaty”, although given their resistance he decided to besiege the town.

Days later, Cárdenas resumed his decision to parley and approached the town on horseback, but when he was arriving “the Indians managed to seize him and brought him alive to their village, which caused us the greatest pain, because he was a distinguished man who, by virtue and affability, he had become loved by everyone” and there he ended his days at the age of 42 García López de Cárdenas, the Spanish, from Llerena in Badajoz and discoverer of the Grand Canyon of Colorado.

Author: Ignacio del Pozo Gutiérrez for revistadehistoria.es

Bibliography

VÁZQUEZ DE CORONADO, Francisco: “Letter to the Emperor giving an account of the expedition to the province of Quivira and the inaccuracy of what was referred to by fray Marcos de Niza about that country”, in Collection of Unpublished Documents of America, volume III.

EZQUERRA ABADÍA, Ramón: “The Spanish in the Far West”, in Bulletin of the Royal Geographical Society, Madrid, 1943, vol. LXXXIX, p. 121–151.

HORGAN, Paul: The conquistadors in North America, Madrid, 1966.

MORA VALCÁRCEL, Carmen de: The seven cities of Cíbola: texts and testimonies about the expedition of Vázquez Coronado, Seville: Alfar University, 1992.

CASTAÑEDA DE NÁJERA, Pedro: “Relation de la jornada de Cíbola”, in Original Relations and Memories to serve the History of the Discovery of America, vol. IX, Paris: Ternaux Compans, 1837–1841.