Several times Mendaña rose from his sickbed and went on shore to demand that the Campmaster keep better control and put down this rising mutiny. But the fiery old Campmaster snorted that he was a gentleman and that if it had not been for him, all these rascals would long ago have deserted the Governor. The Campmaster also introduced his own complaint. Doña Isabel, he charged, was spreading evil rumors about him. Moreover, he protested that the Governor had not supplied enough axes and machetes for the building work, and that he had not been given clear orders about how the fort should be built and the town laid out.
Meanwhile, throughout the little settlement, the pioneers were bickering bitterly over which family should have the best allotment of land, and what their titles should be and how their estates would be entailed for their heirs. A month had not yet passed since their arrival, and already the colony was split into two factions—those who wanted to stay and those who were determined to escape from Santa Cruz even if it meant mutiny and open civil war.
At dawn one morning Doña Isabel’s brother Diego hurried out from land in a small canoe bearing frightening news. He gasped that he had uncovered a plot whereby the men on shore were going to kill Mendaña and the entire Barreto family, as well as any who remained loyal to them. He said the plot arose from the determination of those ashore to abandon Santa Cruz and move on to the riches of the Solomons.
Hardly had this intelligence been digested when the Campmaster came out to the flagship to make fresh petty complaints about new injuries to his authority and his pride. Doña Isabel whispered sharply to her indecisive husband: “Kill the Campmaster or have him killed! What more do you want? He has fallen into your hands, and if you do not, I will kill him with this knife!” Driven by his wife, Mendaña was ready to strangle the old man and hang him from one of the masts, but the Campmaster suspected some plot and, moving his guards about him, cautiously withdrew to the shore.
The time was obviously at hand when the Barretos could no longer endure the existence of the cantankerous old Campmaster. Therefore it was determined in family conference that Captain Lorenzo Barreto and three faithful men would assassinate the old man. Mendaña agreed to go ashore and give the murder a semblance of legality by raising the royal flag and announcing that justice was about to be done.
But at dawn on Sunday, October 8, before the plan could be put into effect, a shout came from the shore to demand that a boat be sent to the beach. Doña Isabel jumped from her bed, shouting, “Alas! They have killed my brothers, and now they ask for a boat so they can come and kill us!” Those on the ship then saw a party of thirty soldiers emerge from the trees and wait.
Mendaña, wracked by disease and barely able to walk, arose from his sickbed and took a boat to the beach. There he asked the party of soldiers where they were going. The lieutenant in command said they were ordered by the Campmaster to go to Malope’s village to seek food. Something in their manner made the Governor warn them not to hurt Malope or take any of his property, for the chief was the friend of the Spaniards. The soldiers ignored him with a harsh laugh, and marched off.
Then Mendaña forced himself up to the place where the fort was being built. The Campmaster, who was having his breakfast in his tent, came out unarmed and without his coat and hat. When he saw who was approaching, he became suspicious and shouted for a servant to bring him his dagger and sword. But it was too late. The Governor gave the signal for the attack in this way: he sighed, raised his eyes to heaven, put his hand on the hilt of his sword and cried, “Long live the king! Death to traitors!”
One of his men grabbed the old Campmaster by the collar and stabbed him twice, once in the mouth and once in the breast. Another gashed him in the side. The Campmaster gasped, “Oh, gentlemen!” and tried to get to his sword. Felipe Corzo, captain of the galiot, hacked at the old man with a huge machete and nearly cut off his right arm.
The Campmaster fell to the ground, pleading, “Leave me time to confess!”
“Well might you feel contrite!” said one of the killers.
The Campmaster lay writhing on the ground, crying, “Jesus María!” A woman settler came up and helped him to die in peace.
The body was left in the dust, with the white locks dabbled in blood. The Governor’s drummer, desiring a new suit of clothes, stripped the body and left it naked. The Campmaster’s epitaph may be found in the words of Pilot Quirós: “The Campmaster was very zealous, a hard worker and good soldier, and in all enterprises he was the first.… Though old, he was vigorous, but very impetuous. He knew how to think much, but he could not be silent, and I believe that for no other thing he was killed.”
Mendaña, himself dying, proclaimed that the Campmaster’s death was approved by him, and that all others would be pardoned in the name of the king. But this was little to the liking of Captain Lorenzo Barreto, who led his men in a search for other traitors, and one of the Campmaster’s aides was struck down. Captain Corzo chopped off this man’s head and also the Campmaster’s head, and others of the party went around seeking enemies to kill, shouting, “Long live the king! Death to traitors!”
Many of the women came out from the camp, fearful for the lives of their husbands; some prayed, and others wrung their hands and lamented. The sergeant major came out of his tent, and in order to prove his loyalty by a valiant act, he gallantly slashed the Campmaster’s little page boy on the head. Other innocents would have been killed except that the Chief Pilot, still trying to act as peacemaker, protected them from the fury of the gang.
Captain Corzo now took the two heads and stuck them up on poles at the guard’s outpost. He then went out to the flagship and announced to Doña Isabel that he had given a good blow against the Campmaster and had cut off two heads. “It is terrible that for so long we endured presumptuous fools,” he told her. “Now that the Campmaster is dead, there is nothing to keep you from becoming the wife of a marquis!”
The Vicar went ashore with the sailors to rally to the flag of the Governor. When he heard that the Campmaster was dead, the Vicar put down the lance in his hand and agreed to celebrate the mass. After he performed the service, he spoke to the people and told them not to be scandalized by the deaths, for the act was ordained. They should be quiet and obey the Governor, and all would be well.
When the loyal ones assembled at the outpost, the Governor ordered that the heads should be taken down from the poles and that everything should look as it was before the killing. He still had to placate the thirty men who had gone to Malope’s village, and he did not want them to suspect anything.
One of the thirty soon returned and reported that they had gone to the house of Malope, who had regaled them with all the food he had. Malope was friendly and felt secure, and was not aware of trouble until a Spaniard, with no provocation whatever, raised his arquebus into the friendly chief’s face, and fired.
As Malope lay on the ground, another soldier put him out of his pain by cleaving his skull with a hatchet, saying, “We have never done a better thing. Malope obviously intended to commit treason.”
When the soldiers, unaware of the assassination of their leader, returned with the good news that they had slain Malope, Mendaña’s men grabbed them and held them prisoners. The lieutenant in charge was put in irons. After being allowed to confess to the Chaplain, he was beheaded and his body covered with branches. Later it was thrown into the sea, despite the weeping and pleading of his wife.
Then the Governor called before him the soldier who had killed Malope. This man prayed for pardon, and swore that he would serve the Governor well thereafter. The Chief Pilot begged that the soldier’s life be spared, but the Governor asked, “How am I to pay for the death of my friend Malope except with the death of this man?” The Pilot suggested a stratagem: show the natives the heads of the two men who had already been killed. Thus the gentle Quirós saved the life of the murderer.
Now the Vicar asked that in charity the two heads be buried, and Mendaña agreed. They were left exposed on the beach, h
owever, and next morning were found with all the flesh and skin gone, for dogs had eaten them. The head of the executed lieutenant still remained, though, and the Governor ordered a party to take it to Malope’s village, where all the natives were bewailing the death of their chief. The Christians showed them the bloody head and with signs tried to explain that vengeance had been exacted for the murder. The natives left their mourning ceremonies and ran into the woods. The head was left at the door of one of the huts, and the party returned to the ship.
The murderer of Malope, imprisoned on board, began to suffer from the pangs of conscience, because his friends asked him, “Why did you kill that good native without cause?” and others said that he should be drawn and quartered for such an act. He turned his face to the wall, refused to eat and drank large draughts of sea water. Within a few days he was dead.
Now each day Mendaña, like his ill-fated colony, grew worse. In order to revive him, his men took him to a house ashore; but the new residence was dangerous, for many natives, enraged over the death of Malope, kept in hiding near the Spaniards and greeted any man who moved with arrows, which wounded many. But more deadly than the black men was the unprecedented disease which now began to fell one Spaniard after another.
The first of the party died on October 17. He was the hard-working Chaplain, and the Vicar, the only remaining priest, cried aloud because, if he too should have to die, he would have no one at hand to shrive him. That night there was a total eclipse of the moon, and the colonists could not help feeling that this was an ominous sign, for they were alone in a vast ocean many leagues from Peru, and their friends were beginning to die.
Mendaña was now so weak that he could scarcely sign his name to his will, which had been written out for him. In it he nominated his brother-in-law, Captain Lorenzo Barreto, to be captain general of the party. He named his wife, Doña Isabel, as his heiress, and in addition he made her Governess of the whole expedition, for he carried with him a special decree from the king granting him power to name as his successor any person he chose.
On October 18 the Governor was clearly dying. The Vicar brought a crucifix and before it the Governor seemed to bend his knees in spirit, since physically he could not move. While joining in saying the Miserere and the Credo, Governor Alvaro de Mendaña, who had discovered the Solomon Islands, the Marquesas and Santa Cruz, passed from a life devoted to the service of his God and his king. Doña Isabel and her relatives felt the loss keenly, as did most of the company; but some people secretly rejoiced, for now it might be possible to abandon the cursed settlement.
Mendaña’s body was placed in a coffin covered with black cloth, and carried on the shoulders of eight men of the highest social rank. The soldiers stood with their arquebuses in reverse position, according to the usage customary at the funeral of a general. With muffled drums, the procession went to the church that was being built, and the Vicar performed the services. Then the people returned to console Doña Isabel on her widowhood.
Doña Isabel quickly assumed the title of Governess, in charge of the whole expedition. Never before had a woman been the head of a Spanish exploring enterprise, but unfortunately, as the Chief Pilot pointed out, this great responsibility did not change her character or bring her more wisdom.
Yet there was increased need for her to make wise decisions, for now the Santa Cruz disease struck down two or three people every day. The Vicar walked about the camp, crying out, “Is there anyone who wants to confess? There is a man who does not know whether he is a Moor or a Christian; others have committed sins so foul that I will not name them. We have among us sickness, war, famine, and discord, and we are far from any remedy. Confess yourselves, and with repentance appease the anger of God, Who has brought us this terrible chastisement!” Day after day he went about giving the sacrament to the sick and burying the dead.
Meanwhile, the fighting with natives went on. The soldiers who were not stricken with illness burned more villages, and finally captured some women and children and held them as hostages. But their menfolk came and asked that they be returned to them, and in order to avoid more trouble the Spaniards yielded the hostages.
Now a new petition was circulated, begging the Governess to leave the island of Santa Cruz. This time the Vicar himself wrote out the petition and announced that nobody would be killed for signing it.
The sick continued to die, stretched out in the clutches of the unknown disease and delirious with long fever, which did not kill suddenly but which ultimately struck most of the people on the shore. Those on the ships did not fall prey to this plague, which probably resulted from the changes which had been made in the lives of the colonists. They had exposed themselves to heat and cold, and eaten strange foods, and worked bareheaded in the sun in wet clothing and slept on the ground in the night mists. No doctor had accompanied the expedition, and death seemed inevitable.
Aboard the flagship, even the resolute Doña Isabel appeared lost in a fog of irresolution. She was unwilling to abandon the settlement that had once seemed so promising, yet the toll of death showed her how necessary some drastic action had become. She became aware of this when Chief Pilot Quirós rowed out from shore and asked that the Vicar join him at the settlement.
The Vicar answered, “I cannot go; can you not see that I am dying too? And I must die unshriven, for the good Chaplain has gone before me.” But when it was explained that Doña Isabel’s brother, Don Lorenzo, was dying, the fever-wracked Vicar agreed to go ashore. He was wrapped in a blanket and taken by canoe to the beach. Then he was carried to the bedside of the Captain General, and confessed him. That night Don Lorenzo was much worse, and at daybreak on November 2, 1595, he died. He was buried with the same military honors that had been given his brother-in-law, the Governor. Now it was obvious that Santa Cruz was doomed.
Perhaps not even the wisdom of Solomon could have solved the problems that had arisen on this unlucky island. Five days later, Doña Isabel decided to terminate the settlement, for the sickness was so bad that ten determined natives might have attacked the village and killed everyone ashore. The Governess ordered that all the sick people should be carried to the ships, along with the royal flag. Thus the promising colony of Santa Cruz was abandoned and, as Quirós wrote, left in the claws of the devil, who had held it previously for so long. Mendaña’s men had been ashore only two short months since the fleet had first sighted the smoke of the volcano that brooded over these Melanesian islands, and now the enterprise was ending in total tragedy.
Before the three ships left, they stocked up with provisions. Thirty men went across the bay to the charming and fertile little island that the Spaniards had called The Garden. There they captured five native canoes loaded with biscuit made from a starchy root. They also killed many pigs, and collected coconuts and bananas. The soldiers abused the natives, who then dug pits in the earth and lined them with sharp stakes, on which one soldier hurt his foot.
On the flagship, it was now the Vicar’s turn to die. He called for a crucifix and, with no one to shrive him, bravely commended his own soul to God. He was buried in the waters of the bay, so that the natives, now completely out of hand, could not dig up and insult his remains.
The Governess gave her decision to the Pilot. The ships would sail westward in search of the Solomon Islands, on the chance that the vanished consort ship might be found there. If it were not, then the remaining vessels should head for the city of Manila in the Philippines, where there was a Spanish colony. There Doña Isabel would recruit new priests and more settlers, and return to finish founding the town at Santa Cruz.
Pilot Quirós told her that since some of the sailors were coming down with sickness, and since the hulls and rigging of the ships were rotten, it would be sensible to abandon the galiot and the frigate, which were not decked over, and put their crews aboard the flagship. But Captain Corzo of the galiot objected, for he had secretly developed his own plan for getting his ship away from this doomed venture. The Governess, whose stingines
s was now becoming a mania, fell in with Corzo’s plan, for she did not want to lose the money value of the two smaller ships, which now belonged to her, and she insisted that they come along.
Some of those who were still healthy now came forth with a gruesome plan. Since they objected to having sick people on the flagship, they proposed to dump them all on the little frigate. But the humane Quirós remonstrated at this cruelty, and the sick ones were allowed to remain on the flagship. However, when some loyal men crept ashore at night and dug up the body of Mendaña to be taken to Manila, the healthy settlers insisted that it be put aboard the frigate. “With this,” wrote Quirós, “ended the tragedy of the islands where Solomon was wanting.”
The ships departed from Santa Cruz on November 18, 1595. Manila was nine hundred leagues away, but it was easier to reach there than to try to make the long northern circle back across the Pacific to Peru. The ropes of the vessel were so rotten that the falls carried away three times when the sailors tried to get the longboat on board the flagship.
But in spite of such an ominous beginning, the people aboard ship were overjoyed to see the last of hated Santa Cruz, where in one month forty-seven persons had died. According to Quirós, they turned their eyes to the abandoned huts of the settlement and cried, “Ah, there you remain, you corner of Hell, which has made us mourn for lost husbands, brothers, and friends!”
The voyage which began with these frustrated cheers was destined to become one of the strangest in Pacific history, for Doña Isabel quickly showed herself to be strong-willed, capable and utterly inhuman. The journey developed its true character when on the first day the skilled boatswain and four ordinary sailors fell ill with some new disease that completely incapacitated them and brought them to the point where death seemed imminent. The seamen who remained healthy warned Quirós that the three ships were unfit for service, they were filled with dying men, and the food and water were short.