Page 28 - Cooke's Peak - Pasaron Por Aqui

who accompanied these expeditions saw that even though there was no gold, there was an ecclesiastical richness to be mined in the souls of “the heathen.” The Spaniards then came bent on achieving glory, either for themselves or their God, and for gold.
These sturdy men from the Iberian Peninsula had weapons, tactics, and military precision previously un- known to the Indian. In addition, the Spaniards had the horse that made them highly mobile and devastat-
ing in battle. With these awesome weapons in their arsenal, the Spanish had swept across the great cul- tures of Mexico and Central and South America. Now it was the Apaches’ turn to feel their might, and in turn, the Spaniards felt the might of the Apaches.
By 1540, the Spanish, under Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, were ready for their next leap forward in the subjugation of the New World (Figure 9). Their expedition up the west coast of Mexico, into what would be Arizona and New Mexico, was the first by Europeans in the American Southwest. The expedi- tion was a failure, if the original objectives of finding gold or converting the savages were to be used as yardsticks of success, and for the next 55 years Spanish
interest in New Mexico and the Southwest was sporadic. Other interests occupied the Spaniards’ at- tention, among them the development of silver dis- coveries in the central valleys of Mexico. The frontier line was extended ever northward, however, and by 1595 the Spaniards were ready to push a salient into
The Iberian Influence
Figure 9. Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, from a mural by Gerald Cassidy. Photo courtesy of the Museum of New Mexico, #20206.
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Spanish expedition routes and
New Mexico.
developed roads (Figure 10) crisscrossed the area.
The Don Juan de Onate expedition left Chihuahua in 1598 with 400 men (130 families), 8 Franciscan priests, Indian and Black slaves, and proceeded across the Mexican desert to the Rio Grande near El Paso del Norte, modern Ciudad Juarez. From there the caravan followed the river north, negotiated a pass near present-day Hatch, which they named Sombre Robledo, and on August 18 they arrived at San Juan, where they founded the first capital of New Mexico,
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By 1610, Santa Fe had also been settled and was to remain the seat of Spanish (and Mexican) influence until the middle of the nineteenth century. The Spanish, under the guidance of the missionaries, pursued a policy of assimilation, hoping eventually to absorb the Indian into Spanish
San Juan de los Caballeros.