Lafayette (LA) Daily Advertiser, January 26, 1999

Spaniard slaughtered Frenchmen who would not Claim Catholicism

by Jim Bradshaw

They were waiting for the right winds and tides when their first leader, Jean Ribault, finally freed from his English jail, returned to the settlement. He brought seven ships with 500 French soldiers and artisans and 70 women aboard. Knowing that the Spaniards might attack them at any time, he immediately put his men to work to strengthen Fort Caroline.

Historian Francis Parkman tells us that at 11:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 4, 1565, the crew of Ribault's flagship, Trinity, which was anchored at the mouth of the river, "saw a huge hulk, grim with the throats of cannon, drifting towards them in the gloom." She was big, she was well armed, and she was Spanish.

The Spaniards had wanted to break up the settlement before Ribault got there with his reinforcements, and King Philip II had picked Pedro Menendez de Auiles to lead the expedition. The king wanted Menendez not only to drive the Protestant Frenchmen out of North America. He wanted him to settle Florida for Catholic Spain.

Menendez had grown rich in Spanish service and he expected to get richer during this expedition. According to his instructions, he was to bring horses and mares, 200 calves, 400 hogs, 400 sheep, and a few goats. He could bring 500 slaves to plant sugar cane and to build the mills to grind it. In return for establishing a settlement, Menendez would get 1/15 of all rents, mines, gold, silver, pearls, and produce he could find for His Majesty the King.

Menendez sailed from Cadiz on June 20, 1565 with 19 ships, the largest armada of ships and colonists yet to come to Florida. They carried 1,000 people. Others would follow.

Storms forced Menendez back into port in Spain and another 500 people joined the expedition by the time he had repaired and reformed his fleet.

A storm scattered the ships at sea somewhere past the Canary Islands, but five of them -- including Menendez' flagship -- were able to stay together and continue on to San Juan, Puerto Rico, where they found four others that had beaten them there. Menendez left San Juan for Florida on Aug. 15 with five ships carrying 500 soldiers, 200 sailors, and 100 settlers. He reached the Florida coast near what is now Cape Canaveral on Aug. 28, then sailed north to a river the French had named the River of Dolphins. Menendez renamed it the St. Augustine because he reached Florida on the saint's feast day.

Menendez did not know that Ribault had won the race to Fort Caroline until he sailed up to the little settlement on Sept. 4. Menendez ship was called the San Pelayo. He sailed to within hailing distance of Ribault's ship, Trinity, and dropped anchor.

Parkman's history gives an account of the dialogue that followed.

"Whence does this fleet come?" Menendez called across the water.

"From France," came the reply.

"What are you doing here?"

"Bringing soldiers and supplies for a fort the King of France has in this country, and for many others which he will soon have."

"Are you Catholics or Lutherans?"

"Lutherans, of the new religion."

That was all Menendez needed to know. Parkman says he then answered, "I am Pedro Menendez, General of the Fleet of the King of Spain, Don Philip the second, who have (sic) come to this country to hang and behead all Lutherans whom I shall find by land or sea, according to instructions from my king, so precise that I have power to pardon none; and these commands I shall fulfill, as you will see. At daybreak I shall board your ships, and if I find there any Catholic, he shall be well treated; but every heretic shall die."

The French responded in one voice, "If you are a brave man, don't wait until day. Come on now, and see what you will get."

Menendez accepted the challenge. He cut his anchor cables so that the San Pelayo drifted toward the Trinity. The French, outgunned and without their leader, Ribault, who was on shore, quit their taunting, raised the sails, and fled out to sea. Menendez chased them, but could not catch the smaller and quicker French ship.

In the morning t he turned around and returned to Fort Caroline. But the French had had time to get ready for him. Bands of armed men patrolled the beach and Ribault's smaller ships were drawn up in battle positions. Menendez could not attack because his ship was too big to maneuver in the shallow water at the river's mouth. He sailed back to St. Augustine to think things over.

The French at Fort Caroline made their plans, too. They considered three alternatives: They could stay at Fort Caroline and fortify the place as best they could. They could march overland and attack St. Augustine. They could attack St. Augustine by sea. They elected to leave a handful of defenders at Fort Caroline and attack the Spanish by sea. It proved to be the wrong choice.

Then the French fleet appeared off the coast of St. Augustine, there was too little wind for the big Spanish ships to maneuver. They prayed for more wind, and they got it. First there was a breeze, which rose to a gale, then turned into a full-fledged Atlantic hurricane. Ribault's Frenchmen forgot about fighting Spaniards, they were too busy keeping themselves afloat. Most of them were able to do that, but the storm scattered the French fighting force all along the coast.

Menendez took advantage of that. As the storm began to wane, he led 500 soldiers through the rain and wind to Fort Caroline. Its defenders s were scattered at sea. Only a handful of soldiers were there to respond when the Spanish soldiers swarmed over the place.

Only a few people from Fort Caroline garrison escaped into the woods, but 142 people were killed. Their bodies were heaped together on the riverbank opposite a small French vessel commanded by Jacques Ribault, the commander's son. The Spaniards mangled the corpses and shouted insults across the water, hoping to lure him into cannon range. Instead, he sailed down the river, picking up the few survivors he could find. They finally made it back to France. Jean's father and the rest of the French force were not so fortunate.

All of the French ships had been driven ashore and shipwrecked. The men were scattered up and down the coast, divided into small groups that were easy prey for the Spanish.

Parkman gives a vivid description of what happened in a typical encounter as the Spanish found the straggling bands of Frenchmen. In it this instance, there were about 200 Frenchmen camped across a river from Menendez and 60 men in a Spanish camp. The Frenchmen needed to cross the river to get to Fort Caroline, but they had no boat to do it.

According to Parkman's account, the French officers swam to the middle of the river and met with Menendez, who had rowed from his camp, and begged him to lend them a boat to cross the river and get back to their fort.

"Are you Catholics or Lutherans," the Spaniard asked.

"We are Lutherans."

"Gentlemen," he replied, "your fort is taken and all are put to the sword."

The leader of the French band begged for a ship to take his survivors back to France. Menendez said he would give them one willingly if they were Catholics, but that he had no ships for Lutherans. The French begged to stay among the Spanish until French ships could come rescue them.

Menendez replied, "All Catholics I will befriend; but you who are of the New Sect, I hold you as enemies, and wage deadly war against you; and this I will do with all cruelty in this country, where I command as Viceroy and Captain General for my King. I am here to plant the Holy Gospel, that the Indians may be enlightened and come to knowledge of the Holy Catholic Faith of Our Lord Jesus Christ, as the Roman Church teaches it. If you will give up your arms and banners, and place yourselves at my mercy, you may do so, and I will act towards you as God shall give me grace. Do as you will, for other than this you can have neither truce nor friendship with me."

The starving Frenchmen had no choice but to throw themselves on Menendez' mercy. He brought the French across the river 10 at a time, led them out of sight of their brethren across the river, and bound their hands behind their backs. When he'd brought them all across the river, he asked if there were any Catholics among the Frenchmen. Twelve men claimed the faith. He sent these to St. Augustine. The rest of them were slaughtered.

On Oct. 10, the Spaniards found Ribault and 350 survivors from his ship. They, too, were stranded by a river they could not cross.

Menendez wrote later to the king, "I saved the lives of two young gentlemen of about eighteen years of age ... and I caused (Ribault) with all the rest to be put to the knife, judging this to be necessary for the service of God Our Lord and of Your Majesty." The inlet where Menedez found Ribault became Matanzas Inlet, the Place of Slaughter.

About a month later, Menendez received a return message from the king, "Say to him" Philip II had his scribe write, "that as to those he has killed, he has done well; and as to those he has saved, they shall be sent to the galleys."