Ferdinand De Soto, The Discoverer of the Mississippi / American Pioneers and Patriots

by John S. C. Abbott

The priests in the army, and most of the officers, earnestly implored De Soto to pardon the culprits. But he was inflexible. He would administer equal justice to the Indian and the Spaniard. The culprits were led into the public square to be beheaded. It so happened that, just at that time, an embassage arrived from the Cacique with complaints of the robbery, and demanding the punishment of the offenders. Juan Ortiz, the interpreter, whose sympathies were deeply moved in behalf of his comrades about to be executed, adopted the following singular and sagacious expedient to save them:

He falsely reported to the Governor that the chief had sent his messengers to implore the forgiveness of the culprits—to say that their offence was a very slight one, and that he should regard it as a personal favor if they were pardoned and set at liberty. The kind-hearted De Soto, thus delivered from his embarrassment, gladly released them.

On the other hand, the tricky interpreter sent word to the Cacique that the men who had robbed him were in close imprisonment, and that they would be punished with the utmost severity, so as to serve as a warning to all others.

Many circumstances led De Soto to the suspicion that the chief was acting a treacherous part; that he was marshalling an immense army in the vicinity to attack the Spaniards; that his pretended friendliness was intended merely to disarm suspicion, and that the warriors who visited the village were spies, making preparation for a general assault. In this judgment subsequent events proved him to be correct.

Early in the month of March there was a dark and stormy night, and a chill north wind swept the bleak plains. The sentinels were driven to seek shelter; no one dreamed of peril. It was the hour for the grand assault. Just at midnight the Cacique put his martial bands in motion. They were in three powerful divisions, the central party being led by the chief in person. These moccasoned warriors, with noiseless tread, stealthily approached their victims. Suddenly the air resounded with war-whoops, blasts of conch shells, and the clangor of wooden drums, rising above the roar of the storm, when the savages, like spirits of darkness, rushed upon the defenceless village. They bore with them lighted matches, made of some combustible substance twisted in the form of a cord, which, being waved in the air, would blaze into flame. The village was built of reeds, with thatch of dried grass. The torch was everywhere applied; the gale fanned the fire. In a few minutes the whole village was a roaring furnace of flame.

What pen can describe the scene which ensued of tumult, terror, blood, and woe! What imagination can conceive of the horrors of that night, when uncounted thousands of savages, fierce as demons, rushed upon the steel-clad veterans of Spain, not one of whom would ask for quarter! every one of whom would fight with sinewy arm and glittering sabre to the last possible gasp.

Nothing could throw the veteran Spaniards into a panic. They always slept prepared for surprise. In an instant every man was at his post. De Soto, who always slept in hose and doublet, drew his armor around him, mounted his steed ever ready, and was one of the first to dash into the densest of the foe. Twelve armored horsemen were immediately at his side. The arrows and javelins of the natives glanced harmless from helmet and cuirass, while every flash of the long, keen sabres was death to an Indian, and the proud war-horses trampled the corpses beneath their feet.

The fierce conflagration soon drove all alike out into the plain. Many of the Spaniards could not escape, but perished miserably in the fire. Several of the splendid horses were also burned. Soon all were engaged hand to hand, fighting in a tumultuous mass by the light of the conflagration. There was, perhaps, alike bravery on either side. But the natives knew that if defeated they could flee to the forests; while to the Spaniards defeat was certain death, or captivity worse than death to every one.

De Soto observed not far from him an Indian chief of herculean strength, who was fighting with great success. He closed in upon him, and as he rose in his saddle, leaning mainly upon the right stirrup, to pierce him with his lance, the saddle, which in the haste had not been sufficiently girded, turned beneath him, and he was thrown upon the ground in the midst of the enemy. His companions sprang to the rescue. Instantly he remounted, and was again in the thickest of the foe. The battle was fierce, bloody, and short. So many of the horsemen had perished during their long journey that many of the foot soldiers were protected by armor. At length the savages were put to flight. Pursued by the swift-footed horses, they, in their terror, to add speed to their footsteps, threw away their weapons, and thus fell an easy prey to the conqueror.

The Spaniards, justly exasperated in being thus treacherously assailed by those who had assumed the guise of friendship, pursued the fugitives so long as they could be distinguished by the light of the conflagration, and cut them down without any mercy. A bugle-blast then sounded the recall. The victors returned to an awful scene of desolation and misery. Their homes were all in ashes, and many of the few comforts they had retained were consumed. Forty Spaniards had been slain, besides many more wounded. Fifty horses had perished in the flames, or had been shot by the natives. Their herd of swine, which they prized so highly, and which they regarded as an essential element in the establishment of their colony, had been shut up in an enclosure roofed with straw, and nearly every one had perished in the flames.