[Fac-simile of an engraving in Herrera, vol. iv. p. 260. He was one of the distinguished cavaliers of the Conquest, to whom Muñoz—erroneously, as Prescott thinks—assigned the authorship of the Relacion primera of Ondegardo. He was distinguished at the defence of Cusco, when that town was besieged by the Indians. Later, as governor of Cusco for Almagro, he had charge of Gonzalo Pizarro while he was held a prisoner, and had, later still, command of the artillery under Gasca. He died at Charcas.—Ed.]
Almagro was induced to undertake an expedition for the discovery and conquest of Chili. He was accompanied by a large army of Indians, led by two Yncas of the blood royal; and he had with him about two hundred Spaniards. He set out from Cusco in the autumn. Pizarro then returned to the coast, to push forward the building of Lima, and to found the cities of Truxillo (1535), Chachapoyas (1536), Huamanga (1539), and Arequipa (1540). Hernando Pizarro, on his return, was sent to join his brothers Juan and Gonzalo at Cusco, and to take command of that city and fortress.
SKETCH MAP OF THE CONQUEST OF CHILI.
The Spaniards had already begun to look upon the natives as their slaves, and the young Ynca Manco was not only treated with neglect, but exposed to every kind of humiliating insult. He escaped from Cusco, and put himself at the head of a great army of his subjects in the valley of Yucay. This was a signal; and immediately the whole country was in revolt against the invaders. Juan Pizarro was driven back into Cusco, and the city was closely besieged by the armies of the Ynca from February, 1536. The besiegers succeeded in setting the thatched roofs of the halls and palaces on fire, and the Spanish garrison was reduced to the greatest straits. The Yncas had occupied the fortress which commands the town, and Juan Pizarro was killed in an attempt to carry it by storm. Finally Hernando Pizarro himself captured the fortress, after a heroic defence by the Ynca garrison. Still the close siege of the city continued, and the garrison was reduced to the last straits by famine. Month after month passed away without tidings. At last the season for planting arrived, and in August the Ynca was obliged to raise the siege.
Chili, the long strip of land along the west coast of South America, to the south of Peru, had been conquered by the Yncas as far as the river Maule. Beyond that limit were the indomitable tribes of Araucanian Indians. Bounded on one side by the cordillera of the Andes, and on the other by the sea, the country enjoys a temperate climate, suited for the cultivation of wheat and the rearing of cattle. It can be approached from Peru either by traversing the great desert of Atacama on the coast, or by marching over the snowy plateaus and rocky passes of the Andes. Almagro chose the latter route. The Indian auxiliaries, led by Paullu, the brother of Ynca Manco, and by the Uillac Umu, or high-priest, marched first, carrying provisions and making arrangements for their supply, taking the road through the Collao and Charcas (the modern republic of Bolivia). The Indian contingent was followed by one hundred Spaniards under Don Juan Saavedra; and this advanced party waited at Paria, in the south of Charcas, for the main body. This was commanded by Don Rodrigo Orgoñez, a native of Oropesa, who had served under the constable Bourbon at the sack of Rome. He was a brave and experienced commander, ever faithful to his chief, the marshal Almagro. The whole force, when united in the distant valley of Jujuy, consisted of five hundred Spaniards, with two hundred horses. The march across the Andes to Coquimbo, in Chili, during the winter of 1536, was a time of intense suffering and hardship bravely endured; but it was stained by the most revolting cruelties to the people of Charcas and Jujuy.
Almagro advanced from Coquimbo to the southward, and his Peruvian contingent suffered a defeat from an army of Promauca Indians. He was reinforced by Orgoñez and Juan Rada, another faithful adherent, who brought with them the royal order appointing Almagro to be adelantado, or governor, of New Toledo, which was to extend two hundred leagues from the southern limit of Pizarro’s government of New Castile. The explorers now desired to return and occupy this new government, which they claimed to include the city of Cusco itself. Almagro had arranged that three small vessels should sail from Callao, the port of Lima, for the Chilian coast, with provisions. Only one ever sailed, named the “Santiaguillo,” having a cargo of food, clothing, and horse-shoes. She arrived in a port on the coast of Chili; and when the tidings reached Almagro, he sent the gallant Juan de Saavedra, the leader of his vanguard, with thirty horsemen, to communicate with her. Saavedra found the little vessel anchored in a bay surrounded by rugged hills covered with an undergrowth of shrubs, and having a distant view of the snowy cordillera. In some way it reminded him of his distant Spanish home. Saavedra was a native of the village of Valparaiso, near Cuenca, in Castile. He named the bay, where the principal seaport of Chili was destined to be established, Valparaiso. This was in September, 1536. Landing the much-needed supplies, Saavedra rejoined his chief, and the expedition of Almagro began its painful return journey by the desert of Atacama. On arriving at Arequipa, Almagro first heard of the great insurrection of the Yncas. Marching rapidly to Cusco, his lieutenant, Orgoñez, defeated the Ynca Manco in the valley of Yucay; and Almagro entered the ancient city, claiming to be its lawful governor.
The royal grant had given Pizarro all the territory for two hundred and seventy leagues southward from the river of Santiago, in 1° 20´ north, and to Almagro two hundred leagues extending from Pizarro’s southern limit. Herrera says that there were seventeen and one half leagues in a degree. This would bring Pizarro’s boundary as far south as 14° 50´, and would leave Cusco (13° 30´ 55″ south) well within it. But neither the latitudes of the river Santiago nor of Cusco had been fixed, and the question was open to dispute.