Relation of the discovery of the mines and of the pacification of the Ygolotes in the province of Pangasinan
Relation of the voyage and entrance that I, Captain and Sargento-mayor Alonso Martin Quirante, made by order of the governor and captain-general, Don Alonso Faxardo de Tenca, during this present year, one thousand six hundred and twenty-four, to the province and mines of the Ygolotes; and the tests or assays made of the metals there by various miners; the nature of the country, and what I was able to learn of its inhabitants.
First, I left the city of Manila by order of the said governor and captain-general, to attain the said entrance, on December twenty-two, one thousand six hundred and twenty-three, and went overland to the province of Pangasinan. I reached that province on January first, six hundred and twenty-four, and took over the offices of justice and war from Captain and Sargento-mayor Antonio Carreño de Valdes. As he notified me of the royal decree ordering his residencia to be taken, in fulfilment thereof I took it, and sent him to the said city on the fifth of the following February.
On the eleventh of the said month of January, the champan which was despatched at my departure from the said city, laden with the infantry, ammunition, and other war-stores necessary for the said entrance, reached the port and storehouses of Arrimguey.
From the said day, January first, until the eleventh of the following February, when I reached the said town and storehouses of Arriguey [sic] I collected and gathered provisions and everything else important for the success of the said expedition. Likewise, together with the preparation that I made of food in the said time, in the said month of February, I caused to be collected, in addition to the seventy Spanish soldiers and officers of my company, fourteen adventurers [extravagantes] or substitutes [sobresalientes], besides two sailors (one of them a miner), two Japanese miners, and one armorer; a clerk [tenedor] and notary; eleven of his Majesty’s negro slaves, and nine Indians imprisoned for crimes; forty-seven Sangley carpenters, smiths, and sawyers; and one thousand seven hundred and forty-eight other Indians—eight hundred and ninety-three from the province of Ylocos, formed into twelve companies; and eight hundred and fifty-five from the province of Pangasinan, formed into ten other companies—who in all totaled one thousand nine hundred and three rations. Father Fray Raymundo Beger[1] of the Order of Preachers, and Licentiate Augustin Tabuyo Baldecañas, who was supplied by the bishop of Nueva Segovia, also went with us as our curas and vicars for the success of the said expedition.
On the fourteenth of the said month, I made a muster and enrolment of the said men. The next day rations were given to all of them for a fortnight, and I began to despatch them by troops in the manner and order following. On the sixteenth of the said month of February, I despatched Adjutant Andres Tamayo with twenty soldiers and two hundred Pangasinan Indians, a chosen and light troop, in order that being unencumbered or discommoded by their rations, arms, and tools they might open and clear the road, arranging camping-places along it during the assigned marches. They were given orders to stop in those quarters only over night, so that afterward and without joining them the second troop who were to follow could occupy the same. On the next day, the seventeenth, after having formed three divisions from the other men, with eighteen soldiers in charge of my sargento and of a corporal, I despatched five hundred and sixteen of the Indians of each province—all except their officers with their packs—with orders to follow the first divisions. They were to make the same marches, but were not to unite with the first troop, nor with the following one. This was in order to avoid the confusion and obstacles that might arise from both troops, since they were men of so little reason, both in camp and in marching; since they had to go by only one path, where because of its narrowness and poor condition they had to go in single file.
I despatched the third troop consisting of a like number of natives with seventeen Spanish soldiers, on the eighteenth of February, in charge of another corporal, ordering them to follow the other two preceding divisions, in the same order and marches.
The next day, February nineteen, having assigned eight soldiers under a half-pay alférez, and twenty-five Pangasinan Indians under their captain, as a guard to the said storehouses—and having despatched the master-of-camp of the province of Ylocos for more men, in order to exchange them after a month with those who had gone out before, who, I feared, were already beginning to desert in part—I started with the rest of the men that were left. I went to pass the night at the place called San Juan, two leguas along the road, where, at the foot of a cross set up there, I found a letter from the troop ahead, announcing that they had found the quarters burned to the ground, and that they did not know who had set the fire, but suspected it was the Ygolotes.
I left the above place on the twentieth, and went to pass the night with the said last division at the site of Duplas, located about four leguas along the road. I also found the camp and the country round about burning, the said Ygolotes having set it afire only a short time before.
Next day, Wednesday, the twenty-first of the said month, after the conclusion of sprinkling ashes on all the soldiers, I left the said place and went to pass the night at another place called San Francisco. On that day not more than one and one-half leguas could be made, because of the many rivers.