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In a few days Moscoso came also with the residue of the army. They were about sixty miles north of Uribaracaxi. It is supposed the place is now known by the old Indian name of Palaklikaha. The chief, whose name was Acuera, and all his people had fled to the woods.
That nothing might be left unprovided for, he appointed in presence of all his officers and principal followers Luis Moscoso de Alvarado to succeed him in the command till the king might order otherwise; and after commending the virtue and bravery of Alvarado, he entreated and commanded all to yield him implicit obedience, even taking their oaths to that purpose, and represented to them how necessary it was for them all to be united and obedient, for their own preservation among these barbarous nations.
And touching the Governor which he commanded they should elect, he besought him, that it would please his lordship to name him which he thought fit, and him they would obey. And presently he named Luys de Moscoso de Alvarado, his captain-general. And presently he was sworn by all that were present, and elected for governor.
Luys de Moscoso told him that the Governor was not dead, but gone to heaven, and that of his own Christian soldiers he had taken such as he needed to serve him, and prayed him to command those Indians to be loosed, and not to use any such bad custom from thenceforth: straightway he commanded them to be loosed, and to get them home to their houses.
It was at Aminoya that De Moscoso, who succeeded De Soto, built his little fleet of seven strong barges, with which the Spaniards descended, in a voyage of sixteen days, to the mouth of the river.
The Gouernour lodged himselfe in the Lords houses, and with him Vasques Porcallo, and Luys de Moscoso: and in others that were in the middest of the towne, was the chiefe Alcalde or Iustice, Baltasar de Gallégos lodged; and in the same houses was set in a place by it selfe, al the prouision that came in the ships: the other houses and the Church were broken down, and euery three or foure souldiers made a little cabin wherein they lodged.
Moscoso was searching for Coronado, and he was one of the most humane of all the officers of De Soto's command, for he evidently bent every energy to extricate his men from the dreadful environments of their situation; despairing of reaching the Gulf by the Mississippi, he struck westward, hoping, as Cabeca de Vaca had done, to arrive in Mexico overland.
It is recorded, however, that some time during the year 1542, his decimated army, then under the command of Luis de Moscoso, De Soto having died the previous May, was camped on the Arkansas River, far upward towards what is now Kansas. It was this command, too, of the unfortunate but cruel De Soto, that saw the Rocky Mountains from the east.
Canoes, propelled by the paddle, would often dart out from the thickets, a shower of arrows be discharged, and the canoes disappear where no foot could follow them. A very bold courier, on one of the fleetest horses, was sent back to summon the main body of the army to march, under the command of Moscoso, and join the party of explorers which De Soto had led.
He dispatched orders to all the troops who were with him to be on the alert, and to hold themselves in readiness to repel an assault. At the same time he sent back a courier to inform Luis De Moscoso, who was master of the Spanish camp, of the dangerous posture of affairs.
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