United States or Bahamas ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Charmed with the beauty of the bay, the opulence of vegetation, the hope of wealth in the river sands, he christened it "the rich port," and extending this, applied to the whole island the name of San Juan Bautista de Puerto Rico St. John the Baptist of the Rich Port. The natives knew their island as Boriquen.
Friar Iñigo Abbad, in his History of the Island San Juan Bautista de Puerto Rico, gives the story of the discovery in a very short chapter, and terminates it with the words: "Columbus sailed for Santo Domingo November 22, 1493, and thought no more of the island, which remained forgotten till Juan Ponce returned to explore it in 1508." This is not correct.
San Juan Bautista came first; then Soledad, San Antonio, San Miguel, San Luis Obispo, Santa Inez; and that brought him to Santa Barbara. He had spent two months on the journey. At each of these places he found Indians; miserable, half-starved creatures, most of them. Felipe's heart ached, and he was hot with shame, at their condition.
All the streams, large and small, are much swollen by late heavy rains, and the travelling is consequently very laborious and difficult. Resting our horses a short time, we crossed the mountains, and reached the mission of San Juan Bautista about noon. At San Juan we met with Messrs.
I can well recall that Ord and I, impatient to look inland, got permission and started for the Mission of San Juan Bautista. Mounted on horses, and with our carbines, we took the road by El Toro, quite a prominent hill, around which passes the road to the south, following the Saunas or Monterey River.
It was in 1774 that Captain Juan Bautista de Anza, of the presidio of Tubac in Arizona, was detailed by the Viceroy of New Spain to open this road. He made quite an expedition of it, 240 men, women, and Indian scouts, and 1050 animals. They named the San Gorgonio Pass the Puerto de San Carlos, and the San Bernardino Valley the Valle de San José.
In 1510 Ponce de Leon founded the town of Caparra, soon after abandoned, and now known as Pureto Viejo, and in 1511, with more success, the city of San Juan Bautista, or better known simply as San Juan. The native inhabitants were soon subdued and swept away. In 1595 the capital was sacked by Drake, and in 1598 by the Earl of Cumberland.
Carillo was my friend, and had his cause been a just one I had gone with him to the gates of death or the chair of state. But could I, I, conspire against a wise and great man like Juan Bautista Alvarado? No! not even if Carillo had asked me so to do. But, by the stars of heaven, he did not.
His fourth journey was with the intrepid Captain Juan Bautista de Anza, when he set forth in 1774. to discover a road from the missions already established in Northern Mexico, over the then unknown Arizona and Colorado deserts, to the new missions of California.
The mission of San Juan Bautista has been one of the most extensive of these establishments. The principal buildings are more durably constructed than those of other missions I have visited, and they are in better condition. Square bricks are used in paving the corridors and the ground floors.
Word Of The Day