Indians 101: The Calusa Indians and Spanish missionaries in 1549

The Calusas were a complex fishing/hunting/gathering society which was divided into commoners and nobles. Like other Florida tribes, the Calusas were not an isolated people and engaged in long-distance trade. The Calusas had large sea-going canoes as well as smaller cargo canoes and barges made from platforms which connected two or more canoes. Some of the Calusa canoes held 80 people and were used for traveling to Cuba.

The Calusas maintained a military force which collected tribute throughout south Florida. In his chapter on the Calusas in Societies in Eclipse: Archaeology of the Eastern Woodland Indians, A.D. 1400-1700, William Marquardt says:

“Warfare was likely waged to gain prestige, seek revenge, humiliate an enemy, bolster population, or maintain boundaries, rather than to annihilate one’s neighbors.”

The first recorded contact between the Calusas and the Spanish occurred in 1513 when Spanish ships under the command of Juan Ponce de Leon (the conqueror of Puerto Rico) sailed into San Carlos Bay where they intended to clean and recaulk one of their ships. Eighty Calusacanoes filled with archers holding shields approached the Spanish ships. The Spanish attacked, drove the Calusa canoes to shore, broke up some of the canoes, and captured some Calusa women. The Calusa warriors, however, forced the Spanish to withdraw.

It should be noted, however, that the Calusas were well aware of the Spanish long before this first encounter. With their extensive trading networks, they had heard reports of Spanish atrocities toward other tribes in the Caribbean region.

In 1518, three Spanish ships under the command of Hernández de Córdoba stopped for water at San Carlos Bay. The well-armed Spanish landing party was driven off by the Calusas. In his chapter in North American Exploration. Volume 1: A New World Disclosed, Robert Weddle reports:

“In the fight, thirty-five Indians were slain. Half a dozen soldiers were injured, and a Spanish sentry was carried off alive.”

By the 1540s, the Spanish were wary of the hostile Calusas and the Calusas were not inclined to be friendly to the Spanish invaders.

The missionaries

The Catholic Dominican Order (the Order of Preachers, OP) had been founded in France by Dominic de Guzmán in 1216. During the sixteenth century, many Dominican missionaries worked in the Americas.

Fray Luis Cáncer de Barbastro (1500-1549), a Dominican missionary, had come to the Americas in 1518. As a missionary determined to convert the pagan Native Americans to Catholicism, he initially worked in Puerto Rico and Hispaniola. In his approach to missionary work, he felt that his primary hope in converting Indians lay in contacting people who had not been antagonized by the Spanish show of force. He felt that Indians could be converted by kindness and good example instead of force.

Having had some success on the islands and in Guatemala, he turned next to Florida. In 1547 his mission to Florida was approved by King Charles V with the stipulation that he avoid hostile territory and focus on Florida’s upper east coast.

For the missionary expedition into Florida, Cáncer recruited three other Dominican priests: Gregorio de Beteta, Diego de Tolosa, and Juan García. In addition, a Brother Fuentes was to accompany them.

Cáncer felt that converting the Indians required explaining the true faith to them and, since none of the Dominicans spoke any of the Native languages of Florida, they needed an interpreter. An Indian woman called Magdalena was chosen to come with them as an interpreter. It is not certain if Magdalena was a Calusa who had been captured by an earlier Spanish expedition or if she was a Native Cuban who had been captured by the Calusa and learned their language. Trading trips to Cuba by Calusa traders predated the Spanish invasion.

(Note: I’m assuming that Magdalena’s name was not her Native name, but a name given to her by the Spanish, and that she was a slave.)

In 1549 the Dominican missionaries set out for Florida in a caravel captained by Juan de Arena.

The Expedition

The Spanish missionary expedition landed south of Tampa Bay in June 1549. Here they encountered an apparently peaceful Calusa group who told them of the many populous villages around Tampa Bay. This news was welcomed by the missionaries who saw it as opportunity to convert many people. Magdalena, Diego de Tolosa, Brother Fuentes, and an unknown sailor went with the Calusas to their inland village. The others returned to the ship with the understanding that the two groups would meet up again at Tampa Bay.

When the Spanish arrived at Tampa Bay, they found only the Calusas and Magdalena waiting for them. Magdalena, now wearing Native clothing, told Cáncer that she had convinced the Calusa chief that the Spaniards were peaceful and that the Spaniards who had accompanied her to the Calusa village were now the guests of the chief.

In the meantime, Juan Munos, a Spanish sailor who had been captured and enslaved by the Calusas several years earlier, escaped from his captors and made his way to the caravel. When Cáncer returned to the ship he was told that the Dominicans had been killed and the sailor enslaved.

Cáncer, however, still wanted to save the souls of the Indians. The three Dominican missionaries rowed to the shore, and Cáncer waded onto the beach. Dennis Reinhartz and Oakah Jones, in their chapter in North American Exploration. Volume 1: A New World Disclosed, report:

“He waded ashore alone and was greeted on the beach by Indians who snatched his hat and felled him with a blow to the head before killing him.”

He thus became a martyr to his cause and a victim of Calusa hostility which had been incited by earlier Spanish expeditions.

The Spanish and Magdalena had inadvertently brought typhus with them, passing it on to the Calusas. The mortality rate from this epidemic was about 10%.