Spanish Florida
Florida’s European discoverer was Juan
Ponce de León (1460–1521), who trav-
eled with Columbus on his second voyage
(1493–1496) and who conquered Puerto
Rico beginning in 1508. According to a
dubious legend, he came to Florida
searching for a mythical “Fountain of
Youth.” What is certain is that he landed
on the northeast coast near present-day
St. Augustine on April 2, 1513, and
claimed the land for Spain, calling it
Florida because he discovered it in the
season of Easter, known in Spanish as
Pascua Florida, “Floral Passover.” He
returned in 1521 and attempted to found
a settlement on the peninsula’s west coast,
facing the Gulf of Mexico, but a Native
American attack drove him off, leaving
him with an arrow wound that killed him
once he reached Cuba.
Spanish exploration of Florida and
adjacent areas continued in the coming
decades. In 1526, Lucas Vásquez de
Ayllón (ca. 1475–1526) founded a colony
in what is now North or South Carolinabut died of fever that year; the colony
foundered soon after. Two years later, in
1528, an expedition headed by Pánfilo de
Narváez, former antagonist of Cortés in
Mexico, landed on the Gulf Coast at
Tampa Bay and marched inland almost to
the present-day border with Georgia. But
through Narváez’s mismanagement, the
explorers lost contact with their ships
and were forced to build barges to try to
sail across the Gulf of Mexico to New
Spain. The barges were wrecked near
present-day Galveston, Texas, and all but
four men were lost. They managed to
stay alive and return to tell their astonish-
ing tale. Led by Álvar Núñez Cabeza de
Vaca (ca. 1490–ca. 1557), they walked
for years across Texas and what is now the
American Southwest, becoming the first
Europeans to see American bison and
making their living as healers among the
Native Americans before arriving back in
Mexico in 1536.
After this dismal start, Spain had lit-
tle reason to continue exploring Florida.
The terrain was difficult, there was no
gold or silver, and the Native Americans46 ATLAS OF HISPANIC-AMERICAN HISTORY
This 19th century image shows Hernando de Soto entering an Indian Village during the journey in which he became the first
European to see the Mississippi River.(Library of Congress)“Juan Ponz de Leon, giving
heed to the tale of the
Indians of Cuba and Santo
Domingo, went to Florida in
search of the River
Jordan...then that he might
become young from bathing
in such a stream.”
— Hernando de Escalante
Fontaneda in his memoirs