Hernando de Soto was a conquistador, a conqueror.
By the time de Soto came to Georgia in 1540, he was already a wealthy man. He had
gotten rich fighting in South America and taking part in the conquest of the
Incan Empire. But he came to the southeastern United States looking for
even more riches.
3-2-1-0 All engines running!
Lift off! We have a lift off!
Exploration and discovery, today it means a voyage to the
planets, a journey to the moon, and the stars. We explore because there is in all
of us a need to know more, a curiosity about the universe and how it was made
and where we came from. But 500 years ago, exploration meant crossing the Atlantic
Ocean, discovery meant finding gold, and that's what Hernando DeSoto was looking
for when he came to the southeastern United States, to a place he called la Florida.
They had had reports of gold being in Florida, in the hands of native
people. What they didn't realize is that that gold had come off Spanish ships
that had wrecked on the coast of Florida and had been salvaged by the Native
Americans. So yes some of the Native Americans had gold, but it wasn't mined here.
Inevitably, DeSoto's search for gold led to war.
*War Sound Effects*
But he only had six hundred men and he faced thousands of Native Americans.
How could he win against such terrible odds?
With them, they brought their
weapons which were the state-of-the-art weapons of the 16th century. I think the
two most devastating weapons were first the war dogs. The attack dogs that were
trained to attack people and also the war horses. There were Knights who came
with their servants and their armor and their weapons and those armored Knights
would be mounted on horses that were also armored in some fashion and
essentially it was the Sherman tank of the day. A Native American with a club or
a spear or a bow and arrow was not necessarily a very good opponent for one
of these tank like mounted Knights. Today dogs are our pets and we like little
dogs. Back then, dogs were also pets but then they were used for hunting and for
attack purposes. Large Mastiff like dogs were trained to attack Native Americans
and could tear them limb to limb. Sure, they were cruel and when the other
Indians saw them do this most likely they then
would bend to the will of the Spanish.
*Native American War Cries*
The Native Americans tried repeatedly to
defeat the Spanish but, first most of the Native American weapons you really need
to get pretty close and because of the war dogs the horses they just weren't successful.
How do we know what happened to de Soto's expedition 450 years ago? At least
three of the people who traveled with him kept journals. These journals or
chronicles describe a terrible battle near M'Vila in Alabama where de Soto was
ambushed. They counted up and and the Chronicles reported thousands of Native
Americans were killed. It must have been an incredible horrendous battle. The
Spaniards lost a lot of their supplies and equipment at that but they were they
were able to get out of this ambush and to survive.
In the end, his expedition was
a failure. De Soto never found any gold. His legacy
was one of disease and cruelty and death but at least there is this. The journals
of his expedition kept alive the names and stories of the native people he
encountered. When Hernando de Soto went through the Oconee River Valley which is
where we're excavating, he encountered a chiefdom or something like a kingdom in
medieval Europe, that was known as au coûte and that was the name of the
people that lived at Raccoon Ridge. Now, the people of Raccoon Ridge probably
paid their tribute their allegiance to a local chief known as [Chief's Name] and we
have those names because de Soto actually went there.
But in many instances the only reason we know that some of those Native American groups
existed, that many of those Native American groups existed, is because
information about them is recorded in the accounts of the de
Soto expedition. I think that's his most important legacy, what he tells us about
the past although he helped to destroy that past.
*End Music*
There are still lots of places I'd like you to see in this state and there are
still lots of people I'd like you to meet. This is Georgia Stories,
I'm Colin Sidor. Thanks