644
RULE OF VICEROY ENRIQUEZ.
Several of the members of Hawkins' expedition were transported to Spain.[1] Some were kept in Mexico in a state of worse than bondage, and were brought under the tender mercies of the inquisition, after it was formally established there, and made to undergo most terrible suffering; a number were burned to death. What could savages do more?[2]
- ↑ They were followed within a year by Job Hortop and several others. After escaping death by shipwreck and hanging, the latter were surrendered to the casa de contratacion of Seville. Hortop's Trauailes, in Haklvyt's Voy., iii. 494.
- ↑ Of the prisoners in Spain, Barret, Hortop, Gilbert, and two others out of seven, who had attempted to escape, were retaken. After horrible cruelties, Barret and Gilbert were burned alive, and the others sentenced to different terms of service in the galleys; Hortop served 12 years in the galleys and seven more of common imprisonment, till 1590, when he made his escape to England. The others in Mexico were kept in close solitary confinement about 18 months, and tortured on the rack, or otherwise tormented. Several died under the inflictions. Finally the day of their trial arrived, when they were carried to the court wearing sambenitos, a rope round the neck, a taper in the hand, and there sentenced, one to receive 300 lashes on the bare back and 10 years in the galleys, the rest to be given from 200 to 100 lashes, and service in the galleys from eight to six years. A few, among them Miles Philips, escaped the lash, but had to serve in the convents from three to five years, wearing the sambenitos. Three were sentenced to death by burning, and suffered their penalty publicly. The floggings above spoken of were inflicted on good Friday, in 1575. The victims were paraded through the principal streets on horseback, and called English dogs, Lutherans, heretics, enemies of God, and the like. The stripes were laid on with all the fierceness that bigotry and brutality could prompt. Later they were sent to the galleys of Spain. Philips and six companions served only part of their terms, and managed to escape to Spain, and thence to England. Hortop's Trauailes, in Haklvyt's Voy., iii. 494; Philip's Discourse, in Id., iii. 479-87. Spanish historians, with the exception of Juan Suarez de Peralta, from whose apparently impartial account I have copiously drawn, and March y Labores, whose information is meagre and evidently biassed by a spirit of nationality, have omitted to give a detailed narrative of Hawkins' visit to Vera Cruz. One of the Spanish writers, who could not have been ignorant of the particulars, disposes of the subject in a few words: 'Llegó al puerto de San Juan de Ulva' — Viceroy Enriquez — 'dondo tuvo dares, y tomares con vn inglés llamado Juan de Acle.' Torquemada, i. 638. Another gives Hawkins' name in one place Juan de Aquines, and in another Jaun de Aquines Acle. He is not very positive as to the number of ships on either side, and disposes of the whole thing in a very off-hand manner: 'Lo desbaratò y echò de la Isla.' Vetancvrt, Trat. Mex., 10; Id., Teatro Mex., 77. This last writer, however, adds that the 200 prisoners were sent to the Santa Marta quarries to work in getting stone for Mexico, which does not exactly bear out the assertion of March y Labores that the prisoners from Pánuco were treated 'con humanidad.' Another misnames the English chief Jaween. Alegre, Hist. Comp. Jesus, i. 150. Cavo, Tres Siglos, i. 188, speaks of the viceroy's course in the matter as one that did honor to the inception of his rule. The name of Aquines is clearly a corruption of Hawkins, Juan Aquines Acle meaning perhaps John Hawkins, Esquire! See, also, Icazbalceta, Doc. Hist., in Soc. Mex. Geog., Boletin, 2da ép., ii. 493. Luther-loving corsairs and smugglers in whom no faith could be placed deserve to have little said of them. A
