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Pedro Menéndez de Avilés (born February 15, 1519 in Avilés, Spain, died in Santander on September 17, 1574), was the first Spanish governor of Florida. He founded the city of St. Augustine on August 28, 1565.
Explorations
Pedro Menéndez de Avilés was about forty-six years when he had risen to the highest rank in the Spanish navy; he was a man of means with a huge family fortune; an Hidalgo. In 1554, he commanded the royal galleon which bore his king Philip II of Spain to England to wed Queen Mary; and in 1561, he commanded the great treasure-fleet of galleons on their voyage from Mexico to Spain. When he had delivered the fleet in Spain, he asked permission to go back in search of one lost vessel, but was then refused. This was the vessel where he lost his son and other family and friends on. However after a lengthy delay, his request was granted only on the condition that he would explore and colonize La Florida as king Philip II's Adelantado. He fitted out an expedition for the purpose at his own expense, but when he was about to sail, orders came to him from the king to wipe out all Protestant interlopers he might find there, or in whatever corner of the Indies he should find them, on land or sea, in forests or marshes.
Military
Don Pedro is credited as the Spanish leader who first surveyed and authorized the building of the royal fortresses at major Caribbean ports. He was appointed Captain-General of the Armada de la Carrera in 1554 when he sailed out with the Indies fleet and brought it back safely to Spain. The experience he gained assured him of the strategic importance of the Bahama Channel and the position of Havana as the key port to rendezvous the annual 'Flota' of treasure galleons.
Menéndez de Avilés' brilliant military experience, allowed him to surprise and destroy the French outpost of Fort Caroline on the St. Johns River and, with the help of a storm, also defeat the French fleet there. Due to a lack of foodstuffs and the religion of the defeated French (many were Protestants), Menéndez de Avilés ordered that the survivors of Fort Caroline be put to the sword. The slaughter of these men led to the area of their execution being called 'Matanzas.' With the coast of Florida now firmly in Spanish hands, he then set to work finishing building and leaving a garrison in St. Augustine, establishing missions to the natives for the Church, and exploring the east coast and interior of the peninsula.
The founding of Saint Augustine
When Menéndez arrived off the coast of Florida, it was August 28, 1565, the Feast Day of Saint Augustine. Eleven days later, he and some 600 soldiers and settlers came ashore at the site of the Timucuan Indian village of Seloy with banners flying and trumpets sounding. He hastily fortified the fledgling little town and named it St. Augustine, the oldest continuously-occupied European settlement in what is now the United States.
Pedro Menendez High School on State Road 206 in Saint Johns County is named after him, as well as several streets in the area.
See also
Explorers of North America | Spanish explorers and conquistadores | City founders | Asturian people | History of Florida | 1519 births | 1574 deaths
Pedro Menéndez d'Avilés | Pedro Menéndez de Avilés | Pedro Menéndez de Avilés
"Pedro Menéndez de Avilés"