Tlte Searclt for La Salle, 1685-1689
Tl,e expedition of Captain Retana. The missionaries had immediately reported the rumors to Governor Juan Isidro Pardinas, who received the confirmation as a piece of extraordinary good luck. He knew how anxious the viceroy was to find the French colony and he realized the honor that would befall him should he succeed in an enterprise that had worried all the officials of New Spain for almost four years and cost the king so much. Without loss of time, on November 2, 1688, he issued orders to Captain Juan de Retana to raise a force of ninety men to search for the intruders. The expedition was to set out from Presidio de San Francisco de Conchos and go to La Junta de los Rios. It was to cross the river at this point and proceed as far to the east as might be necessary until the French colony was found . In his instructions the governor explained that several attempts had been made without success to discover the Bay of Espiritu Santo where the colony was located. He warned him particularly, therefore, to make a determined effort to find it and ordered him to reconnoiter it carefully. He was to learn everything he could concerning the settlement established on this bay and to cultivate the friendship of all the Indians in the lands he visited. If he should find any nation, such as the Tejas, who had an organized form of government and a recognized ruler, he was to negotiate a permanent treaty of alliance with him. The expedition was to start from the Presidio de Conchos on November 15.' 0 But in the meantime the Indians at La Junta had again revolted. The two missionaries had been forced to take refuge at Presidio de Conchos with the tribes in the neighborhood. This delayed the departure of Captain Retana who had to pacify these Indians before undertaking the expe- dition entrusted to him. In a short campaign, he attacked and subdued three of the chief tribes implicated in the revolt and then proceeded to La Junta. It was either late in December or early in January when he arrived at the Rio Grande. From here he sent out scouts to determine the best route to follow in his search for Espiritu Santo Bay. After a few days, the scouts returned to report that the chief of the allied tribes of the Jumanos was on his way to La Junta, that he was coming from the country of the Tejas, and that he was bringing back letters from the other Spaniards that would explain everything. Retana, anxious to talk to this strange personage, set out immediately to meet him. Great was his surprise to find, after a four days' march, that this man was the old first to bring out all these interesting facts was Dunn in his S,pa11isli and F,-,,,clt Rivalry. 40 Retana to Pardiiias, March 3, 1688, Ibid. pp. 19-22.
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