W. H. Koebel

The discovery of Uruguay—Reception by the Indians—Juan de Solis and his fate—Navigation of the River Plate—Serrano and Magellanes—Rivalry between Spaniards and Portuguese—The first settlement in the Banda Oriental—Aggressive tactics of the Indians—Forts destroyed by them—Colonisation under difficulties—The introduction of cattle—A prophetic move—Intervention of the missionaries—Jesuit settlements established—Uruguay's isolation comes to an end—Influence of the livestock—Cattle-raiders—The first Portuguese invasion—Victory of the Spaniards, assisted by native auxiliaries—Treaties and their attendant troubles—The indecision of Old Spain—Partial extermination of the Indians—The town of Colonia as a bone of contention—Introduction of the first negro slaves into the provinces of the River Plate—Unrest on the Spanish main—Moreau, the buccaneer—The fate of his expedition—Portuguese invaders expelled by the Spaniards—A fort is constructed on the present site of Montevideo.

The early history of Uruguay needs but cursory recapitulation, since its episodes form part and parcel of the general discovery of the River Plate. Juan Diaz de Solis, the famous explorer of the great river, was the first leader in the Spanish service to set foot on Uruguayan soil. The precise point of his disembarkation is unknown, but it is certain enough that the spot lay somewhere just to the north of the island of Martin Garcia. His reception at the hands of the hostile CharrÚa Indians, who at the time inhabited the district, was fatally inhospitable. Solis and many more of the landing party of fifty who accompanied him were slain by these natives almost as soon as they had landed, and the disheartened expedition returned to Spain.

It is supposed that Rodriguez Serrano was the first to sail the waters of the Uruguay River proper. In 1520, when anchored in the mouth of the River Plate on his way to the South, Magellane is supposed to have sent this subordinate of his some distance up the Uruguay. There is much, however, that is vague in the history of these particular waterways at this time. A certain material reason obtained for the mystery. The rivalry between the Spaniards and Portuguese tended towards a concealment on the part of each of discoveries that affected comparatively unknown and debatable areas. Thus there is no doubt that various Portuguese expeditions sailed the Uruguay River at this period; but the details of these are uncertain.

In 1527 Spain, fearing the possibilities of Portuguese influence, turned her attention once more to the great river system of the South. It was in that year that Cabot founded the fort of San Sebastian on the Uruguayan coast. This, at the confluence of the San Salvador River with the Uruguay, was the first Spanish settlement in the country. Its existence was short-lived. Attacked by the CharrÚa Indians in 1529, the fort was destroyed and many of its garrison slain.

After this little was heard of the Uruguayan coast until, in 1552, Irala, the famous Governor of the River Plate, ordered Captain Juan Romero to found a settlement on that shore. Juan Romero set out with an expedition of 120 men, and founded the settlement of San Juan at the mouth of the river of the same name. This attempt was likewise unsuccessful. The CharrÚas had to be reckoned with, and two years later the place was abandoned on account of their incessant attacks.

In 1573 another noted conquistador, Zarate, on the completion of his voyage from Europe, arrived at the island of San Gabriel. He founded a settlement on the neighbouring Uruguayan mainland, and the CharrÚas for once received him with comparative hospitality. Nevertheless it was not long ere hostilities broke out, by reason of the Spaniard's own arrogance, it is said. In the end the Europeans were completely defeated by the famous chief ZapicÁn, losing over one hundred soldiers and various officers. The Spaniards then retired to the island of San Gabriel, leaving the aboriginal tribe in possession of the new township, which they immediately destroyed.

A short while after this Juan de Garay, afterwards famed as the founder of the modern Buenos Aires, arrived near the scene of the disaster. With a diminutive force (it is said by some that his expedition comprised no more than twelve cavalry and twenty-two infantry) he attacked ZapicÁn's army of a thousand men. The result was the rout of the Indians, in the course of which ZapicÁn and many other leading caciques perished. This action was fought in the neighbourhood of ruined San Salvador, and Zarate founded a new settlement on the ruins of the old. Triumph, however, was short-lived, for the Indians remained as fiercely persevering as ever, and three years later their aggressive tactics caused the establishment to be abandoned once again.

In 1603 it is said that Hernando Arias de Saavedra, the first colonial-born Governor of the River Plate, led an expedition of five hundred men against the CharrÚas. Hernandarias, by which name the Governor was popularly known, was a famous warrior of whose prowess and feats of arms much is told. For all that, according to report, the defeat of the Spanish force was so complete that only Hernandarias, thanks to his tremendous personal strength, escaped from the field alive. It is probable, however, that this version of the fight is, to say the least of it, exaggerated.

The next move of Hernandarias in the direction of the Banda Oriental was of a more pacific nature. With a rare touch of wisdom and foresight he shipped from Buenos Aires to Colonia across the river one hundred head of cattle, and a like number of horses and mares. These, sent adrift to roam at their own sweet will in the new country, multiplied at least as fast as had been anticipated. The animals in question undoubtedly stand as the nucleus of the pastoral riches of to-day. Thus Hernandarias sent out wealth to the land that was closed to his men in order that it should seed and multiply until the time came for the European to take it over with the country itself.

In this earlier era of River Plate history the march of civilisation had been arrested at the first step in Uruguay on each occasion on which it had been undertaken. It was not until the beginning of the seventeenth century that success attended the endeavours of the Spaniards. In 1618 the first missionaries entered Uruguay. The Franciscan fathers Bernardo de Guzman, Villavicencio, and Aldao landed in that year at the mouth of the Rio, and converted to Christianity many members of the more peaceably disposed tribes. In 1624 Bernardo de Guzman founded the first Uruguayan Jesuit settlement, Santo Domingo de Soriano, and a little later the missions of Espinillo, Viboras, and Aldao were established in the present provinces of Soriano and Colonia. Larger and more important missions were shortly afterwards founded in the north, and formed a more or less integral portion of the great Jesuit field in Paraguay. At one time there were no less than thirty-seven of these stations existing within the frontiers of the old Banda Oriental as they were then defined. In consequence of the later Brazilian encroachments, however, the sites of only seven of these—San Francisco de Borga, San Nicolas, San Juan Bautista, San Luis Gonzaga, San Miguel, San Lorenzo, and Santa Angel—lie within the boundaries of the present Republic.

While in the north of Uruguay the Indians, taught by the missionaries, were now beginning to occupy themselves with agriculture and grazing, in the south the herds introduced by Hernandarias were multiplying amazingly. These were responsible for the visits of many who came over from Argentina to slay the cattle and to collect their hides. They were licensed by the Cabildo of Buenos Aires, who received a third of the profits. In order to facilitate this traffic in hides, these Faeneros, as they were termed, gradually established themselves upon the banks of the Uruguay and its tributaries, and upon the ocean coast. Thus the names of CufrÉ, PavÓn, Toledo, Pando, Solis, Maldonado, and many others have been bequeathed to the soil by the merchant adventurers who trafficked in those spots, since each named his settlement after himself.

No little competition was afforded these Faeneros by the Changadores, adventurers of a more reckless order who made their incursions into the country without licence and against the law. Corresponding precisely to the buccaneers of the farther north, they slew where opportunity offered, taking refuge in Brazil when pursued, until their growing numbers enabled them from time to time to offer armed resistance to the officers of the Crown sent to chastise them. Attracted by this commerce, pirates, whether of Portuguese or other nationality, would occasionally make descents, and would raid and harry the cattle in their turn. The Indians, for their part, were not slow in availing themselves of this new and convenient source of livelihood, and, according to a Uruguayan writer became "carnivorous from necessity and equestrian from force of imitation." In 1680 a more serious danger threatened the Banda Oriental. At the beginning of that year a Portuguese fleet came to anchor off the island of San Gabriel. Eight hundred soldiers and a number of colonist families were disembarked at Colonia del Sacramento on the mainland, where they founded a township. On learning of this invasion the Governor of Buenos Aires, JosÉ de Garro, immediately demanded the evacuation of the place. As a reply to this request, Lobo, the Portuguese commander, triumphantly produced a map on which Colonia was represented as in Brazilian territory. A strenuous geographical discussion ensued, at the conclusion of which Garro, having failed to convince the intruders of the inaccuracy of the chart by more subtle arguments, resolved to expel the enemy by force.

With this end in view he obtained the loan of three thousand Indians from the Jesuits, who were by this time becoming accustomed to the lending of men and arms for such patriotic purposes. With this force, stiffened by the presence of three hundred Spaniards, he captured the hostile settlement, taking prisoners the Portuguese Governor and garrison.

It is related that the Spanish general had prepared a striking ruse de guerre that was to serve in this assault. Four thousand loose horses were to be driven to the front of the charging forces, and upon these animals the first devastation of the artillery fire of the defenders was to expend itself. The Indians, however, whose destined place was in the vanguard, raised some powerful objections to this scheme of attack. Considering with reason that a backward rush of the wounded and terrified beasts—like that of the elephants of a previous age—would promise greater disaster to themselves than to the enemy, they protested against the living bulwark with its many possibilities. Thus the town was captured without the aid of the horses, and the first of the many combats that reddened the shore of Colonia ended in favour of Spain.

This triumph was short-lived. In 1681 Carlos II. of Spain in a weak moment signed a treaty by which Colonia was given back to Portugal, to be held by her until a definite decision could be arrived at concerning the vexed question of ownership. In the meanwhile it was arranged that the geographical arguments should be settled by the pontifical authorities, whose expert knowledge upon the point was doubtful. The Portuguese, moreover, in order to obtain an added salve to their dignity, stipulated that Garro should be deprived of his post. This was complied with; but the result did not in the least coincide with the Portuguese expectations. Garro himself must have smiled broadly when he learned that he was deprived of his command at Buenos Aires in order to take over the superior governorship of Chile!

In 1702 a campaign was waged against the Indians. The tactics of the majority of the tribes had remained consistently aggressive, and their predatory interest in the commerce of hides and dried meat had developed to a pitch inconvenient to the settlers. The war, although its scope did not include the entire aboriginal population, was one of extermination so far as it went, and at its conclusion the sections of the CharrÚas, Bohanes, and Yaros in the neighbourhood of the River Yi had practically ceased to exist.

In the meanwhile Colonia, in the hands of the Portuguese, had become the centre of contraband operations by means of which merchandise was smuggled into the sternly closed port of Buenos Aires. As a point of vantage it served so admirably for this purpose, and so greatly to the profit of both the Portuguese and of the more unscrupulous residents of Buenos Aires, that in 1705 Philip V. of Spain ordered its recapture in earnest.

For this purpose two thousand Spaniards and four thousand Jesuit Indians assembled. After a six months' strenuous siege of the place the Portuguese garrison fled in a fleet that had been sent to their rescue, and Colonia passed back into the hands of the Spaniards. But the vicissitudes of the spot were not yet at an end. Oblivious of the past, Philip V. by the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 ceded the town to the Portuguese. Garcia Ros, the Governor of Buenos Aires, was of sterner mould. Taking advantage of a loosely worded clause in the treaty, he limited the Portuguese ownership of the soil to the radius of a cannon-shot from the plaza of the town. By this means the inconvenience of the occupation was to a certain extent neutralised.

About this time negro slaves were first introduced from Africa into the provinces of the River Plate. This measure had been originally urged by the famous Father BartolomÉ de las Casas with a view of augmenting the local force of labour, and thus of alleviating the condition of the aboriginal races that in many parts were becoming exterminated on account of the excess of toil imposed upon them. This state of affairs, as a matter of fact, did not obtain in the Banda Oriental, where Indian and Spaniard stood entirely apart. Nevertheless an influx of negroes occurred in the province, and—though nothing can be said in favour of the morality of the proceeding—there is no doubt that, once arrived, their presence tended to benefit the industries of the land.

The period now was one of considerable unrest throughout the Spanish main. For some while the adventurers of other nations, seeking a share in the great riches of the South American provinces, had been knocking loudly at the gates that remained closely barred to them. Privateering and raids upon the coast had become more and more frequent, while the Spanish galleons, in continuous dread of attack, only put to sea for the purpose of long voyages in imposing numbers and beneath weighty escort. The River Plate, owing to the practical absence of the mineral traffic from its frontier, suffered far fewer depredations than fell to the lot of the gold and silver bearing countries to the north.

Yet the homelier riches of the pastoral districts were becoming known and appreciated to a certain extent. In consequence of this the waters of the River Plate from time to time had many unwelcome visitors. Privateers of all nationalities, although their enforced ignorance of the navigation forbade them to penetrate for any distance up the waters of the great streams themselves in the face of local opposition, harassed the coast-line, and occasionally landed in more or less formidable parties. One of the most notable of these was a French adventurer of the name of Moreau, whose buccaneering ideas were considerably in advance of those of the majority who were wont to harry these particular districts. Moreau's plan of campaign, in fact, savoured rather of regular warfare than of the more usual methods of the rapid raidings and retreats. Thus in 1720 he disembarked with a body of men and four cannon at Maldonado, where he fortified himself, and began to amass a great store of hides. Surprised by the Spaniards, he was forced to take to his ships in haste, with the loss of his guns and of his stock-in-trade. A few months later the Frenchman returned, accompanied this time by a force of over a hundred well-armed men, and prepared to settle himself for an extended stay in the country. Curiously enough, it appears to have been the unfortunate Moreau's fate to reverse the fighting rÔles of the buccaneer and local resident, since, instead of surprising others, it was he who was caught unawares on either occasion. The termination of his second visit was more fatal than that of his first. Attacked when in an unprepared condition by the Spaniards, the defeat of the buccaneer force was complete. Moreau himself was slain, together with the greater part of his company, while the remainder were taken prisoners.

Freed from this source of danger, the inhabitants of the Banda Oriental were not long left without anxiety on another head. The Portuguese had never ceased to covet the rich land that might be made to serve as such a valuable and temperate pendant to their torrid northern areas. The River Plate stood to them in the light of a Rhine, and at the end of 1723 they awoke once more into aggressive activity. An expedition then left Rio de Janeiro consisting of four ships with three hundred soldiers. The force sailed to the point where the town of Montevideo now stands, at that time a lonely spot whose commercial and strategic importance was then for the first time discovered. Here the expedition landed, and in a short while its leaders had negotiated with the natives whom they found in the district, had supplied them with arms, and had founded a settlement. On learning of this aggression the Buenos Aires authorities determined to resist the attempt in earnest. Gavala, the Spanish Governor, collected a powerful fleet, and sailed in haste to the spot. The Portuguese, ascertaining the strength of the attacking force, abandoned their new settlement, and made off to the north without awaiting its arrival. Gavala then took possession of Montevideo in turn, and took measures in order to prevent a repetition of the incident. To this end he constructed a powerful battery on the spot, and supplied the fort with a garrison of a hundred Spanish troops, and with a thousand native auxiliaries.