Southern Appalachian Digital Collections

Western Carolina University (20) View all

Beginning of history in the Great Smoky Mountains

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  • Florida, with 800 soldiers and H9 horses, on an exploring and gold-hunting expedition that led for four years through on unknown wilderness. De Soto*s little army went first north Into fee Appalachian Mountains, then westward across the Jiissisaippi to the great plains, back again to the Mississippi, ■HfUQ ftf 3oto died, and their tattered remnant finally reached Old Mexico, Throe of De Soto*a companions wrote narratives of this extraordinary march, namely; Ranjel, secretary of the expedition; Biedma, one of the officers; sad a Portuguese cavalier who remains anonymous and is known simply as "the Gentleman of filvaa." There is a fourth narrative, by the scholarly Inca of Peru, Garoilaso de la Yega, who took it from the lips of an old soldier in the ranks of the expedition; but this was dictated from memory, forty years after the event, and is not so dependable ©s the others. In May, 1540, De Soto was oa the lower Savannah Biver. The tribe with which he was resting at the time was governed by a soman chief whom the Spaniards called "the queen"# De Soto, lusting for gold, was shown some implements of copper that seemed to be mixed with the precious metal. These, the Indians told him, came from a mountain province in the north. He had already been told by more southern tribes of a rich province called Coosa, In "he country of the Greeks, lying on the watershed of the Coosa River and extending into the mountains, This was the particular magnet that was drawing him oa. The Spaniards wera, of course, living off the country as they traveled. This does not mean subsisting on game and fish; for gold- hunters have no time to hunt and fish. Anywey, a whole regiment, with horses, could not have been supported in any such manner. It maana
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Object’s are ‘parent’ level descriptions to ‘children’ items, (e.g. a book with pages).