Juan de Esquivel

Juan de Esquivel (* 1480 in Seville, Spain, † 1513 in Jamaica) was a Spanish conquistador. He took for the Spanish crown, the island Jamaica in possession and was the first governor of the island. Juan de Esquivel was the founder of the first settlements under the Spanish crown in the new world.

Biography

Juan de Esquivel was born in 1480 in Seville, now the capital of the Autonomous Community of Andalusia, in the eponymous province of Seville in Spain.

At the age of 13, he accompanied Christopher Columbus on his second voyage to the Americas. On November 28, 1493 they reached the island of Hispaniola, where Juan de Esquivel took part in the conquest of the island, and the subjugation of the tribe of the Taíno part. There he remained some time.

As Nicolás de Ovando was appointed governor of Hispaniola in 1502, Juan de Esquivel was promoted to lieutenant. Two years later, he was sent at the head of 400 soldiers in the province of Higuey, which was under the direction of the Taíno chief Cotubanamá. They subjected the Indians and sold them into the mountains. Esquivel founded in the region, the city Higuey. This is the capital of today's province of La Altagracia, in the Dominican Republic. After another bloodily suppressed rebellions he founded another city called Santa Cruz del El Seibo.

1509, Juan de Esquivel with 70 soldiers, the island of Jamaica, on his behalf, under the possession of the Spanish crown. In the same year he founded a colony on the northern coast of the island where Christopher Columbus had been shipwrecked in 1503. The settlement was named Sevilla la Nueva after his birthplace in Spain. It was the first settlement under the Spanish crown on the island and the third settlement in the New World. The city is named after Saint Ann 's Bay today. Juan de Esquivel was appointed the first governor of Jamaica and was the first cattle, pigs and horses one on the island. He is also the founder of the first port facility and shipyard on the island at the site of the present town of Old Harbour Bay.

Juan de Esquivel died in the fall of 1513 in Jamaica.