American Demons

La Navidad

In the first hour of the morning on December 24, 1492, a Monday, a current pushs the Santa Maria onto a sandbank in the Rio de los Mares. The helmsman has left the helm of the flagship of Columbus's first expedition to a cabin boy. A havarie occurs. The accident plays out as a spectacle for the subjects of the cacique Guacanagari. The ruler orders the recovery of the wreck and its inventory. The "Indians" pile up things that are of inestimable value to them. They don't steal a single nail. Their behavior is completely incomprehensible to the stinking, mentally corrupted and scurvy-disfigured Spaniards.

"The villages and houses in Hispaniola (now Haiti) are cute and each village is led by a little cacique to whom the population completely obey. All rulers say little. Often they give orders with just a wave, and I (Columbus) had to be amazed because I saw how they were immediately understood."

The helmsman and the cabin boy are put in chains according to the sense of justice at the time. They don't survive their punishment. Columbus establishes an outpost of civilization on Guacanagari's doorstep. Then the curiosity of his lover Isabella of Castile calls the admiral to Spain. He takes "savages on board, both men and women... They have a fair stature and no dark skin. It is true, they paint themselves," wrote the man-killer Columbus. He writes about people whose enslavement he has made it his mission. They should see Spain, become Christians, and prove themselves useful in future travels. They are "of a gentle nature and without guile or guile." They do not kill each other and do not deprive each other of their freedom.

"They carry no weapons and are so afraid that one of us is enough to put hundreds of them to flight. They believe everything we tell them."

Under the supervision of the cacique Guacanagari, the first Spanish settlement on American soil was built - Fort La Navidad. The 39 people left behind feel pushed into paradise by the moral simplicity of the people living there. So far they have led a laborious and unhygienic life. These are stunted people, these boat people, full of wounds and cracks. Their faith is without love. They live now with people who cannot imagine lovelessness. The Spaniards overcome all barriers of local order. Before they are massacred, they confiscate the cacique's treasury. The treasure is considered lost.

The Transfiguration of Columbus is a masterpiece of disinformation. Columbus abused his mandate. He converted with the sword. His undertakings were based on a cynical calculation. Contemporaries and successors of the "discoverer" still viewed Columbus soberly as a robber baron. Michele de Cuneo, a companion, reports: "We captured twelve very beautiful and very fat women, they were about 15 to 16 years old, and at the same time two boys... We sent them to Spain as examples."

Exploring the sea route to India competes with a larger state goal - the reconquest of the Holy Land. For a Christian's salvation there was little in the West Indies and much in Jerusalem. Their Royal Highnesses Isabella and Ferdinand had the ambition to be model students. They wanted to be the best Catholic monarchs and therefore the Pope's favorite kings in his Roman atrium of the Kingdom of Heaven.