CORONADO

In support of the overland Coronado expedition to the Seven Cities of Cibola, Hemando de Alarcón sailed under orders of Mendoza, Viceroy of New Spain, on May 9, 1540 from Acapulco with food for the expedition. This idea made sense then because Frey Marcos (whom Mendoza had sent north on a scouting mission) incorrectly reported the relative proximity of the ocean to his route to Cibola.

Sailing north along the west coast, Alarcón came upon the mouth of the Colorado River (which he named Buena Guia). On August 26, 1540 (per Coronado’s soldier Castañeda), Alarcón and twenty men started up the river. Here’s what he said in his journal: [Sound of page turning]:

We continued ahead with great difficulty, turning our prows now this way, now that, in trying to find the channel. God willed that thus we should reach the end of the gulf. Here we found a mighty river with such a furious current that we could scarcely sail against it. So I decided to sail up the said river the best way I could, in two boats, leaving the other with the ships.

Upon encountering armed Indians whose help and respect he sought by convincing them he came from the sun (which they worshipped), Alarcón overcame the swift current with the help of Indians pulling the boats upstream with ropes. He goes on to say:The Indians took to the ropes so willingly and in such rivalry with one another that it was not necessary to ask them. Had it not been for this help, the current being so swift and the men at the ropes inexperienced, it would have been impossible to navigate up stream against the current.

On returning to the ships anchored at the river’s mouth, Alarcon wrote:The distance that had taken me fifteen and a half days to travel against the current upstream, I traveled on my way back in two and a half days, so great and swift was the current.

Historian Herbert Bolton concluded Alarcón got as far up the Colorado as the tributary Gila River (north of Yuma), and Alarcon reported he had gone more than thirty leagues inland.

Colorado River State Historic Park in Yuma Aura tells me presents visitors with a snapshot of the navigable old days, the present, and mulls what’s next.

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