The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1897-04-13
JUDGE CLARK'S DISCOVERY.
The First Settlement in This Country
Made by the Spaniards.

Made by the Spaniards.
History frequently turns up in uneX-
pected places. Bancroft and other lead
ing historians have been telling us that
the oldest European settlements made
within the present limits of the United
States were those made by the Spaniards
at st. Augustine, Florida, in 1865, and
Santa Fe, New Mexico, about the same
date. the first English settlements being
Sir Walter Raleigh's at Roanoke Island
in 1888, and next John Smiths at James
town, Va, 1907. But not long since an
investigator among the manuscripts ly-
ing in the Royal Library at Slmancas'
in Spain, thought to con over bulky
mass of legal papers. In doing so he
CHANGED upon the long forgotten lltlga-
ton in regard to the cost, expenses, etc.
of the first European settlement In
America, long ante-dating all those above
mentioned. 1t contained the Royal
charters, commissions of officers, official
acts. dispositions and judicial decisions,
which showed that in 1923, under aua
thorty from the King, Lucas Nalasquez
D'Ayllon, sent an expedition TO the
coast of America TO find location for
a settlement. Among other points, they
landed at the mouth of the Cape Fear.
After their return. DAYTON visited
Spain, had Il personal interview with
Charles the V. king Of Spain and En-
peror OF Germany and obtained voyage
charters, commissions and grants, under
authority of which, on June >, 1875, at
the head of an expedition, consisting OF
three vessels, and containing QUO colon
lists. men, women and children. he set
7 ,,nI al AyAO
full supply of priests and, physicians
besides supplies of all kind, including
horses. cattle. sheep, etc. Few colonies,
if any, so we'll furnished or so pretentious
ever after landed on our shores Cen
tering between Capes Charles and
Henry. he explored the James river and
selected as site for his colony a PENN
sula about fifty miles from its mouth,
which he named Guandape and he To-
Gated his colony thereon, which, in honor
of his patron saint, he styled San
Miguel. 1t was the identical spot on
which Jamestown was located eighty
one years later, in 1907.
The winter proved an unusually severe
one TO these sons of Southern climate,
and at it's worst some of the men left
on board of the vessels were frozen to
death. DAYTON himself dying of
malaria and exposure, q civil war broke
out over the the succession to the gov
ernorship. When it was suppressed, the
rebel leader was tried and executed for
high treason Malaria, however, proved
still more fatal as it did to John Smith.
and his comrades in the beginning OF
the next century. After enduring about
a year. the shattered fragments of the
colony. disheartened and decimated,
returned to Porto Rico, and the litigation
began. whose moth-eaten records escap-
ing the knowledge of Bancroft and
many other historians, has only of late
years given. by their recovery, back to
the world the proofs of the existence of
| this ambitious. but unfortunate and
| long forgotten attempt, which if sue
cessful. might have made this country
Spanish and not English, Catholic and
not Protestant Nearly one hundred
years later, when the English were set
tied at jamestown, the Spaniards sent
an admiral from Florida. with the charts
of DAYTON to see what the English
| were doing and he found that the Eng
| fish settlement was on the same spot
| marked on his charts as that OF San
| Miguel de Guandape.
| The above is brief summary Of an
| interesting article furnished by Judge
| Walter Clark to a Northern magazine.
Another recent article of his, on more
| modern subject. 'The Mal-Administra-
! ton of the Postoffice," which appeared
in the Trinity Archive,' has been
copied largely by the press in the West
ern States. especially in the labor papers.