Draft:Patricio de Hinachuba

Patricio de Hinachuba (died Spring of 1706) was the last chief of the Apalachee town of San Lorenzo de Ivitachuco during the latter part of the 17th century and the first years of the 18th century. Although today an obscure figure, Patricio played a big role in the defense of the Apalachee people in the midst of abuses committed against them by Spanish settlers, primarily cattle ranchers, living alongside them. He also played a smaller but significant role in the defense of Spanish Florida against joint British and Creek raids into the colony between 1702 and 1709, having led a caravan of a few hundred Apalachee and Spanish refugees from the Apalachee Province to St. Augustine, defending various towns along the way.

Defender of Apalachee rights
Though most of the first few years of his life are unknown, records from 1688 indicate that he was a member of the Apalachee native nobility, and that he likely gained the title of chief of San Lorenzo de Ivitachuco the same year, as he had attended his first council of chiefs. After this, his name does not resurface in records until 1695, when a hunting dispute arises between his town and the nearby Apalachee town of San Pedro de Patale which later escalated into the accusation of one Santiago, an Indian carpenter from San Pedro, of murder, though later being acquitted and the case being dropped by cleric Antonio Ponce de Leon, a Floridano of an old prominent family in the colony.

Being an educated and articulate man, having seen abuses by Floridano settlers in Apalachee province towards his people, especially that of the Florencia family, a prominent cattle ranching family that had treated the Indians as nothing less than servants and their planting fields as prime land for their ranching businesses, Patricio along with the chief of the main Apalachee town of San Luis de Talimali, Don Andres, wrote directly to King Charles II of Spain in February of 1699 complaining of the abuses and that many Apalachees and La Tama christians had abandoned the region due to these abuses.

The letter appears to have been initially successful, as King Charles II of Spain issued a royal decree responding to the letter in May of 1700, which commended the fact that the Apalachee chiefs were standing up for themselves, and subsequently ordered the Governor of Spanish Florida to act on these accusations and abuses by sending an inspector to the province in order to rectify the situation. However, this attempt in ordering the Governor to act was a failure, as no inspector was known to have been sent to Apalachee Province in this timeframe.

In 1702, a battle ensued between a group of Apalachee traders and Creek warriors, which had ruined the already dubious peace which Creek and Apalachee peoples had been under, resulting in a Creek assault on the town of Santa Fe de Toloca on May 20th, 1702. Soon after this, a group of Apalachee chiefs, including Patricio, requested to the Spanish government that a war party be organized in order to suppress the Creek, which resulted in the organization of roughly 800 Apalachee warriors and a couple dozen Spanish soldiers, though in the end, the British defeated this war party, rendering Apalachee Province vulnerable to renewed British attacks. Though this vulnerability was clear to Apalachees, Spaniards and the British along with their Creek allies, life went on as usual in Apalachee, as in February of 1703, a group of Indians destined for the Repartimiento gathered in San Lorenzo de Ivitachuco, escorted by Patricio and 3 other chiefs to St. Augustine with new guns.

While in the city, Patricio likely made another appeal to the Governor for the sake of the Apalachees, as Bernardo Nieto de Carvajal, aide to the Governor, was dispatched to Apalachee in order to finally administer justice. However, the exact opposite occurred, and Carvajal soon returned to Saint Augustine with cattle mules full of gifts given to him by the Spanish settlers of the region, being the final attempt at appeasing the Apalachees.

The Apalachee massacre
On January 25th, 1704, a war party of roughly 50 British and 1,000 Creek warriors attacked the Spanish mission and Apalachee town of La Concepcion de Ayubale, leading to the beginning of a conflict between the British and the Spanish in Apalachee which resulted in the destruction of the entire province. Two days after the destruction of Ayubale, the British sent for Patricio, being the chief of one of the largest towns in Apalachee Province, in order to discuss terms of peace. Having carefully picked out and evaluated all of his options, he decided to strike a deal with the British, giving them horses ladden with provisions as well as his church plate, resulting in Ivitachuco being temporarily spared from the onslaught. In June of the same year, with the conflict continuing, the new deputy governor of Apalachee Province, Manuel Solana, called Patricio for help in defending San Luis de Talimali from the British, bringing to the town 45 of his men that had been in the defense of Ivitachuco. However, after arriving to San Luis, the British seemingly retreated. Patricio, fearing that they were headed for Ivitachuco, withdrew back to Ivitachuco with 4 Spanish soldiers that Solana had given to him. Soon after, a war council was convened in San Luis which voted to go on the offensive against the British rather than continue to defend the towns of the province, leading Patricio to return once more, regrouping men necessary for assaulting the town of San Pedro de Patale, which by now had become a base for the British and Creek in the region. The battle was a disaster and led to the deaths of dozens of Spaniards and Apalachees, with the bulk of the Apalachee forces from San Luis running away from the battle scene. By this point, the remaining Spaniards in San Luis had become completely demoralized, and the bulk of the San Luis Apalachees along with their chief had begun fleeing towards the Spanish outpost at Pensacola, leading to a complete Spanish exodus from the region starting July 23rd. With this, Patricio and his Apalachees in San Lorenzo de Ivitachuco were the last Apalachee stronghold remaining in the entire province, as by now, the rest of the entire province had either been razed or abandoned in the conflict.

Soon after however, Patricio would organize a caravan of roughly 400 people, both Apalachees and Spaniards, along with 600 cattle, with the intention of leaving Ivitachuco behind. Later on in the voyage, the caravan stopped at San Francisco de Potano just east of the Suwannee River that they had crossed with major struggle, with the intention of loading all of their cargo onto mules in order to continue the voyage inland. It is at this point where the Governor advises Patricio and the caravan to settle south of Saint Augustine for protection and aid, though feeling that it was not a safe idea considering it would possibly leave his people even more vulnerable, he instead opts to move the caravan to an area known as Abosaya, close to the La Chua ranch. It is at Abosaya where Patricio and the caravan settled down, forming the new town of Ivitachuco. In February of 1705, Patricio sent his nephew, Don Antonio de Cardenas, to Saint Augustine in order to request that the governor give the new settlement more ammunition and at least 6 new musketeers for defense, sending a small contingent back with him led by an old enemy of Patricio's, Don Francisco de Florencia.

At Abosaya
A few months passed without any assaults, so with this, Patricio left Florencia temporarily in charge of the settlement while he travelled to Saint Augustine in order to retrieve more supplies. While he was in Saint Augustine, three new Creek war parties were organized in order to continue the assaults on Spanish Florida, leading to an attack on the settlement at Abosaya on August 20th with roughly 200 Creek warriors. Florencia sent word of the attack to Saint Augustine, though no initial response was given by neither the Governor or Patricio, even after he had requested for more ammunition and gunpowder. A week later, the Governor gave Patricio as many resources as he needed, and allowed for a contingent of roughly 100 Spanish soldiers and Cherokee and Yguaja auxiliaries to travel to Abosaya, though after hearing of another attack along the way at San Diego de Salamototo, the troops instead directed themselves there before heading to Abosaya. While this contingent was gone, the Cherokee town near Saint Augustine where the axuliaries had come from was attacked by the Creek, which had been left in the defense of a few poorly armed black militiamen, prompting the Governor to order that the contingent instead pursue this group of Creek attackers, leading to a battle on September 3rd which left the leader of the Spanish contingent, Captain Joseph de Begambre, along with many of his men, dead. Don Patricio and his troops had split off earlier from this contingent however, worried about their town which was still in danger, setting up camp at La Chua ranch. Believing Legambre and his men were still alive, Patricio stayed at La Chua waiting for them to arrive so they could regroup. During this however, the same Creek warriors that they had dispersed earlier at Salamototo had caught up and surrounded the blockhouse at the ranch, slaughtering the livestock and horses that the ranch had available. After this, information becomes more scarce, though it is believed Patricio did make it to Abosaya with his remaining men and ammunition, but those who stuck with him were weak and hungry, and many had contracted sicknesses.

Death
On September 28th, the Creeks once again attacked La Chua ranch with what Patricio and his people at Abosaya believed to be 2,000 men. Though there were still Spanish troops at Abosaya ready for defense, the people living in the town were restless and did not believe that they could defend any longer, leading to the townspeople along with Patricio relocating just south of Saint Augustine in the winter of 1705-06. As Indians were not allowed to live within the city boundaries, they opted to settle down in view of the city just outside of it, though they moved in with fellow Indians who had also been displaced from other parts of Florida during the conflict. In the Spring of 1706, this area was attacked once more by the Creek, leading to the deaths of many of the people that remained, including Patricio, though a few were able to escape the onslaught.