DeSoto Trail 1539-1540--Telltale Bones
Posted by: 
Markerman62
N 30° 09.255 W 084° 12.255
16R E 769278 N 3339179
Located on Riverside Drive at the Tallahassee St. Marks Trail, St Marks
Waymark Code: WM15A4E
Location: Florida, United States
Date Posted: 11/19/2021
Views: 1
It’s October 16, 1539…
In searching this area for a usable harbor, Hernando de Soto’s captain Juan de Anasco has found evidence of Pánfilo de Narváez’ expedition of 1528…
In an overgrown clearing, we have discovered many horse skulls and bones, evidence that Narváez and his men slaughtered their horses for food. The stumps of trees tell of their escape from La Florida on crude rafts. We have also come upon several marked graves of Spaniards who died from starvation, disease, and Apalachee attacks. In remembrance, I have named the nearby bay La Bahia de Caballos - The Bay of the Horses.
The Conquistador Trail
Narváez and his men built a fleet of rafts in an attempt to leave La Florida for Mexico. Following the coast, they were hit by a storm off present-day Texas. All but 7 drowned when their crafts capsized. The survivors spent the next 7 years walking through the Southwest to Mexico City. Before the start of his expedition, De Soto consulted with survivor Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, whose stories about La Florida and Cibola’s Seven Cities of Gold inspired De Soto.
The Native Path
The Apalachee used the experience gained fighting Narváez to oppose De Soto. They attacked the Spanish relentlessly during the army’s occupation of their village Anhayca. Burning houses and crops, the Apalachee denied the conquistadors any comfort during the winter of 1539.
”We agreed to make nails and saws and axes and other tools of necessity from stirrups, spurs, and crossbows and other iron objects that we had. And we determined that, in order to provide means of sustenance in the period in which this was to be carried out… that every third day a horse would be killed to be distributed among those who were working and the sick.”
- Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, Castaways, 1542,
survivor Narváez expedition
Marker Number: 32
Date: None
County: Wakulla
Marker Type: Roadside
Sponsored or placed by: Florida De Soto Trail, Florida Department of Transportation, the Florida Park Service, and the National Park Service
Website: Not listed
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