Christopher Columbus

VI

The First Voyage (1492-1493)

The people of Palos were ordered to provide and equip two caravels (small, light sailing ships). The first, owned by Cristóbal Quintero, was called the Pinta; the second, owned by Juan Niño, was officially named the Santa Clara but known as the Niña. The third ship, a small, round ship with a large hold, most likely a type of vessel known as a nao, was Columbus’s flagship. It was called the Santa María and was owned by Juan de la Cosa. Little is known about the actual construction of the ships, but evidence suggests that the Niña and the Pinta were small, about 54 metric tons each and 21 to 24 m (70 to 80 ft) in length. The Santa María was 80 to 90 metric tons and not much longer than the other two. Of the three, the Pinta was the fastest.

Initially Columbus had difficulty recruiting a crew because many sailors feared a voyage into the unknown. The royal secretary tried to help by offering freedom to any convict who enlisted. Some experienced seamen objected to this plan, but in the end only a few convicts accepted. More than anything, the friars of La Rábida and Martín Alonso Pinzón, an experienced sea captain from Palos, persuaded local sailors to join the expedition. Two other Pinzón brothers also joined the voyage; all were commanding officers.

About 40 men including Columbus sailed on the Santa María. Between 20 and 30 men were each on the Pinta and Niña. Most were Spanish, with the largest number coming from around Palos. The crew was made up largely of experienced seamen and a few government officials. But the crew included no priests, no soldiers, and no settlers—this was a voyage of exploration and discovery.

A

Life Aboard Ship

Little is known about life aboard the ships, but it could not have been comfortable. There were no crew’s quarters and no mess halls. Only the captains and pilots had cabins, and they were very small. At night the crew slept wherever they could find a vacant spot, tying themselves down to prevent being tossed into the sea. Prayers, songs, stories, chores, eating, and waiting filled the sailors’ days. Stargazing under a new, unknown sky filled their restless nights.

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The ships carried enough provisions for a year, at a time when two weeks at sea was a long voyage. Supplies on board included foodstuffs, such as water, dried fish, salt meat, live pigs and hens (to be killed aboard ship), rice, cheese, and figs; navigational instruments, including nautical almanacs, charts, compasses, magnets, hourglasses, and rulers; and trade items, such as glass beads, brass rings, knitted caps, gold, silver, pearls, and spices.

B

Navigation

Navigation in the 15th century was far from an exact science, although several navigational tools and aids were available. The most important navigational aids were compasses, astrolabes, hourglasses, maps, and charts. Although celestial navigation (finding direction by checking the positions of stars and other heavenly bodies) was the favored method while sailing under familiar skies, a technique known as dead reckoning was more dependable on voyages in unknown seas.

Using an astrolabe, a metal disk inscribed with a map of the major celestial bodies, a mariner could tell location simply by positioning the stars on the astrolabe to match the stars in the sky. But the astrolabe worked only when the skies were clear and the positions of the stars were known. On cloudy days or when the stars in the sky were unfamiliar, celestial navigation and the astrolabe were ineffective.

In dead reckoning, the technique often used for traveling in unknown waters, the position of the ship was determined by starting with its last known location. Then, by calculating what direction the ship was going, how fast it was going, and how much time had passed, the pilot could come up with a new position. Pilots could calculate the distance they had traveled in an hour or a day by dropping a floating object in the water at the front of the ship and timing how long it took to get to the back of the ship. Knowing how long the ship was, the pilot could calculate how fast the ship was moving and, thus, how far they had traveled.

Columbus preferred dead reckoning over celestial navigation and was never comfortable with the astrolabe and other devices for navigating using the heavenly bodies. Above all, he was masterful in interpreting the signs of nature, such as the behavior of birds, the smell of the air, the color of the sky, the condition of the seas, the pressure he felt in his joints, the appearance of floating debris, and more. Successful navigators survived by “reading” nature in this way. Columbus was expert at this and could even predict hurricanes accurately.

C

The Westward Journey

At daybreak on August 3, 1492, the small flotilla of ships left Palos de la Frontera for parts unknown. At the age of 41, standing on the bow of the Santa María, watching the coast slowly slip below the horizon, Columbus left behind on dry land a struggle that had lasted a quarter of his life. He was now in his element, doing what he had dreamed about for the past ten years.

After a trip to the Canary Islands, where the rudder of the Pinta was repaired, the voyagers departed the known world on September 6, 1492. Throughout the voyage the ships traveled primarily westward. The choice of sailing from the Canary Islands proved to be a good one, as the Canaries Current speeded their journey. On September 25 it was thought that land was sighted, but it was nothing more than low-lying clouds. As the trip lengthened, many of the crew feared that the strong daily winds would prevent them from getting back to Spain. Columbus had difficulty with his crew at times, and he found it hard to work with the Pinzóns, especially Martín Alonso, who had much more experience than Columbus. However, there is little evidence that the crew was ever close to mutiny. Moreover, the story that Columbus tried to deceive the crew by keeping two sets of logs, one that showed the distance they had traveled as much shorter than it actually was, is only legend.

Two hours past midnight on the morning of October 12 a lookout named Rodrigo de Triana (sometimes called Juan Rodríguez Bermejo) on the Pinta cried out “Tierra! Tierra!” (“Land! Land!”). A reward of a pension of 10,000 maravedis per year (an able seaman could earn about 12,000 maravedis per year) was to go to he who saw land first. Rather cruelly, Columbus pocketed the money himself, claiming that he had seen several lights the night before.

D

First Contact

On October 12, 1492, Columbus and a handful of the excited but weary voyagers set foot on land after 36 days of sailing. Columbus raised the royal standard, claiming the island for Spain, and two of the captains carried banners decorated with green crosses and letters representing Ferdinand and Isabella. Soon the curious islanders, with some trepidation, came out of their hiding places and greeted the visitors.

The location of the actual landfall site is still in question. Called Guanahaní by the Taínos, the island was renamed San Salvador (“Holy Savior”) by Columbus, but no one today knows for sure which island it was. Most favor either Watling Island (renamed San Salvador in 1926 to honor Columbus) or Samana Cay in the Bahamas. Ten or more islands in the Bahamas fit the physical description as recorded by Columbus in his journal, which described the island simply as large and flat, with bright green trees and a great deal of water.

The islanders were friendly and open to trade with the sailors. They traded anything for anything: balls of spun cotton, parrots, and spears for the sailors’ glass beads, red caps, and trinkets. Called Taínos by the Spaniards, the islanders belonged to a larger language family called the Arawak. The Taínos showed neither fear nor knowledge of Spanish swords and cut themselves while examining the weapons. Most interesting to the explorers, however, was the fact that the islanders had small pieces of gold pierced in their noses. In addition, they told Columbus that the inhabitants of other islands wore gold bands around their arms and legs. They also described countless islands, all like theirs. The Spaniards, believing that they had arrived in the Indies, soon called all islanders “Indians.”

On the third day, Columbus, accompanied by several Taíno guides, left San Salvador to explore other islands. By the end of October, Columbus reached the coast of Cuba. After sailing north and then south along its coast, he was convinced that it was one of the lands described by Marco Polo. Despite the fact that the local pilots told him it was an island, Columbus convinced himself that Cuba was a promontory of China. Shortly after this event, Martín Alonso Pinzón suddenly sailed off in the Pinta without leave. Although historians disagree on the reasons why, many suspect that Pinzón, disgruntled with the lack of riches that had been discovered to that point, went off in search of gold.

Crossing the Windward Passage to the east of Cuba, Columbus sailed to another large island, which he called La Isla Española (“The Spanish Island,” modern Hispaniola). For a month he cruised the coast, stopping occasionally to inspect the land and the people. On one of these excursions, Columbus met and befriended a young Taíno chief by the name of Guacanagarí. After a brief meeting aboard ship, arrangements were made for another meeting, this one on Christmas Day, December 25, at the chief’s residence in a nearby village. Before the meeting could take place, however, the Santa María struck a reef off the coast and grounded. Over the next few days, the crew of the two ships and Taínos in canoes sent by Guacanagarí removed everything that could be salvaged. They constructed a fort out of the lumber of the ship and stored enough supplies to last a year. Thirty-nine men stayed behind in the fort, the first European settlement in the Americas since the Vikings had landed in what is now Newfoundland and Labrador some 500 years earlier. But the settlement, named Villa de la Navidad (“Christmas Town”), would prove no more enduring than had those of the Vikings.