Gregorio de Villalobos, 1554 
41 
your royal Council of the Indies, at the time when all the officials of your 
Majesty rose against me in the said province of the River de la Plata, 
they and other private persons took all my goods and put me in a brigan¬ 
tine named the San Marcos, which I had made with other vessels to go 
up the river, and brought me to these kingdoms without giving me any 
of the goods that they took from me. The said brigantine stopped in the 
Guadalquivir River, where it has been and is, and as it is mine, as appears 
by this evidence which I present, I ask and supplicate that your Highness 
order your decree to be given that it shall be delivered to me to dispose of 
as I wish, for I have nothing to eat nor means to get it. 
[There is a rubric.] 
To the señor licentiate Sandoval, 
Come to the council. 
Evidence of the services and merits of Gregorio de Villalobos, one of 
the first explorers and conquerors of New Spain—six months before 
Hernán Cortes captured Mexico—where he (Villalobos) was the first 
to bring in cattle for breeding purposes. Mexico, October 22, 1554. 
Question 2.—That the said Gregorio de Villalobos went to this part of 
New Spain in the year 1521, armed and mounted, in order to serve his 
Majesty, and arrived six months before the capture and conquest of 
Mexico. By order of the Marqués del Valle, 21 who was governor at that 
time, he remained on the northern coast with a certain number of soldiers 
as garrison for the coast. . . . 
Question 3.—That after the pacification of the City of Mexico, the 
Marqués del Valle, having heard that Gregorio de Villalobos was an 
honest man and worthy of confidence, gave him very important offices 
in the city of Vera Cruz, called also by the name of Quisahuistlan, and 
made him lieutenant governor. ... In the said offices he rendered great 
service to God, our Lord, and to his Majesty, by assembling the Spaniards 
who came at that time from the islands of Cuba and Santo Domingo and 
other parts and sheltering them, and ministering to their ailments. . . . 
Question 4.—That after the pacification of the City of Mexico and the 
other provinces off this New Spain, the said Gregorio de Villalobos, with 
the intention of remaining in it permanently, at the time that he came 
from the islands of Santo Domingo brought a number of calves, so that 
there might be cattle, he being the first to bring them to New Spain. 
