Cuartocentennial of the Colonization of New Mexico
June 30-July 11, 1598
The expedition rested on the banks of the Rio Grande for three days then continued its journey. On June 30th, they passed San Felipe and stopped at Santo Domingo. They chose Santo Domingo as an appropriate place to build a convent devoted to Nuestra Señora de la Asumpción. Once the people in the expedition completed the building, that would become the religious administrative center of New Mexico, they held a modest ceremony dedicating the convent.
On July 4th, due to the fact that the carts lagged far behind the lead group, Oñate sent Don Juan de Zaldívar southward to help lead the colonists to the settlement. Zaldívar was instructed to lead them to the San Juan valley (the colonists finally reached the valley on August 18th, the day before the feast of San Luis Obispo, a Franciscan friar).
On July 7th, at Santo Domingo the chiefs of seven Indian tribes, from different areas of New Mexico, held a general council. According to colonists' journals, each chief, in the name of his province, voluntarily promised obedience to King Phillip. It is difficult to ascertain if this pledge of allegiance was truly voluntary or not. More likely the Indians were merely complying with the Spanish practice of requerimiento, the requirement. This compelled Indians to read a statement which stated that King Phillip of Spain owned all their territory and that they would submit to his authority. It further required the Indians to convert to Catholicism and live by its religious beliefs.
In return for their oath of allegiance to the King of Spain and his Christian God, the Indians would receive protection from all their enemies. Although this seems like a give and take situation since the Indians would receive protection in exchange for loyalty, nonetheless the Indians had little choice but to comply. If they did not submit to Spanish authority and Catholicism, the Spaniards felt justified in waging war against the Indians, burning villages and killing men, women, and children who lived there. Therefore, it was easier, and safer, for Indians to at least go through the motions of swearing allegiance to Spain.
Although the lead group reached their destination on July 7th, the entire expedition would not reassemble in the same place until August 18th. When everyone was finally together again they had traveled 750 miles from the Concho River to the Yuque-Yunque pueblo near the junction of the Rio Grande and Chama rivers, just north of the present day town of Española. They renamed the nearby Tewa pueblo San Juan de Los Caballeros, in honor of John the Baptist. The expedition had reached their goal; it had taken six months. Eighty-three carts and wagons left New Spain but only sixty-one completed the journey. Many carts and wagons had been abandoned once the colonists had consumed the supplies they carried. It was easier to leave empty carts along the trail rather than burden livestock with pulling it all the way to Yuque-Yunque. Many roads along the way were barely passable and the fewer wagons that had to travel them the better it was for the colonists.
Once at Yuque-Yunque, Oñate divided the New Mexico Territory between varoius friars so that each could concentrate on the conversion of the Indians in his area of New Mexico. He also sent out several different groups of soldiers to explore the vast lands of the territory. The colonists who did not embark upon these exploratory missions began to build a settlement at Yuque-Yunque. Although they had endured the hardships of six months of travel from Santa Barbara to Yuque-Yunque, the lead group of colonists now had the difficult task of building and sustaining a colony 750 miles away from familiar surroundings. Although they had finally established their first headquarters in New Mexico, the colonists still had work ahead of them.