Juan Francisco Sáenz-Vázquez de Quintanilla and Sendín de Sotomayor

Juan Francisco Sáenz-Vázquez de Quintanilla y Sendín de Sotomayor (Madrid, Spain, July 22, 1620 - Caribbean Sea, January 4, 1686) was a Spanish soldier, governor of the province of Costa Rica from 1674 to 1679 and from 1679 to 1681.

Personal data

He was born in Madrid and was baptized in the church of San Martín in that city on July 22, 1620. He was the eldest son of Francisco Sáenz-Vázquez de Quintanilla y Fajardo, perpetual notary public of the Real Casa del Tesoro (born in Madrid in 1598 and died in the same city in 1667, 3.er. holder of the estate of Sáenz-Vázquez, and Ángela Sendín de Sotomayor y Almelda, who married in Madrid in 1619. Their paternal grandparents were Francisco Sáenz Vázquez de Quintanilla y Pérez, 2nd holder of the mayorazgo of Sáenz-Vázquez and great-nephew of Fray Bernardo de Fresneda, and Ana Fajardo Girón, and her mother's Juan Sendín de Sotomayor and María de Almelda.Her paternal family traced its origin back to Lope Sáenz, who in the 18th century XV was a neighbor of the town of Quintanilla-Montecabezas in the mountains of Burgos. His maternal ancestor Francisco Sendín had been a huntsman for Emperor Carlos V.

He married for the first time in the parish of San Martín in Madrid at the beginning of 1642 with María Díaz Quijano, a native of the town of Cóbreces, Burgos. From this marriage there was a son, Alfonso Sáenz-Vázquez de Quintanilla y Díaz Quijano, born in February 1645, who was field master of the province of Costa Rica.

He married second in the parish of San Martín in Madrid on July 4, 1667 with Bárbara Lanini y Priami (Madrid, c. 1648-Cartago, Costa Rica, March 1708), sister of the playwright Pedro Francisco Lanini and daughter Jacinto Lanini y Zalli and Micaela Priami y Sagredo, both of Italian descent. From this marriage there were six children: 1) Juan Marín Sáenz-Vázquez de Quintanilla y Lanini (1668-1704), captain, married in 1689 to Ana Margarita de Escalante-Paniagua y Vidamartel (1672-1746); 2) n Pedro José Sáenz-Vázquez de Quintanilla y Lanini (1669-1752), sergeant major, lieutenant governor of the province of Costa Rica on several occasions, married in 1690 to María Vázquez Retes (d. 1738), great-granddaughter of the Adelantado Gonzalo Vazquez de Coronado; 3) Ángela (c.1671-1749), married in 1689 to Pedro de Moya y Benavides (c. 1661-c. 1733), captain, ordinary mayor of Cartago on several occasions; 4) María (1679-1710), married in 1697] with Álvaro de Guevara y Sandoval (b. 1673), captain; 5) Josefa Rosa (b. 1682), married in 1699 to Rafael Mogeimes Fajardo, apparently of Galician origin, lieutenant governor of Matina and lieutenant general of Valle de Barba, and 6) Manuela María Josefa (1684-1751), married in first nuptials in 1700 with Manuel de Moya y Alvarado (c. 1675-1701) and in second with the captain don José de Bonilla y Astúa (1695-1726).

Military career

He served in the Spanish army since 1638, when he was recruited in the company of Don Rodrigo de Tapia y Alarcón, equerry of King Felipe IV, to go to the rescue of Fuenterrabía. As part of that company, one of those that formed part of Don Sebastián Granero de Alarcón's tercio, he participated in numerous armed actions in the Franco-Spanish War, beginning with the battle of Fuenterrabía and Irún, in which Spanish troops they forced the French to lift the siege.

In 1639, promoted to second lieutenant, he joined the company of harquebusier horses of the general commissioner Filippo Filangieri, a Neapolitan soldier in the service of Philip IV of Spain, stationed in the Principality of Catalonia, and participated in the Salzes campaign. In 1640, due to the Catalan rebellion, he took part in the siege of Coll de Balaguer, where he was wounded in the hand, and other military actions of that campaign, such as the taking of Martorell, in January 1641, and the combat for the Tower of Salou (Torre Vella), where he took many prisoners and came out with a very dangerous wound. In the combat of Montjuich and the failed attempt to take Barcelona, he was the one who withdrew Commissioner Filangieri from the field, badly wounded, who died that same night. After Sáenz was promoted to second lieutenant, he joined Captain Jerónimo Álvarez's company of horse cuirass (cuirassiers) and participated in the defense of Tarragona against the French. Shortly after, he returned to Madrid, married in December 1641, and on April 7, 1642, he was given an infantry captain's license and left for Milan. In the Milanese he was in the defense of Nizza Monferrato, participated in the capture of some French ships in the Po and in the siege of Cremona, where he received a serious head wound. Later he joined the troops of Don Luis de Benavides Carrillo, Marquis of Caracena, Spanish Governor of Milan, who crossed the Piedmont to Turin. He took part in the siege and capture of Trino, the capture of the castle of Masino, the siege and capture of Crescentino and the siege and fall of the castle and the city of Casale Monferrato (1652).

On December 22, 1652/1653, he went back to Catalonia as sergeant major of a third. He later returned to Madrid, and on September 18, 1654 Don Bernardino de Ayala Velasco y Cárdenas, VIIIth Count of Fuensalida, appointed him warden of the Castle of Oreja. In 1658 he sat in the company of the One Hundred Continual Hijos dalgo de Castilla, commanded by Don Cristóbal Portocarrero de Guzmán Luna y Enríquez, IV Count of Montijo and III Count of Fuentidueña, and of which he was appointed lieutenant on May 4, 1663. In 1660 he was residing in Pancorbo, where some of his ancestors came from, and he was elected mayor of the Holy Brotherhood of that town for 1661. In October 1661 he was approved in Madrid as mayor of La Mesta. In July 1662 he was chosen as one of the attorney generals of the hidalgos of Pancorbo.

In 1664 he went to the Spanish Navy as a reformed, and in 1669 he obtained a license from the VI Duke of Veragua, Pedro Nuño Colón of Portugal, Captain General of the Navy, to go to the Indies. He carried letters of recommendation for the viceroy of New Spain Antonio Sebastián de Toledo Molina y Salazar, II Marquis of Mancera, but he settled in the Kingdom of Guatemala, since his brother Agustín Sáenz Vázquez de Quintanilla y Sendín de Sotomayor had been appointed in 1667. as Mayor of Chiapas. The president of the Royal Court of Guatemala, Sebastián Álvarez Alfonso Rosica de Caldas, gave him command of the third of Spanish infantry formed for the defense against the Lacandon indigenous people, which he exercised from 1670 to 1671. On April 15, 1671, Bishop of Guatemala Juan de Santo Matía Sáenz de Mañozca y Murillo, Álvarez Alfonso's successor in the presidency of the Audiencia, wrote to Queen Regent Mariana of Austria to express his satisfaction with the way in which Sáenz had restrained the attacks of the Lacandones and the speed with which he acted when he was ordered to march to Granada de Nicaragua, given the news that this city was going to be the victim of an enemy attack. That same year, 1671, he returned to Spain, with the purpose of taking steps at court to try to obtain a position in America.

Governor of Costa Rica: early years

On February 22, 1673, he was appointed by the Queen Regent as Governor of Costa Rica, replacing Juan López de la Flor y Reinoso and because Francisco Osorio de Astorga had declined the position. He traveled back to America in the fleet of 1673, on the ship "Santa Teresa de Jesús", which carried Pedro Nuño Colón of Portugal, designated viceroy of New Spain, to Veracruz. From Veracruz he moved to the kingdom of Guatemala and took office in the city of Cartago, capital of Costa Rica, on April 27, 1674. He wrote detailed and valuable reports on his government to the Crown and to General Fernando Francisco de Escobedo., President of the Royal Court of Guatemala.

At the beginning of his administration, the mining deposits of Santo Cristo de la Victoria de Serradilla were explored, with the support of Dr. Benito de Novoa Salgado, judge of the Royal Court of Guatemala and general visitor of Costa Rica and Nicoya. However, those deposits were not profitable.

In 1675, the inspector issued the Ordinances of Novoa Salgado in favor of the indigenous people, which restricted the repartimiento to a minimum, and tried to avoid the abuses of the doctrineros. These ordinances were approved in 1676 by King Carlos II.

His main concern was the defense of Costa Rica, which since 1666 had been the object of constant attacks by pirates and lacked adequate means to deal with the attacks. In a letter addressed to President Escobedo, he proposed two measures that in his opinion would be very useful for the defense of the province: the creation of an infantry company of one hundred men, which would be quartered in Cartago, and the construction of a tower on the Isleta del Portete, near the current Puerto Limón, with capacity for fifteen men and a lime and stone castle at the mouth of the Carpinteros de Matina river, with capacity for one hundred soldiers, with lodgings, warehouses and four bastions.

In 1676, he was responsible for facing the largest pirate invasion suffered by Costa Rica, led by the English captain William Wright, a privateer with a license from the French governor of Saint Domingue (Haiti), at a time when France and Spain were in conflict. war. Wright had sacked the city of Nueva Segovia in Nicaragua in May of that year, and on June 30 he arrived at El Portete with 800 men. They headed in canoes to the mainland, taking as guides some indigenous people from the Urinama nation. They advanced along the Moín beach until they reached the mouth of the Matina River, which they went up, and at dawn on July 1 they seized its entire basin, where there were numerous cocoa plantations. The coastal watchmen managed to escape and rush to Carthage to report what had happened. To repel the invaders, the governor left Cartago on July 2, at the head of a troop of 700 men. Upon reaching the Matina River, they confronted the pirates, capsized three of their canoes and captured another. Apparently, the invaders had not counted on such a quick reaction from the Costa Rican authorities and were taken by surprise. In the confrontation, around 200 of Wright's men died, some by shots from Costa Rican weapons and others by drowning in the river. The survivors left Matina at full speed, boarded their ships and weighed anchor.

President Escobedo supported Sáenz's proposals for the defense of Costa Rica and the Crown arranged in 1677 to allocate two thousand pesos for that purpose, but the initiative was opposed by the later president of the same Audiencia Lope de Sierra Osorio and did not materialized.

Sáenz also unsuccessfully raised the possibility of undertaking the reconquest of Talamanca and the affiliation of Costa Rica to the jurisdiction of the Royal Audience of Panama.

Indictment and suspension

In the middle of 1677 the royal officials or those in charge of the Nicaraguan Treasury sent reports to President Escobedo in the sense that in Costa Rica «... a foreign boat had entered and traded there with the governor of said province don Juan Francisco Sáenz» and on other points of maladministration of the royal treasury, among them that until then he had not realized important sums that had been sent to Costa Rica from New Spain and Peru for his help against the enemies exteriors. The president ordered Don Pablo de Loyola, governor of Nicaragua, to temporarily leave his position and go to Costa Rica to carry out the rigorous investigation. However, Loyola excused himself in September 1677, alleging his defensive responsibilities in Nicaragua. In December 1677, the Audiencia accepted the excuse and Escobedo appointed Don Lorenzo Ramírez de Guzmán to travel to Costa Rica and carry out the investigation. Although at first Ramírez de Guzmán expressed his willingness to accept the commission, he later wanted to excuse himself. This caused an angry reaction in Escobedo, who filed charges against Ramírez de Guzmán and finally imposed a fine of two thousand pesos and six years in prison in the castle on the San Juan River. On February 7, 1679, when the attorney Sierra Osorio had already replaced Escobedo as president of the Audiencia, the latter appointed Don Francisco Antonio de Rivas y Contreras to go to Costa Rica as commission judge and make the pertinent inquiries and He was also commissioned to receive information there on the convenience of fortification and the creation of the company of one hundred infantry proposed by Sáenz. On February 20, 1679, Captain Agustín de Arango, appointed by the Royal Court as accountant for the adjustment of accounts of what was spent and delivered by Sáenz in effects of war, supplies, ammunition, etc., objected to the account letter. that Nicolás de Céspedes, deputy treasurer and in charge of the royal treasury of Cartago, had presented on the matter. A few weeks later, Rivas y Contreras arrived in Cartago and temporarily assumed the government of the province, while Sáenz went to Guatemala to report on his administration. The investigations against him apparently did not give any results, because by October 13, 1679 he was already back in his duties as governor.

Second phase of his government

At the end of 1680, a group of indigenous people from the Chánguinas or Chánguenes nation, who had not submitted to Spanish authority and lived on the banks of the Tararia or Tilorio river, on the Caribbean slope, abandoned their settlements, He crossed the Talamanca mountain range and settled in the vicinity of the mule trail, which linked the Central Valley of Costa Rica with the Chiriquí region, in the province of Veragua. Soon they began to assault and even kill travelers who used that route. Aware of this situation, the governor sent a small force to the region under the command of Juan Álvarez de Ulate, a resident of Esparza, who managed to get them to withdraw to the mountains, according to what he informed Governor Sáenz in a letter dated December 26 in Boruca. from 1680.

In June 1681, a party of buccaneers, which had attacked the neighborhoods of Cartagena de Indias and captured about twenty people there, disembarked in Matina. The invaders plundered the valley, destroying what they could and taking many people prisoner. After torturing them, they murdered the watch corporal and an Irishman, and also tortured Sergeant Juan de Molina and other people. When Ensign Eugenio Martín learned of what had happened on June 28, Governor Sáenz gathered the neighborhood and went to the Quebrada Honda fortification from where he dispatched people under the command of Lieutenant Juan de Bonilla, to recognize the invaders' intentions. Apparently they planned to advance on Cartago, but the news that Cartagena's windward armada was approaching the Costa Rican coast decided them to leave Matina in haste. They left the prisoners captured in Cartagena de Indias there, but they took with them two inhabitants of Matina, as slaves, "because they seemed brown in color". Lieutenant Bonilla managed to capture a Frenchman.

Last years

To succeed Sáenz, King Carlos II appointed on August 3, 1678 the captain of armored horses Pedro Mariño de Camba Sotomayor y Ulloa, but since he did not accept, Pedro de Balbín y Busto was appointed on April 12, 1680, but he also declined the position and Sáenz's administration lasted until July 24, 1681, the date on which Miguel Gómez de Lara y Brocal succeeded him, who had been appointed on August 7, 1680.

Gómez de Lara submitted Sáenz to a residency trial, in accordance with the legislation then in force. The result of the residency was very favorable to him, since he was only found guilty of not having kept the tariff of rights in a public and visible place and of not having avoided card games. For these accusations, he was sentenced to a pecuniary penalty of one hundred pesos, and another, also one hundred pesos, was imposed on him to defray the costs of the residence trial. Mr. Antonio de Navia Bolaños, oidor of the Royal Court of Guatemala, was entrusted with the collection of these sums. In accordance with the laws of the Indies, the Royal Court sent the case file of the residence trial to the Council of the Indies, so that it could review the proceedings. The Council, in a sentence handed down in Madrid on September 27, 1687, modified the penalties imposed on Sáenz and reduced them to only one hundred pesos of costs. By then Sáenz had already passed away.

At the request of Juan Miguel de Agurto y Álava, president of the Royal Court of Guatemala since December 1681, Sáenz accompanied Gómez de Lara at the end of 1682 on a tour of the Caribbean coast to examine possible fortification points, subject on which he wrote a report to the president on January 4, 1683.

After spending some time in Costa Rica, apparently hoping to be named governor again, he decided to travel to Spain, no doubt to apply for a posting. He left Cartago with his eldest son in February 1685 and headed with him for Panama. His wife and their children from the second marriage remained in Costa Rica.

Death

He died on January 4, 1686, aboard a ship that was taking him from Portobelo (Panama) to Cartagena de Indias, from where he planned to embark for Europe.

Offspring

He is one of the Spanish governors with the greatest descendants in Costa Rica, spread throughout the country and in many different social groups. His numerous descendants include several presidents of Costa Rica and Nicaragua, and the first wife of Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, Mónica Pretellini Sáenz.