Martin Alonso Pinzón

Martín Alonso Pinzón (Palos de la Frontera, Huelva; c. 1441-ibid c. March 31, 1493) was a Spanish navigator and explorer, co-discoverer from America.

He sailed alongside Christopher Columbus on his first voyage to the New World, in 1492, as captain of La Pinta. Martín Alonso was born in Palos de la Frontera, into a wealthy family of sailors. He was the eldest of the Pinzón brothers and tenant of the caravels La Niña and La Pinta . His brothers Vicente Yáñez and Francisco Martín Pinzón were on the first Columbian voyage as captain of La Niña and master of La Pinta , respectively.

Family

The Pinzón, from the XV century, were a family of possible Aragonese origin that arrived in Andalusia from Asturias, his surname being, according to some, a distortion of the term Espinzas or Pinzas. For others, however, the true family surname would be Martín, the name of the grandfather, a sailor and diver in Palos, who was nicknamed Pinzón when he became blind, since he was very fond of singing and remembered the Palermos. to the finch birds, which they blinded so that they would sing better. Their son, also a sailor and also named Martín, was the father of the three brothers who participated in the Discovery of America: Martín Alonso, Vicente Yáñez and Francisco Martín Pinzón.

Martín Alonso sailed since he was a child on the Palermo caravels as a cabin boy. He lived in a house located on the old royal road to La Rábida, and married María Álvarez. They had five children, two boys: Arias Pérez and Juan Pinzón (who would participate in several expeditions through American lands), and three girls: Mayor, Catalina and Leonor, the youngest, who suffered frequent attacks of what they formerly called "choral gout" and which is currently known as epilepsy. She was widowed. This first wife and later appears in documents that he lived with Catalina Alonso.

His nautical experience and audacity provided him with good returns on his coastal voyages, leading to a comfortable economic situation. He had his own boats in which sailors from the entire region enlisted. His fame and prestige grew thanks to the success of his commercial expeditions and the courage he demonstrated in the war armies during the conflict between Castile and Portugal. By 1479, Martín Alonso was one of the councilors of the town of Palos and a servant of Enrique de Guzmán, Duke of Medina Sidonia.

Participation in the discovery trip

The preparations

On May 23, 1492, in the church of San Jorge, the Royal Provision was read to the residents of Palos, in which certain residents were ordered to deliver two caravels to Columbus and depart with him on the voyage he was going to to be carried out by order of Their Highnesses, the town abides by the royal decision but does not comply with it. The Palermo sailors were not willing to embark on that adventure with a stranger without prestige. Regardless of the greater or lesser credibility of the Columbian ideas, the men of Palos would hardly support the Genoese unless he was accompanied by some respected navigator in the town. The enterprise, of considerable risk, and benefits that were difficult to achieve, was not very attractive to those men. The majority of the sailors would either oppose or simply be indifferent to the project presented, and the royal mandate implied plenty of reasons to create discontent among the sailors of the port of Palos.

It is at this time that Martín Alonso Pinzón returns from one of his business trips, specifically from Rome. Pinzón, as mentioned before, had come to have a privileged economic situation, thanks to his outstanding nautical qualities, making numerous voyages and sailings that brought him considerable benefits. For all this, he enjoyed great fame and prestige in the region. Therefore, he had the qualities that Columbus seemed to lack, becoming, therefore, the ideal complement for the future Admiral to carry out said expedition.. The Franciscans of La Rábida were the ones who put Christopher Columbus in contact with the sailor from Palos. But Vázquez de la Frontera, an old sailor from the town, highly respected for his experience and a friend of Martín Alonso, also had a notable influence on Pinzón's decision to support the company not only morally but also financially. In the Columbian Trials, the Huelva witness Alonso Gallego remembered having heard Columbus say:

Mr. Martín Alonso Pinçón, let's go to this viage that, if we go out with him and God discovers us land, I promise you by the Royal Crown to leave with you as a brother.

Pleitos collombinos.

Motivated by whatever, the reality is that, when Martín Alonso decides to join the company, he carries out outstanding support work in favor of the expedition. He went through Palos, Moguer and Huelva, encouraging and convincing his relatives and friends - prominent sailors in the area - to enlist, thereby obtaining the best possible crew. They joined, among others, the Quinteros of Palos or the Child from Moguer. He discarded the ships that Columbus had embargoed and hired other more suitable ships that he knew and that he knew were very sailing and "suitable for the profession of sailing" because he had already rented some of them. He contributed half a million from his personal finances. of maravedíes, the third part of the company's cash expenses.

Start of the trip, departure from the port of Palos

With the preparations completed, on August 3 the Santa María, La Pinta and La Niña left the port of Palos de la Frontera. Martín Alonso assumed command of La Pinta, taking his brother Francisco with him as master. His brother Vicente was captain of the caravel La Niña . Colón wrote down in his diary, on several occasions, complimentary words towards the eldest of the Pinzóns when verifying his qualities and effectiveness in the face of the problems that arose. During the voyage, he demonstrated his abilities several times, such as when he solved the problem of the broken rudder of La Pinta and was able to continue sailing.

Intervention by Martín Alonso in the face of threats of mutiny

Between October 6 and 7, discomfort, fatigue and discouragement from not finding land began to take their toll on the crew of the Santa María, and the first complaints and concerns appeared, However, thanks to the intervention of Pinzón -according to testimonies from the Columbian lawsuits-, who once again showed his decisive capacity and leadership skills, this first attempt at mutiny that Columbus was not able to resolve was managed to calm down. According to one of the evidence of the Columbian lawsuits Columbus asks:

What do we do, Martin Alonso? Because people don't want to go on.

Pinzón answers:

Lord, save you half a dozen of them, and if you don't dare, I and my brothers will sweep over them and we will do it, that armed that came out of such high princes will not return without good news.

Pleitos collombinos.

Thanks to this determination, spirits in the flotilla calmed down and they managed to continue the trip, when they were close to sighting American land. In the next attempt at mutiny, this time more serious, on October 9 and 10, when all the Ligurian calculations had failed, the Pinzóns only managed to calm the crew by setting one condition: they would sail following the same course for only three more days.; If after that time they did not see land, they would return to Spain.

Pinzón advises changing course and thanks to this they arrive at Guanahani

Martín Alonso had suggested to Colón, before the threats or attempts at mutiny began, the change of course "to the fourth west" (west-southwest), on October 6. A change that Columbus initially did not accept, but which he ended up making at the end of October 7 when the flotilla spotted a flock of birds heading southwest. This change led to the arrival of the expedition to Guanahani, in the Bahamas, at dawn on October 12, 1492. From the caravel captained by Martín Alonso, la Pinta, the sailor shouted the expected cry: Land! Rodrigo de Triana.

The version that is known of the diary written by Christopher Columbus of the First voyage to the Indies is a transcription by Brother Bartolomé de Las Casas (1484-1566). Below are some fragments dated October 11, 1492:

They had a lot of sea and more than they had on the whole trip. They saw those of the carabela Pinta a reed and a stick, and they took another broken stick to what looked like with iron, and a piece of reed and another herb born on earth, and a tablet. With these signals they breathed and they all rejoiced...

... After the sun set, he sailed on his first way west. They would be 12 miles an hour, and up to two hours after midnight they would be 90 miles. And because the carabela Pinta was more sailing and went before the Admiral, he found land and made the signs that the Admiral had commanded. This land was first seen by a sailor named Rodrigo de Triana...

... At two hours after midnight the earth appeared, of which two leagues would be. They stopped all the candles (...) until Friday they came to an island of the Lucayos, which was called in the language of the Guanahani Indians. Then they saw naked people, and the Admiral landed in the armed boat and Martin Alonso Pinzón and Vicente Yáñez, his brother, who was the captain of the Child.

Diary of the first navigation. Relationship composed by Brother Bartolomé de las Casas.

Disagreements between Colón and Pinzón

Until their arrival in the New World, the relationship between Columbus and Pinzón was good, something that will change radically after the discovery. Columbus, now an admiral, began a change of attitude towards the Palos sailor. On November 21, Martín Alonso moved forward with the Pinta, separating himself from the other two ships and thereby achieving, reach the destination they had marked, the island of Babeque. In Columbus's diary, extracted by Brother Bartolomé de las Casas, there was a record of some serious accusations against Pinzón for that separation. However, according to various testimonies of the Columbian lawsuits, these accusations could be unfounded, as various people claim. authors. This enmity between both leaders would remain this way until the end of the trip, as recorded both in the diary and in the lawsuits. Finally Pinzón rejoined Columbus, and the rest of the flotilla, on January 6, 1493, when Columbus was preparing to return to Spain.

Return to Spain, last days of Martín Alonso

During the return, Pinzón's ship was separated again due to a strong storm, and Pinzón arrived at the port of Bayonne, in Galicia, days before Columbus arrived in Lisbon. It was, therefore, the caravel Pinta — captained by Martín Alonso — the first to return to the Iberian Peninsula, arriving in Bayonne probably towards the end of February 1493. Martín Alonso Pinzón would write several letters with the discovery to different parts of Spain and, of course, to the Court, which was in Barcelona, and this news will reach the Court in the first half of March. After some repairs made to la Pinta Due to the storms suffered, Martín Alonso will depart with his crew towards Palos, probably on March 9.

From Bayonne he headed to Palos, where he arrived on March 15, 1493, coinciding on that day with the arrival of the caravel La Niña from Lisbon. Martín Alonso arrived in Palos very ill and without directly entering Palos, he was transferred to an estate that he had on land in Moguer. The testimonies in the aforementioned lawsuits, by Hernán Pérez Mateos and Francisco Medel, indicate that he was finally transferred to the monastery of La Rábida where, according to his will, when he died he was buried in the church of said Franciscan convent.