Battle of Jaquijahuana
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Battle of Jaquijahuana | |
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Part of the Cuzco valley, present-day Peru 13°28′6″S 72°12′24″W / 13.46833°S 72.20667°W | |
Result | Decisive victory for Royalist forces |
Alonso de Alvarado
Francisco Hernández Girón
Pedro de Valdivia
Francisco de Carvajal (POW)
6 guns[1]
~800 defected or captured[1]
The Battle of Jaquijahuana was fought between the forces of
conquistadores
.
After the successful
Charles. The Almagristas, followers of Diego de Almagro, met their downfall in the battle of Chupas on September 16, 1542. Two years later, King Charles eventually sent his own envoy, Blasco Núñez Vela, as governor over the recently found Viceroyalty of Peru, and as well to ensure the accomplishment of the New Laws enacted in 1542 to protect the native Peruvian
population of Peru.
Añaquito in present-day Ecuador
, superiority in numbers and firepower ensured victory for Gonzalo Pizarro, who crushed the army of Blasco Núñez Vela, who was decapitated on the field of battle. This, in its turn, ensured a struggle for the control of Peru between Gonzalo Pizarro and the royal forces.
The king then appointed Pedro de la Gasca as new governor of Peru; meanwhile, the land itself fell under control by Gonzalo Pizarro and his forces. De la Gasca landed in Peru in 1547, winning supporters to his initially inferior forces by promising amnesty to those having committed treason to the crown, and proclaimed he would not enforce the New Laws, whose dispositions demanding better conditions for native laborers had led many powerful encomenderos to join Pizarro's cause.
After initial skirmishes, the two forces went close to a confrontation in late 1547 at Jaquijahuana (Xaquixaguana, Sacsahuana) plains near
Cuzco, but de la Gasca succeeded in avoiding battle, gaining precious time which he employed to convince even more of Pizarro's officers to switch sides, among them the notorious Alonso de Alvarado
. Although Pizarro had arrived to Jaquijahuana with a vastly superior force, by the time the two sides finally met on the battlefield in April 1548, the situation had reversed, a steady string of defections having left Pizarro's forces in grave numerical inferiority and poor morale. The notorious conquistador Lope de Aguirre, known as the 'wrath of god', was injured by a harquebus shot to the leg at the battle while fighting for the royalists.
The battle itself proved to be a disaster for Gonzalo Pizarro, with all his men who hadn't already defected being killed or captured on the field, while de la Gasca's men reportedly suffered a single casualty. Gonzalo himself, along with his most loyal commander, Francisco de Carvajal, dubbed the Demon of the Andes, were captured on field of battle and executed by beheading. De la Gasca then made efforts to consolidate his control over Peru, which remained a royal colony and viceroyalty until the revolutionary actions of José de San Martín and Simón Bolívar during the early 19th century.
Notes
References
- Prescott, William Hickling (2004), The Conquest of Peru, Digital Antiquaria, ISBN 1-58057-302-9.