Auriferous Streams And Gold Produced From
1509 TO 1536
If a systematic exploration were practised to-day, by competent
mineralogists, of the entire chain of mountains which intersects the
island from east to west, it is probable that lodes of gold-bearing
quartz or conglomerate, worth working, would be discovered. Even the
alluvium deposits along the banks of the rivers and their tributaries,
as well as the river beds, might, in many instances, b
found to
"pay."
The early settlers compelled the Indians to work for them. These poor
creatures, armed with the simplest tools, dug the earth from the river
banks. Their wives and daughters, standing up to their knees in the
river, washed it in wooden troughs. When the output diminished another
site was chosen, often before the first one was half worked out. The
Indians' practical knowledge of the places where gold was likely to be
found was the Spanish gold-seeker's only guide, the Indians' labor the
only labor employed in the collection of it.
As for the mountains, they have never been properly explored. The
Indians who occupied them remained in a state of insurrection for
years, and when the mountain districts could be safely visited at
last, the auri sacra fames had subsided. The governors did not
interest themselves in the mineral resources of the island, and the
people found it too difficult to provide for their daily wants to go
prospecting. So the surface gold in the alluvium deposits was all that
was collected by the Spaniards, and what there still may be on the
bed-rocks of the rivers or in the lodes in the mountains from which it
has been washed, awaits the advent of modern gold-seekers.
The first samples of gold from Puerto Rico were taken to the Espanola
by Ponce, who had obtained them from the river Manatuabon, to which
the friendly cacique Guaybana conducted him on his first visit (1508).
This river disembogues into the sea on the south coast near Cape
Malapascua; but it appears that the doughty captain also visited the
north coast and found gold enough in the rivers Coa and Sibuco to
justify him in making his headquarters at Caparra, which is in the
neighborhood. That gold was found there in considerable quantities is
shown by the fact that in August of the same year of Ponce's return to
the island (he returned in February, 1509), 8,975 pesos corresponded
to the king's fifth of the first washings. The first smelting was
practised October 26, 1510. The next occurred May 22, 1511, producing
respectively 2,645 and 3,043 gold pesos as the king's share. Thus, in
the three first years the crown revenues from this source amounted to
14,663 gold pesos, and the total output to 73,315 gold pesos, which,
at three dollars of our money per peso, approximately represented a
total of $219,945 obtained from the rivers in the neighborhood of
Caparra alone.
In 1515 a fresh discovery of gold-bearing earth in this locality was
reported to the king by Sancho Velasquez, the treasurer, who wrote on
April 27th: " ... At 4 leagues' distance from here rich gold deposits
have been found in certain rivers and streams. From Reyes (December
4th) to March 15th, with very few Indians, 25,000 pesos have been
taken out. It is expected that the output this season will be 100,000
pesos."
The streams in the neighborhood of San German, on the south coast, the
only other settlement in the island at the time, seem to have been
equally rich. The year after its foundation by Miguel del Toro the
settlers were able to smelt and deliver 6,147 pesos to the royal
treasurer. The next year the king's share amounted to 7,508 pesos, and
Treasurer Haro reported that the same operation for the years 1517 and
1518 had produced $186,000 in all - that is, 3,740 for the treasury.
A good idea of the island's mineral and other resources at this period
may be formed from Treasurer Haro's extensive report to the
authorities in Madrid, dated January 21, 1518.
" ... Your Highness's revenues," he says, "are: one-fifth of the gold
extracted and of the pearls brought by those who go (to the coast of
Venezuela) to purchase them, the salt produce and the duties on
imports and exports. Every one of the three smeltings that are
practised here every two years produces about 250,000 pesos, in San
German about 186,000 pesos. But the amounts fluctuate.
"The product of pearls is uncertain. Since the advent of the Jerome
fathers the business has been suspended until the arrival of your
Highness. Two caravels have gone now, but few will go, because the
fathers say that the traffic in Indians is to cease and the greatest
profit is in that ... On your Highness's estates there are 400 Indians
who wash gold, work in the fields, build houses, etc.; ... they
produce from 1,500 to 2,000 pesos profit every gang (demora).... I
send in this ship, with Juan Viscaino, 8,000 pesos and 40 marks of
pearls. There remain in my possession 17,000 pesos and 70 marks of
pearls, which shall be sent by the next ship in obedience to your
Highness's orders, not to send more than 10,000 pesos at a time. The
pearls that go now are worth that amount. Until the present we sent
only 5,000 pesos' worth of pearls at one time."
The yearly output of gold fluctuated, but it continued steadily, as
Velasquez wrote to the emperor in 1521, when he made a remittance of
5,000 pesos. Six or seven years later, the placers, for such they
were, were becoming exhausted. Castellanos, the treasurer, wrote in
1518 that only 429 pesos had been received as the king's share of the
last two years' smelting. Some new deposit was discovered in the river
Daguao, but it does not seem to have been of much importance. From the
year 1530 the reports of the crown officers are full of complaints of
the growing scarcity of gold; finally, in 1536, the last remittance
was made; not, it may be safely assumed, because there was no more
gold in the island, but because those who had labored and suffered in
its production, had succumbed to the unaccustomed hardships imposed on
them and to the cruel treatment received from their sordid masters.
Besides the river mentioned, the majority of those which have their
sources in the mountains of Luquillo are more or less auriferous.
These are: the Rio Prieto, the Fajardo, the Espiritu Santo, the Rio
Grande, and, especially, the Mameyes. The river Loiza also contains
gold, but, judging from the traces of diggings still here and there
visible along the beds of the Mavilla, the Sibuco, the Congo, the Rio
Negro, and Carozal, in the north, it would seem that these rivers and
their affluents produced the coveted metal in largest quantities. The
Duey, the Yauco, and the Oromico, or Hormigueros, on the south coast
are supposed to be auriferous also, but do not seem to have been
worked.
The metal was and is still found in seed-shaped grains, sometimes of
the weight of 2 or 3 pesos. Tradition speaks of a nugget found in the
Fajardo river weighing 4 ounces, and of another found in an affluent
of the Congo of 1 pound in weight.
Silver. - In 1538 the crown officers in San Juan wrote to the Home
Government: " ... The gold is diminishing. Several veins of lead ore
have been discovered, from which some silver has been extracted. The
search would continue if the concession to work these veins were given
for ten years, with 1.20 or 1.15 royalty." On March 29th of the
following year the same officers reported: " ... Respecting the silver
ores discovered, we have smolten some, but no one here knows how to
do it. Veins of this ore have been discovered in many parts of the
island, but nobody works them. We are waiting for some one to come who
knows how to smelt them."
The following extract from the memoirs and documents left by Juan
Bautista Munoz, gives the value in "gold pesos" of the bullion and
pearls, corresponding to the king's one-fifth share of the total
produce remitted to Spain from this island from the year 1509 to 1536:
In 1509, gold pesos 8,975
1510, " 2,645
1511, " 10,000
1512, " 3,043
1513, " 27,291
1514, " 18,000
1515, " 17,000
1516, " 11,490
1517-18, " 38,497
1519, " 10,000
1520, " 35,733
In 1521, " 10,000
1522, " 7,979
1523-29, " 40,000
1530, " 12,440
1531, " 6,500
1532, " 9,000
1533, " 4,000
1534, " 8,500
1535, " 1,848
1536, " 10,000
Total, 15 share 277,941
The entire output for this period was 1,389,705 gold pesos, or
$4,169,115 Spanish coin of to-day, as the total produce in gold and
pearls of the island of San Juan de Puerto Rico during the first
twenty-seven years of its occupation by the Spaniards.