Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography/Ayllón, Lucas Vázquez de

1225717Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography — Ayllón, Lucas Vázquez de

AYLLÓN, Lucas Vázquez de (ah-eel-yon'), Spanish adventurer, d. in Virginia, 18 Oct., 1526. He was appointed a member of the superior court in Santo Domingo. Cortés sent him to negotiate an agreement with Velazquez, but he did not succeed in effecting it either with Velazquez or with Narvaez, who commanded the fleet of the latter. Ayllón sent an expedition to Florida in 1520, under Gordillo, who, in 1521, landed in lat. 33º 30', and carried off into slavery seventy Indians. Ayllon obtained a grant of the new country, fitted out another vessel, which restored the captives, and in 1526 sailed himself with 500 colonists, landed at the mouth of the Santee; sailed northward to the Chesapeake, and on the site of Jamestown founded the settlement of San Miguel de Guandape, which, after his death from swamp fever, was abandoned by the colonists, only 150 of whom reached San Domingo alive.