Pedro de Unamuno was a Spanish soldier and sailor who was active in

New Spain New Spain, officially the Viceroyalty of New Spain ( es, Virreinato de Nueva España, ), or Kingdom of New Spain, was an integral territorial entity of the Spanish Empire, established by Habsburg Spain during the Spanish colonization of the Am ...

and

Spanish East Indies The Spanish East Indies ( es , Indias orientales españolas ; fil, Silangang Indiyas ng Espanya) were the overseas territories of the Spanish Empire in Asia-Pacific, Asia and Oceania from 1565 to 1898, governed for the Spanish Crown from Mexico C ...

, particularly the

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

, in the second half of the 16th century. He is known for commanding the

galleon Galleons were large, multi-decked sailing ships first used as armed cargo carriers by European states from the 16th to 18th centuries during the age of sail and were the principal vessels drafted for use as warships until the Anglo-Dutch War ...

''Nuestra Señora de la Esperanza'', that in the year 1587 undertook the second trans-Pacific crossing from the

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area ...

n mainland to the

Americas The Americas, which are sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North and South America. The Americas make up most of the land in Earth's Western Hemisphere and comprise the New World. Along with th ...

in history, the first being the one achieved by his contemporary

Francisco Gali Francisco Gali (1539 in Seville – 1586 in Manila) was a Spanish sailor and cartographer, active in the second half of the 16th century across the Pacific Ocean and in New Spain and Spanish East Indies, particularly Philippines. He is best know ...

in 1584.

Trans-Pacific journey

The voyage started in

Macau Macau or Macao (; ; ; ), officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (MSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China in the western Pearl River Delta by the South China Sea. With a pop ...

on July 12, 1587 and reached the

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

n shore on October 18, at 35.5 degrees North latitude, where they went on shore in a bay with sandy beaches (potentially

Monterey Bay Monterey Bay is a bay of the Pacific Ocean located on the coast of the U.S. state of California, south of the San Francisco Bay Area and its major city at the south of the bay, San Jose. San Francisco itself is further north along the coast, by a ...

Morro Bay Morro Bay (''Morro'', Spanish for "Hill") is a seaside city in San Luis Obispo County, California. Located on the Central Coast of California, the city population was 10,757 as of the 2020 census, up from 10,234 at the 2010 census. The town ...

) and made contact with some

indigenous Californians The indigenous peoples of California (known as Native Californians) are the indigenous inhabitants who have lived or currently live in the geographic area within the current boundaries of California before and after the arrival of Europeans. ...

. They then sailed progressively southwards along the Western American coast to

Acapulco Acapulco de Juárez (), commonly called Acapulco ( , also , nah, Acapolco), is a city and major seaport in the state of Guerrero on the Pacific Coast of Mexico, south of Mexico City. Acapulco is located on a deep, semicircular bay and has bee ...

, reaching the area on November 22 of same year. The main goals of the journey were to find the purported islands of Rica de Oro, Rica de Plata and Armenio (which Unamuno concluded did not exist), and also the profitable transport of Chinese goods to New Spain (which was a violation, like Gali's voyage three years earlier, of the

monopoly A monopoly (from Greek language, Greek el, μόνος, mónos, single, alone, label=none and el, πωλεῖν, pōleîn, to sell, label=none), as described by Irving Fisher, is a market with the "absence of competition", creating a situati ...

accorded by the

Spanish Crown , coatofarms = File:Coat_of_Arms_of_Spanish_Monarch.svg , coatofarms_article = Coat of arms of the King of Spain , image = Felipe_VI_in_2020_(cropped).jpg , incumbent = Felipe VI , incumbentsince = 19 Ju ...

to the

Manila galleon fil, Galyon ng Maynila , english_name = Manila Galleon , duration = From 1565 to 1815 (250 years) , venue = Between Manila and Acapulco , location = New Spain (Spanish Empire) ...

s). The official trade galleon of 1587 from Manila, the ''Santa Ana'', reached the Californian coast one month later than the ''Esperanza'' but was then captured along with her cargo by two English

privateer A privateer is a private person or ship that engages in maritime warfare under a commission of war. Since robbery under arms was a common aspect of seaborne trade, until the early 19th century all merchant ships carried arms. A sovereign or deleg ...

ships commanded by Sir Thomas Cavendish. Unamuno had Alonso Gómez as pilot, a crew of Spaniards and Philippine Indios, and three

Franciscan The Franciscans are a group of related Mendicant orders, mendicant Christianity, Christian Catholic religious order, religious orders within the Catholic Church. Founded in 1209 by Italian Catholic friar Francis of Assisi, these orders include t ...

friars as passengers, namely

Martín Ignacio de Loyola Martín Ignacio Martínez de Mallea, known as Martín Ignacio de Loyola (c. 1550 in Eibar, Guipuzcoa, Spain – 1606 in Buenos Aires), was a Franciscan friar, best known for his two travels around the world in 1580–1584 and 1585–1589, being ...

, Francisco de Nogueira, and a third one whose name is unknown. De Loyola brought along with him a young Japanese converted to

Catholicism The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

References

External links

Wagner, Henry R.,"The Voyage of Pedro de Unamuno to California in 1587" in The California Historical Society Quarterly. Jul. 1923

* ttp://www.bibingka.com/sst/esperanza/indios.htm Santos, Hector. "The first Philippine indios in California" in Sulat sa Tansô. US, April 3, 1997.
Santos, Hector. "Did Philippine indios really land in Morro Bay?" in Sulat sa Tansô US, April 9, 1997

Trans-Pacific journey

References

External links

See also