The Jewish Conquistadors

Before joining up with Cortez, Alonso and Diego were in Cuba but on far different rungs of society. Alonso was a blacksmith in town, while Diego and his sisters lived in the governor’s mansion, where he served as majordormo. Despite this all-important class difference, Beatriz married the blacksmith. Apparently decisive was the one thing they did share, a common ancestry. Cortez’ captain wound up his days gathering pearls off the Venezuela coast, only to be poisoned by rivals in 1532. Although much is written about him, nowhere is it mentioned that he was a converso, much less a secret Jew. Like most conversos, Diego passed himself off an Old Christian, and went to his grave with his masquerade intact.

New World Jewesses

Senoritas were a rarity throughout the New World. With less than one Spanish woman for every 10 men, to marry one was considered a feather in the cap for the mostly poor, aspiring hidalgos. After Mexico’s conquest, some ladies felt the same about them. Most were servant girls who journeyed to New Spain to find themselves a newly rich husband. Exceptions were the four daughters of the royal treasurer Alonso Estrada, the natural son, or so he claimed, of King Ferdinand. Few women were as desirable as the Estrada sisters, who could choose from among many suitors, and it is therefore not surprising that they all married well. What is surprising is that their mother was from a well-known Jewish family and their husbands would have known of their wives’ blemished ancestry. That their progeny would also be stigmatized seems not to have mattered. Despite the aggressiveness of the Holy Fathers, and repeated decrees against conversos (converted Jews), they were able to keep their wives’ and children’s Jewish heritage secret. The same holds true of Beatriz and Diego Ordaz’s surviving sister. Only now is their story being reported.

Francisca Ordaz

As Beatriz, having accompanied her husband, lay dying during the siege of Mexico, her sister Francisca was by her side. The two were among only six Spanish women known to have accompanied the conquistadors during the fighting in Mexico. After the final victory, Francisca was observed enjoying a wild night of celebration. According to an eyewitness, Francisca and three other “adventurous women went gaily to dance with men still in their quilted armor.” It may well have been that night that she danced with her future husband, the son of Ponce de Leon, one of the legendary figures of the New World.

After Alonso’s undoing, Diego Ordaz was not about to fix up Francisca with another covert Jew. Instead he found Juan Gonzalez Ponce de Leon, a valiant suitor of noble, unblemished credentials. His father, the conqueror and governor of Puerto Rico, and discoverer of Florida, is forever known for what he searched for when he was getting old—the Fountain of Youth. His son was distinguished in his own right. Serving as a soldier under Ordaz’ command, Juan was the first man to reach the top of the main temple of Tenochtitlan and, despite being badly wounded, led a vanguard force that captured Montezuma. When Cortez asked him why, considering his injury, he had not withdrawn, but instead led the fight up the steps to Montezuma’s quarters, Juan answered: “Senor, this is not the time for men to be in bed.”

Juan was aware of Francisca lineage even before Alonso’s trial had exposed her sister as a judaizer (a false converso). For years he and Alonso were friends, and until Alonso’s flaming death the two men were partners. They shared an encomienda in Actopan in the modern state of Hidalgo, about 60 miles north of Mexico City, where Alonso had his farm.

Alonso Estrada’s Wife & Daughters

In 1522, King Charles V appointed his alleged uncle Alonso Estrada as the colony’s royal treasurer, perhaps the most important position in the rich territory. It was a common belief he was the bastard son of King Ferdinand, the result of a liaison with Donna Luisa de Estrada, the daughter of Don Fernan, Duke of Aragon, when both were teenagers. Raised in Ferdinand’s court, Alonso inherited the title Duke of Aragon and sided with Charles V when he was contending for the Crown. While some Internet postings speculate that he had Jewish ancestors, his wife certainly did. It was widely known that Marina Gutierrez Flores de la Caballeria was from an old Jewish family whose wealth has been compared to the Rothschilds'. Although both sides of her family had converted to Catholicism, for three generations they were condemned as judaizers. Donna Marina, having secured a forged affidavit attesting to her pure blood, followed her husband to Mexico.

Following his death in 1531, she cemented her place in colonial society by marrying off her daughters to two of Mexico’s prominent conquistadors. The youngest, Beatrice Estrada, married Vasquez de Coronado, who (with his wife’s money) set off to find the fabled seven Golden Cities of Cibola. Although the object of his search never was, in the process Coronado was the first to explore America’s Southwest and discovered the Grand Canyon. Luisa, the oldest, became the wife of Jorge de Alvarado, a conqueror of Mexico and governor of Guatemala. The two other Estrada sisters likewise married nobility. What do these marriages portend? Since the Jewish ancestry of their mother-in-law was known, and that her Old Christian certification was a sham, it apparently did not overly concern them that their children would no longer be of pure blood.

In the first four decades of the Age of Discovery, known conversos were involved in nearly every venture as explorers, pilots, and conquistadors or behind the scenes as financiers, ship owners, and administrators. Since all Spanish conversos were forbidden in the New World, it made no difference if one was a true convert, an atheist, or a covert Jew. All were there illegally and therefore subject to prosecution. Today with the advent of Sephardi websites, the Jewish roots of other early pioneers are being disclosed in postings by their descendants. They include the first cowboys in America, but that is another story for another time.

Edward Kritzler is a historian and a former New York-based reporter. He lives in Kingston, Jamaica. He is the author of Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean (Doubleday)