Francisco Gomez
(abt. 1587 - abt. 1656)
Ana Robledo
(abt. 1604 - 1680)
Francisco Gómez and Ana Robledo were the parents of our
ancestor, Andrés Gómez Robledo. We know this from pages 35-37 of Origins of New Mexico Families, Revised Edition, by Fray
Angélico Chávez.
Francisco was born in Coina, a town
thirteen miles from Lisbon, Portugal. He was the son of Manuel Gómez and Ana Vicente,
both of whom died when he was a child.
The family was most likely a noble family as is suggested by Francisco’s
later fate. Reared at first by his elder
brother, Fray Álvaro Gómez, a Franciscan of Lisbon and Commisary of the Holy
Office of the Inquisition, Francisco then passed on to the household of Don
Alonso de Oñate at the Court of ailing King Phillip II in Madrid. He was likely
in the court when King Phillip died in 1598.
He no doubt was well-acquainted with the new king, Phillip III. Oñate
brought him to Mexico City, and
from there Francisco came to New Mexico
to join the young colony of Alonso’s brother, Governor Juan de Oñate. 1604 is probably the year that young
Francisco sailed to the New World.
The
New Mexican capital was at San Gabriel del Yunque during Francisco’s early
years there. He chose as a wife Ana Robledo, daughter of Bartolomé Romero and Luisa López Robledo, who were original
1598 settlers of New Mexico. Her Robledo grandparents were also among
the 1598 colonists. Ana was born about 1604 in San Gabriel,
the year of Francisco’s probable arrival in the New World.
With
such close connections to the Oñate family and a background of nobility, it is
no surprise that Francisco Gómez rose
to become the most outstanding military official in New
Mexico. His name appears often in early records. In 1616 and 1625 he was the leader of the
Mexico
City wagon train escort; in the latter year he
conducted Gov. Sotelo and Fray Alonso Benavides, and a statue of the Virgin
Mary which, as La Conquistadora, became
forever famous in New Mexico
through the initial efforts of his wife and children. We have the following about La Conquistadora:
She
stands only 28 inches tall. She is made of willow wood, native to her native Spain. Having arrived in New Mexico in 1625, she is well preserved, thanks to
the excellent care she receives from La Confradía de Nuestra Señora
del Rosario (The Confraternity of Our Lady of
the Rosary).
Her
wardrobe of 130 elaborate dresses would be the envy of almost any woman in
history. One dress, made by Cochití Pueblo artist Dorothy Trujillo, is of
Native American design and includes small silver bracelets and a miniature
squash blossom necklace.
The
statue's jeweled crown's replacement value equals $65,378, while her pectoral
cross, donated in 1960 by an anonymous admirer, is currently valued at $97,529.
The replacement value of all of her jewelry equaled $180,856 in 2000.
Whole
books have been written about her. And thousands of visitors have come to
admire her at her special chapel at St. Francis Cathedral in Santa Fe. She is the center of attention at the
annual Santa Fe Fiesta, where she is carried through the
capital city's streets at the head of a grand procession.
She
is the image of the Virgin Mary, the most venerated saint in the Catholic
Church. She is the oldest Madonna figure in the United States. She is the most famous religious, cultural
and historical artifact in all of New Mexico. She is listed as a New Mexico Registered Cultural Property.
At
first Father Alonso Benavides showered Gómez with praise and favors, but he
later thought Francisco too attached to the anti-clerical Governor Juan de
Eulate. Gómez had always been a critic
of certain friars in power, thus incurring their enmity and that of their
followers. His Portuguese origin did not
help. The following is a quote from Kiva, Cross and Crown, by John L.
Kessell:
It was night before he rode back
into Santa Fe. He made straight for the governor's
quarters to report on the tribute payment and on the situation he had found at Pecos. He related exactly how he had admonished the Indians, assuming that
the governor would be grateful to him "for having defended his honor and
the cause of God." Instead, [Governor] Eulate exploded. By whose order, he
demanded, had Pérez meddled in affairs at Pecos. That was
none of his damn business! Stung by such "pharisaical words," [Luis]
Pérez Granillo [our kinsman] made his exit, having, as he put it, formed
a bad opinion of the governor. As for Francisco Mosoyo, that "great
idolater and witch about whom our Father Custos has compiled an extremely full
report," Ortega tried to rehabilitate him and his like-minded brother,
"assigning them no greater penance than placing them in the home of
Christian and honorable Spaniards." When Eulate heard what the friar had
done, he bellowed. The accused must be released at once and sent back to Pecos with a letter informing Fray Pedro that they were not to be harmed but
favored. What more could the missionary do.
At every turn, to hear the friars
tell it, Eulate thwarted their missionary program. He abused or threatened
mission Indians who worked for or cooperated with the Franciscans. He opposed
mission expansion, denying escorts to friars who wished to carry the gospel to
neighboring heathens, even though he exacted tribute and services from such
people whenever he could. When certain encomenderos, like Capt. Francisco Gómez, volunteered as escorts, Eulate ordered them
back. But perhaps most scandalous of all, the governor openly obstructed the
building or repairing of churches and conventos, even threatening to hang the
Indian laborers who refused to quit. With his outrageous bullying, he brought
work on the Santo
Domingo and
San Ildefonso churches to a standstill, but the one they were all talking about
was Pecos. A number of Spaniards had lent Father
Ortega their oxen, presumably in the off season, to help build his grand
church. One such cooperative citizen was diminutive Canary Islander Juan Luján [our ancestor], a resident of
New Mexico since 1600. Eulate accosted him. If he did
not send immediately to Pecos for his oxen, he could count on a fine of
forty fanegas of maize! Ensign Sebastián
Rodríguez [our ancestor], who had
traveled to New Mexico with his wife in the company of Eulate and Father Ortega
back in 1618, also had oxen on the Pecos project, as did Ensign Juan de Tapia.
With them, the governor was even more brutal. If they did not go at once and
bring back their animals from Pecos, "he
would dispose of them and the oxen." When they protested that they had no
horses to ride, Eulate yelled at them "to go on foot and bring in the
whips, the yoke straps, and the yokes on their own backs!" The governor
had made his point. "In order to avoid disputes and strife," Father
Custos Esteban de Perea reluctantly ordered his religious to stop all building.
At Pecos a frustrated Pedro de Ortega complied.
Francisco Gómez occupied every high
office of importance, including that of High Sheriff of the Holy Office of the
Inquisition. [His granddaughter, Francisca Gómez Robledo would one day
marry Don Ignacio Roybal y Torrado,
who also would hold this position.] In
1641, the dying Governor Rosas of New Mexico
appointed him as interim Governor, but Gómez was not accepted by the hostile Cabildo
of native New Mexicans in Santa Fe. [Our uncle, Antonio Baca; our ancestor, Diego
Márquez, et al] Francisco is included in the list of
New
Mexico governors, indicating that he held the office
for a short while in 1641. He was fifty-four at the time. New Mexico
was in a virtual state of war between those who sided with the friars and those
who sided with the civil government. Francisco was seen as belonging to the
latter.
He surely
played a major role in July of 1643 when the new Governor, Alonso Pacheco de
Herédia, had eight captains of the military executed in the plaza for their
roles in condoning the murder of Governor Luis Rosas. The very men who had rejected Francisco as
interim Governor were among those who were beheaded.
Francisco
was an encomendero under the encomienda system of New
Mexico. That
meant that the Indians of his encomienda district would have to pay him
tribute/tax each year with food, labor, or other valuable products. His encomienda encompassed Pecos Pueblo among
others, though he had no claim to the land.
The Pueblos deeply resented
the enriching of high-ranking Spaniards at their expense. It was one of the resentments that led to the
1680 Pueblo Revolt.
Colonial
Spanish society was dominated by a caste system. At the top of the hierarchy
were people who had been born in Europe (called Gauchupines, or, more respectfully, Peninsulares). Most administrative
officials belonged to this group. Next were the Creoles [Criollos], people of pure Spanish descent who had been born in the Americas.
Creoles did not occupy the top administrative posts, but they dominated the
Catholic Church and political bureaucracies, owned land and mines, and were
often encomenderos. Below the Creoles were the mestizos, people of mixed Indian and European descent. At the
bottom of the caste system were the mulattos, Indians and negroes. Mestizos
were considered racially inferior, and although "free," they were
usually without power. In Mexico,
the system was so elaborate that 16 classes of mestizos were distinguished.
New
Mexico, being on the fringe of things, had a more
simplified system. In terms of government, the Spanish system was not at all
democratic. Power was in the hands of European-born Spaniards and the Creoles.
Most of the Spanish colonists in New Mexico
were Creoles or mestizos. From the ancestors that we have been able to identify
so far, several lines succeeded in maintaining a pure European ancestry clear
into the 18th century.
Francisco’s
enemies accused him of secretly practicing Judaism. They claimed he was born a Jew. We have no
evidence of that, though many Jews of an earlier generation had converted to
Catholicism to avoid execution. Genetic studies show that several of our
ancestral lines have Semitic [Jewish or Moorish] origins.
Francisco
was given a royal cedula [document or
bulletin] making him a caballero
hidalgo, the lowest level of Spanish nobility. The
word comes from the Spanish phrase hijo
de algo [son of some worth].
Although all the 1598 colonists had been promised hidalgo
status, Francisco is the only one I know of who actually received it, and he
didn’t arrive in 1598.
Probably
to honor her husband, Ana Robledo was granted a coat of arms after Francisco’s
death. Today tiles bearing this coat of
arms is on the wall of the the Angélico Chávez Library at the Palace of the
Governors in Santa Fe.
Ana Robledo de Gómez spent her last
years living in the Taos
Valley
with the family of her daughter, Francisca
Gómez Robledo, the widow of Pedro Lucero de Godoy. When the Pueblos
planned their Revolt in 1680, the leader was Popé, of the nearby Taos
Pueblo. They attacked the Lucero de
Godoy rancho killing Ana, Francisca, and three daughters of
Francisca. Francisca’s other children were either soldiers or married women who
lived elsewhere. There were more family
members killed, but it is difficult or impossible to identify them.
CHILDREN OF FRANCISCO GOMEZ AND ANA ROBLEDO
[1] Francisco
Gómez Robledo was born about 1631 in Jerez
de los Caballeros, New Mexico. He married Juana López del Castillo [abt. 1640-23 Aug 1734]. He and his wife survived the 1680 Pueblo
Revolt, but Francisco died in 1693 in Guadalupe del Paso and did not
participate in the re-entry to New Mexico
that year. A daughter, Ana María Gómez Robledo, was taken
captive during the Revolt and died in captivity.
After
his father’s death, Francisco was accused by hostile New Mexican friars of being
a crypto Jew and practicing sorcery. He was
imprisoned and had to convince the Inquisition that he did not practice
Judaism. The enmity between New
Mexico’s two factions was deeply venomous. A stripsearch revealed that Francisco was not
circumcised and did not possess the small tail that the diabolic were “known”
to have. His estate was confiscated during his confinement in Mexico
City and sold to pay for his confinement, but he was
able to regain most of it when he was found innocent. He got his offices and his encomiendas back
and continued on with his prominent life, including his role as mayordomo of the religious confraternity
of Nuestra Señora del Rosario [La
Conquistadora]. [Spain in the Southwest, by John L. Kessell, page 116]
We
have this from the website Beyond Origins
of New Mexico Families:
On May 4, 1662, at
Santa Fe, an inventory of the embargoed possessions
of Francisco Gómez Robledo (ONMF: 36) was made as part of his arrest by the Inquisition. This first thing
listed was his house "que cae en
la esquina de la plasa Rl desta villa," indicating that
the house of Francisco Gómez Robledo was right along the
Plaza of Santa Fe at one of the corners. This house consisted of "una sala, tres aposentos, y un patio
conseguerta abaj_ [missing letter(s)] espaldas" ("one living hall/living
room, three rooms, and a patio that was entered from behind"). Among the items embargoed were his personal
papers. According to the list, Gómez Robledo had fourteen appointments ("nombimientos") as Captain and Cabo (Squadron Leader),
two royal "provisiones"
as Sargento Mayor, another
royal "provision" as
Cabo, a "titulo de fiscal de su
magd", and a "merced
de alferez Rl." Of
particular interest are three additional entries. Gómez Robledo held "dos titulos de teniente de govr y capn gl,
and one "merced de titulo de
teniente de govr y capn gl." This
indicates that he was appointed Lieutenant Governor and Captain General,
presumably of New
Mexico,
prior to 1662. The third entry is the most intriguing. It was recorded that
among his personal papers Gómes Robledo had "una informacion de servicios, y en ella una sedula Rl de
cavallero hijodalgo que esta en veinte fojas escritos en todo y tres en blanco"
("a report of services, and among this a royal decree of Caballero Hijodalgo").
Here is an indication that either Francisco Gómez Robledo, or possibly his
father before him, was knighted by the King of Spain, most likely for services rendered in
New Mexico. In either case, it would be extremely
worthwhile for the adventurous researcher who is familiar with the process and
documents of Spain pertaining to petitioning the king for acquiring the title and
privileges of Caballero Hijodalgo to attempt to locate copies of these records.
Perhaps, if such records still survive in some archive in Spain, there may be documents relating to the
lineage of the Gómez and Robledo families.
In addition to the papers mentioned above, a list of the land holdings
and encomiendas of Francisco
Gómez Robledo were made. The land documents that Gómez Robledo had in
possession were:
"El titulo de
encomienda de la mitad del pueblo de Acoma, orto titulo de encomienda de total
del pueblo de Tesuque, mas otro titulo encomienda de dos partes y media del
Pueblo de los Taos; otro titulo de encomienda de todo el Pueblo de Pecos; otro
titulo de encomda de la mitad del Pueblo de Sandia; y de ella
despues trueque por la mitad de Abo - en dho titulo tiene la mersed de la mitad
de xengopau y que son las encomiends que tiene el dho Sargto
Myr Franco Gomes Robledo merced de estancia en el Pueblo de San Juo
otro titulo del arroyo tesuque mersed de estancia en los Taos merced de la
estancia de Barrancas, otro del Pueblo de San Juo que es una legua
mas arriba, y esta sin poblar"
In all, Sargento Mayor Francisco
Gómez Robledo possessed title to all or part of seven encomiendas in New Mexico. In addition, he had held five land grant
titles. In is no surprise that his enemies wanted to see his downfall with the
Inquisition. These enemies stood to profit from the loss of his encomiendas if he was found guilty.
Researcher: José Antonio Esquibel
Source: Archivo General de la Nación, Inquisición, Concurso de Peñalosa,
Tomo I, Leg. 1, no.6, f. 33-34v (microfilm copy located at the
New Mexico Records Center and Archives under the title:
AGN-Inquisition of Mexico, Roll#1, Trial of Bernardo Lopez de
Mendizabal, 1662).
[2] Andrés Gómez Robledo, our
ancestor, was born about 1643 in Santa Fe. Like
his father and his elder brother Francisco, he was a soldier. He married Juana Ortiz, daughter of Diego
Montoya and María Ortiz de Vera.
In 1680 when the Pueblos laid siege to the Spanish settlers who had taken refuge in
Santa Fe, Andrés was the only officer, and one of
just three soldiers killed during the siege.
His grieving wife and children were in the exodus to El Paso after Governor Otermín surrendered the town
of Santa Fe. His
biography is elsewhere in this work.
[3] Francisca Gómez Robledo was born
about 1627 in Santa Fe. She was the second wife of Pedro
Lucero de Godoy [abt. 1600-1663].
They were married 8 April 1641, in Santa Fe. She was active in affairs connected with
the Palace of the Governors in Santa Fe. A widow, she was living at her rancho in
the Taos Valley in August of 1680 when the Taos Pueblos
attacked and killed Francisca, three daughters, and her mother.
[4] Bartolomé Gómez Robledo was named
for his grandfather, Bartolomé Romero. He was born in Santa Fe about 1639.
He was not married. He survived the Pueblo Revolt.
[5] Juan Gómez Robledo was accused of
being a crypto-Jew but was found innocent like his brother Francisco.
[6] José Gómez Robledo was born about
1645 in Santa
Fe; no
information
[7] Ana María Gómez Robledo was born
about 1636 in Santa Fe; no information.
Submitted by Donald Rivara, June 23, 2009.
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