The author of this biography of Don García Hurtado de Mendoza, the fourth Marquis of Cañete, who served as the second Governor of Chile (1557-1561) and later as Viceroy of Peru (1589-1596), has set a dual task for himself: to rescue his subject’s reputation both from certain of the contemporary chroniclers, and from the criticisms of modern Chilean historians. Lawyer-historian Campos Harriet has authored several studies of colonial Chile, and his stated hope is to offset the negative influence which older interpretations of Don García have had on modern Chilean historiography.
The House of Mendoza, which produced thirteen Spanish viceroys, is a subject not without historical importance. Don García’s father, the third Marquis of Cañete, served as Viceroy of Peru, and in 1557, following the death of Pedro de Valdivia, named his son to the governorship of Chile at the age of twenty-two. That year Don García began the crucial task of extending Spanish domination south and east of the Bío-Bío River into the territories occupied by the fierce Araucanian Indians. Pushing southward, he captured the Indian cacique Caupolicán, repopulated the forts and townships between Concepción and Osorno, which he founded, and ordered the exploration of the Chiloé archipelago. By 1560 he had extended Spanish mle in Chile eastward to the transandean province of Tucumán and had authorized the founding of the town of Mendoza. Frequently cruel, to Indians and whites alike, Don García redistributed Indian lands, often taking them from white settlers and granting them to his own soldiers. Although Chile was still unpacified following his departure in 1561, Don García more than anyone else consolidated the conquest of Chile, and helped to place Spain firmly in control of “The Long Land.”
Campos Harriet contends that Don García’s earlier biographer, Crescente Errázuriz, the former Archbishop of Santiago, treated his subject unfairly by restricting his study only to Don García’s tenure in Chile, and completely neglecting his services to the King in Europe and Peru later on. He rectifies this slight by continuing his own study up to Don García’s death in Spain in 1609. Moreover, Campos Harriet charges that Errázuriz’ use of documents concerning Don García’s residencia in 1562, following his recall from Chile by King Phillip II, unfairly condemns the governor, since it omits Don García’s defense and supportive documents which were later destroyed by fire. He points to the fact that Don García was subsequently appointed Viceroy of Peru by Phillip in 1588 as proof that the Crown had absolved him of any charges of misconduct raised during the residencia.
Insofar as Campos Harriett rounds out the picture of Don García, both as a warrior in Chile and as a capable administrator in Peru, he does history a service. The basic flaw in his approach is that in trying to rescue his subject’s reputation, he avoids unfavorable views of him and thereby distorts his true character. For example, he draws heavily upon the opinions of contemporary chroniclers Suárez de Figueroa and Tristán Sánchez, both of whom were fierce apologists for the governor. Similarly, he seeks to offset the negative influence of Don Alonso de Ercilla y Zuñiga, author of La Araucana, which hardly mentions Don García, by citing persons such as Pedro de Oña, whom Don García commissioned to write an “official” version of the conquest of Chile, and Lope de Vega, who dedicated a play to Don García’s son. Oña’s work has been termed “ridiculous” by Chilean historian Luis Galdames (History of Chile, Chapel Hill: 1941, p. 84). Elsewhere, Campos Harriet praises Don García as a humanitarian for executing the measures of his legal adviser Hernando de Santillán which abolished personal service on behalf of the Indians, failing to note that the measure was never carried out due to encomendero opposition. In still another place, he moralizes about Don García’s execution of the Indians, calling it nothing in comparison to the Nazi execution of the Jews.
In short, by trying to present a more favorable view of his subject, Campos Harriet fails to give us increased historical access, either to the man or to the extraordinary times in which he lived.