| Juan Garrido | |
| Birth Place: | West Africa |
| Death Place: | New Spain, Spanish Empire |
| Employer: | Hernan Cortés |
| Occupation: | Conquistador |
Juan Garrido (c. 1480 – c. 1550) was an Afro-Spaniard conquistador known as the first documented black person in what would become the United States. Born in West Africa, he went to Portugal as a young man. In converting to Catholicism, he chose the Spanish name Juan Garrido.
Juan Garrido joined a Spanish expedition and arrived in Santo Domingo (Hispaniola) about 1502. He participated in the conquest of present-day Puerto Rico and Cuba in 1508. In 1513, as part of Juan Ponce de León's entourage in search of gold, the expedition landed in Florida. He is the first known African to arrive in North America.[1] By 1519, he had joined Cortes's forces and invaded present-day Mexico, participating in the siege of Tenochtitlan. He married and settled in Mexico City, where he was the first known farmer to have sowed wheat in America. He continued to serve with Spanish forces for more than 30 years, including expeditions to western Mexico and to the Pacific.[2]
Other black conquistadors included Estevanico, Juan de Villanueva, Beatriz de Palacios, Juan Valiente, Juan Beltrán, Pedro Fulupo, Juan Bardales and Antonio Pérez.
Garrido was born in West Africa[3] in about 1480,[4] and came to Portugal as a youth. When baptized, he took the name Juan Garrido. He went to Seville, where he joined an expedition to the New World, possibly traveling in assistance to Pedro Garrido's.
Arriving in Santo Domingo in 1502 or 1503, Garrido was among the earliest Africans to reach the Americas. He was one of numerous Africans or possibly a "freedman" who had joined expeditions from Seville to the Americas.[5] From the beginning of Spanish presence in the Americas, Africans participated as voluntary expeditionaries, conquistadors, and auxiliaries.[6]
By 1519, Garrido participated in the expedition led by Hernán Cortés to Mexico, where they lay siege to Tenochtitlan. In 1520, he built a chapel to commemorate the many Spanish killed in battle that year by the Aztecs. It now stands as the Church of San Hipólito.Garrido married and settled in Mexico City, where he and his wife had three children. Restall (2000) credits him with the first harvesting of wheat planted in New Spain.
Garrido and other blacks were also part of expeditions to Michoacán in the 1520s. Nuño de Guzmán swept through that region in 1529–30 with the aid of black auxiliaries.[7] [8]
In 1538, hoping for some rewards or benefits for his 30 years of service as a conquistador, Garrido provided following testimony to the King of Spain, requesting a royal pension:
Garrido's letter had the desired effect as he was compensated for his services with land and money.