Global InformationAntonio de Benavides information
Antonio de Benavides | |
|---|---|
 | |
| 34th Royal Governor of La Florida | |
| In office 3 August 1718 – 21 May 1734 | |
| Preceded by | Juan de Ayala y Escobar |
| Succeeded by | Francisco del Moral y Sánchez |
| Governor of Veracruz | |
| In office 1734–1745 | |
| Governor of Yucatán | |
| In office 1745–1750 | |
| Preceded by | Manuel Salcedo |
| Succeeded by | Juan José de Clou |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 8 December, 1678 La Matanza de Acentejo, Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain |
| Died | 9 January 1762 (aged 83) Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain |
| Profession | General and Administrator (governor of Florida, Veracruz and Yucatán) |
Antonio Benavides Bazán y Molina (8 December, 1678 – 9 January 1762) was a Lieutenant General in the Spanish Army who held administrative positions in the Americas as Royal Governor of Spanish Florida (1718–1734),[1] Governor of Veracruz (1734–1745),[2][3] Governor and Captain General of Yucatán province (1745 – 1750),[4][5] as well as Governor of Manila in the Philippines (September 1750 – ?).[6] Before his successive appointments to these various positions, he served with distinction in several campaigns of the War of the Spanish Succession in 1710, and perhaps saved the life of Philip V, the first Bourbon King of Spain, at Guadalajara.
During his term of office in Florida, Benavides jailed Juan de Ayala y Escobar, the previous governor, for dealing in contraband, and repelled several attempts by the English to invade Florida by land and sea. He secured the friendship of the neighboring Indian groups who had previously been inimical to the Spaniards, a state of affairs that continued without interruption while he governed the province. He defended the rights of the indigenous people and established the first black militia unit in Florida to defend St. Augustine, the capital of the province, from British attacks. Over the course of his various administrative appointments, Benavides apparently donated most of his income to the poor people of Florida, Yucatan, Veracruz and Santa Cruz de Tenerife in the Canary Islands.
- ^ John Worth. "The Governors of Colonial Florida, 1565-1821". University of West Florida. Archived from the original on 13 September 2015. Retrieved 30 May 2016.
- ^ Francisco A Eissa-Barroso (Fall 2013). ""Having Served in the Troops": The Appointment of Military Officers as Provincial Governors in Early Eighteenth-Century Spanish America, 1700-1746". Colonial Latin American Historical Review. Second. 1 (4): 350. ISSN 1063-5769.
- ^ Juan Francisco Molina Solís (1913). "Gobierno del General D. Antonio de Benavides Bazán y Molina". Historia de Yucatan durante la dominacion española [History of Yucatan During the Spanish Dominion] (in Spanish). Loteria del estado. p. 213.
- ^ Pedro Pérez Zeledón; Chandler Parsons Anderson; Léon Fernandez; Manuel María Peralta (1913). Costa Rica-Panama Arbitration: Historical development of the question. Treaties and international relations. The Paris arbitration. Press of Gibson Bros. p. 475.
- ^ Serapio Baqueiro (1881). Reseña geográfica, histórica y estadística del estado de Yucatan desde los primitivos tiempos de la península. F. Diaz de Leon. p. 57.
- ^ Juan Francisco Molina Solís (1913). "Gobierno del General D. Antonio de Benavides Bazán y Molina". Historia de Yucatan durante la dominacion española [History of Yucatan During the Spanish Dominion] (in Spanish). Loteria del estado. p. 212.