Bartolome de las Casas, A Very Brief Relation of the Devastation of the Indies by Brandon Calhoun

Bartolome de las Casas (1474-1566) was a Spanish historian and “missionary.” According to Norton Anthology, he is considered to be the “Protector of the Indians.”(p. 39). De Las Casas attended a school called Seville, and there is where he first heard of the discovery of new land and Indians. De Las Casas would see Columbus proudly walking through his city with, according to The Norton Anthology, “Seven Indians who had survive the voyage.” (p. 38). Columbus brought other things as well which slightly influence De Las Casas to be a member of party that will have him partaking in the exploitation of natives.

Once Bartolome  became a priest he convinced himself that all actions that he and other have done to the natives were wrong and does not tie with Christian teachings. He wrote this in one of his books called, History of the Indies. He went on to say, “went about his concerns like the others, sending his share of Indians to work fields and gold mines, taking advantage of them as much as he could.” Once he was labeled “Protector of the Indians” by the government, they gave him permission to find a peaceful colony on the Venezuelan coast. De Las Casas then decided to find solutions to stop the violent acts towards Natives. One of his plans were to, according to a passage in Norton Anthology, “Import Africans to the Indies to replace the enslaved Indians.”  Later he realized he was just as wrong by writing in History of the Indies, “black slavery was as unjust as Indian slavery, and was no remedy at all.”

Bartolome de las Casas is really know for his work called, The Very Brief Relation of the Devastation of the Indies. In this book, he gives the read a very detailed and gruesome story of the voyage in Hispaniola that he and other were apart of in 1502. He went on and discussed things like, raping women, murdering babies, and for the most part burning victims alive. De Las Casas said in the context of Norton Anthology, “They took infants from their mothers’ breasts, snatching them by the legs and pitching them headfirst against the crags or snatched them by the arms and threw them into the rivers, roaring with laughter.” This shows how heartless and cruel he and the others were. He also quoted that, “They laid bets as to who, with one stroke of the sword, could split a man into two. 

Finally what I found most disturbing was his description of them burning the Natives. They wrapped them in straw and set them on fire and watch their souls leave their bodies.  De Las Casas also recalls the screams from the victims from being burned and the reaction of the captain’s request. The captain could not sleep because of the screams so according to De Las Casas, “he ordered (the constable) them to be strangled.” Instead of struggling they, “put a stick over the victim’s tongues, so they could not make a sound, and he stirred up the fire, but not too uh, so that they roasted slowly, as he like.

I strongly believe his works, especially this one, is important because you can see the transition of his thought process of the whole act of dehumanizing Natives. Reading his works, you can see he is a person who is repenting for his previous acts and it is not what God wanted. Tis was rare because most Christians in that time claimed they were doing “God’s Will.” He took a step back by thinking of replacing Indians with Africans but realized that was just as wrong. His works can even be used todays time for what is going on now. Especially with the Native Americans now. Currently in South Dakota there is a crisis involving Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and Dakota Access Pipeline. According to an article about the pipeline with the Washington Post, “that runs through North and South Dakota, Iowa, and Illinois, and has a capacity to transport more than 500,000 barrels of oil a day.” It was approved to cross under the Missouri River just a mile north of the reservation. This will affect their source of water and ruin grave sites of their ancestors. Security of the DAPL recently released vicious dogs on the protestors. This relates to De Las Casas because in his book, he also mentioned their use of dogs towards Natives. De Las Casas states, “Pursed them with the fierce dogs they kept which attacked the Indians, tearing them to pieces and devouring them.”

Bartolome de las Casas also made this document personal because he shared pin point details about the cruel actions he witness while on his voyage. You can tell that he felt guilty about because after he then changed and decided to protect them. He also didn’t use the term savage or out of their names, he called them Natives. That meant a lot because other would just called them out their names disrespectfully. I personally felt as though he left out if he actually did the actions or he just watched and allowed it to happen.