WHO KILLED THE GOVERNOR?

The story which follows appears in History of the Catholic Church in Jamaica by Francis J. Osborne.  It involves two people, Captain Blas de Figueroa and his son, the vicar general, Duarte Figueroa, and is set in Jamaica in 1650.  It end with the father and the son being deported from Jamaica to Cuba.

The great, great, great, great grandfather of Perucho Figueredo was Captain Blas Figueredo, who was born in about 1600 in Jamaica, was captain of infantry in the militia, and had a son called Duardo Figueredo, who was vicar general of Jamaica.  They left Jamaica for Cuba in the mid 1600s.

I can’t prove that Blas de Figueroa and Duarte Figueroa are the same father and son as Blas Figueredo and Duardo Figueredo, but the similarities of their names, that they were father and son, that, in both cases, the father was a captain and the son the vicar general of Jamaica, that in both cases the events happened in the mid 1600s, and that both Blas Figueroa and Blas Figueredo went from Jamaica to Cuba - make a pretty convincing case.

In May 1649, Don Pedro Caballero, the governor of Jamaica, had a disagreement with the abbot of Jamaica.  At issue was a bed which Caballero demanded be erected in the sanctuary of the church, next to the altar, on the occasion of the baptism of his new-born son.  The abbot refused his demand.

Caballero was a person unwilling to take no for an answer.  He hurried to the abbot's residence, burst in on the prelate, and tried to press home his point.  With deadly temper mounting at each refusal, Caballero broke into abusive language, hurling choice epithets at the resolute abbot.  Failing the abbot's consent, the governor now tried to persuade the vicar general to grant permission for the arrangement.  He too refused.  At this refusal, the governor went beyond himself as a gentleman and physically attacked the vicar general.  Caballero was almost immediately excommunicated by the church and the next month was replaced as governor of Jamaica.

Some eight months later, on January 1, 1650, Caballero decided to make an effort to persuade the abbot to remove the excommunication and walked to the abbot’s residence.  The abbot was celebrating mass and Caballero sat on the patio to await his return.

A servant of the abbot saw Caballero and wrongly assumed that he was waiting there to murder his master.  He ran to a nearby building where the town council was meeting and screamed that Caballero was waiting at the abbot’s house to murder him.  The assembly rose in alarm and the new governor, Sedeno, gathered a group of soldiers, under Captain Blas de Figueroa.  They all ran quickly to the abbot’s house.

Seated quietly in the abbot's patio, Caballero was most surprised when the troop of highly excited men burst in.  Sedeno opened with a barrage of questions, but then changed his tactics and accused Caballero of lying in wait to lay violent hands on the abbot.  More words followed, and the unjustly accused Caballero leaped to his feet in a threatening manner.  Suddenly Captain Figueroa stepped behind him and plunged his sword into the heart of the former governor.  Caballero slumped to the floor.  Here was murder before their very eyes; some acceptable explanation approximating the truth had to be made.

The story was put about that when the governor, Sedeno, had asked Caballero why he was waiting for the abbot, Caballero had risen from his chair and struck a blow at Sedeno.  Caballero, it was said,  then attempted to draw his sword but as he drew it from its scabbard it fell to the floor and Caballero stumbled and fell onto the blade, accidentally killing himself.

Some may have believed the story, but not Dona Teresa de Guzmán Caballero, the wife of Caballero.  She petitioned for an inquiry into the death and on June 8, 1650, an investigation began in Santiago de la Vega.

Three days later, the new governor, Sedeno was arrested and was hustled off and bound in chains.  Two days later, he was placed in a cart and carried to Port Caguay where he was locked in a narrow cell on board a ship in the harbor.

On August 16, 1650, as Sedeno was being transferred from his cabin to the quarter deck, he saw the old abbot being brought on board; he too was under arrest.  His clothes were dirty, his person unkempt.  Two fellow prisoners were with him - the vicar general, Don Duarte Figueroa, and his father, Captain Blas de Figueroa.   Sailors placed mattresses in boxes for the abbot and the other prisoners, who all slept on the open deck.

They sailed across the Caribbean and arrived in Cartagena, in Cuba, on August 27, 1650.  On the following night the officials of the Holy Office of the Inquisition took them into custody and lodged them in the common jail.  The abbot was placed in the monastery of St. Dominic, while his vicar general had to be content with the bleak walls in the tower of the parish church.

That’s the story.  What do YOU think?