Marcelo Mojica Cruz, Salvador Hernida Tiborcio, and Hugo Garcia Pacheco

This interview was taped on December 20, 2004, in Alvarado. On enslavement in Veracruz, we suggest that the reader consult Patrick J. Carroll's Blacks in Colonial Veracruz, his article "Mandinga . . . .," and other texts, such as those by Adriana Naveda Chávez-Hita, Gonzalo Aguirre Beltrán ("Slave Trade in Mexico"), Gerald Cardoso, and others in the bibliography that ends this special section.

ROWELL: Could you describe the beginnings of what you know about the history of Alvarado?

CRUZ: It is believed that Alvarado was founded in 1600, after the battle of Lepanto in Spain. Don Juan of Austria was a devotee of the Virgin of the Rosary. He wanted to give his soldiers something. Since he could not give them money, he gave them land in the Americas. After sending them to the battle of Lepanto, they come here to establish Alvarado. Sure there were already indigenous settlements here, we have proof of this. Archeologists have found artisan objects that show they did exist. What's more is that they have found a star on a clay artifact with Mayan influences. Also a five-ton rock was found. Sincerely, the founding of Alvarado began in 1600, when the Spanish thought that this zone was rich in fish. Alvarado has large fish of distinct species. As a result they settled here. Since the Spanish were devoted to the Virgin of the Rosary, they founded their church here and she became the head of the church. Why? Because Don Juan de Austria was said to have fought the battle of Lepanto with a rosary in his hand. His dedication to the Virgin helped him win the battle against the Moors. This is why it is believed that Alvarado emerged in 1600. Although Grijalvo passed through here in 1518, during an excursion with Pedro de Alvarado, but it wasn't until 1600 when the population began to grow with European blood.

ROWELL: Is there any particular meaning in the name itself, in the name Alvarado?

CRUZ: Alvarado was named Atlizíntla before it became Alvarado. The word is of the Nahuatl language and means "abundant water." If we were to ride a helicopter, we could see that Alvarado is a peninsula, totally surrounded by water. There is the Gulf of Mexico, and the lagoon that is formed by the Blanco and Papaloapan Rivers and other streams. Alvarado has an extraordinary geography; it is an area of lagoons. Like this young man Alonso said, Alvarado is a medal. Before it was named Atlizíntla, which said precisely that, place of abundant water. Since Pedro de Alvarado was the first to be more interested in the Papaloapan, he changed the name during colonization. Instead of calling it the Papaloapan River, he renamed it the Alvarado River because Pedro de Alvarado discovered it on his excursion. As time passed though, the river became known as the Papaloapan again and Alvarado has the name for Pedro de Alvarado. The town's official name is San Cristobal de Alvarado.

JONES: Is Pedro Spanish?

CRUZ: He was Spanish; he was the lieutenant for Grijalva and then Cortez.

ROWELL: When were the Africans as slaves introduced into Alvarado?

CRUZ: They arrived when the Spanish began to form the sugar mills in Tuxla. When the first factories and many sectors of sugarcane were established, the Spanish started bringing African slaves to work in the mills. Sometime after they arrived, blacks began to mix with other people here in Mexico. But we still have some Negroid features. Yanga was a black man and a leader of black people. He united them and fought with them. The black race arrived here when the first sugar mill factories were created. This is how they came.

ROWELL: Why did the Spanish enslave Africans and bring them here to Mexico?

CRUZ: To cut sugarcane, but the techniques...