ABSTRACT
In January the Spaniards sent an expedition of 300 men, under the command of the governor's nephew, from Puerto Rico, to destroy the colonists upon the Virgin Islands; and, after a desperate resistance, they succeeded in killing and taking the whole, except eighteen, who escaped to the woods: the Spaniards then burnt and destroyed whatever they could not carry off, and embarked with their commander mortally wounded. When they were gone, the surviving French returned to their smoking habitations, and with some iron utensils made a canoe, in which five of them set off to look for help, and the others followed soon afterwards : they were all taken up by a Spanish bark, treated with great kindness, and carried to Puerto Rico, where the Governor, Don Francisco Maldonado, conceiving them men particularly favoured by God, kindly received them. Two afterwards married and settled on the island, and the others became the first colonists upon the island of St. Martin's.
