Juan Francisco de la Bodega y Quadra (baptized 3 June 1743 – 26 March 1794) was a Spanish naval officer born in Lima, Peru. Sailing from the Spanish Naval Department base at San Blas, in what now is the Mexican state of Nayarit, from 1774 to 1788 this South American navigator explored the Northwest Coast of North America as far north as Alaska.
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Juan Francisco de la Bodega y Quadra joined the Spanish Naval Academy in Cádiz at 19, and four years later, in 1767 was commissioned as an officer of the rank Frigate Ensign (Alférez de Fragata'). In 1773 he was promoted to Ship Ensign (Alférez de Navío), and in 1774 to Ship Lieutenant.
In 1775 under the command of Lieutenant Bruno de Heceta, the Spanish explored the Pacific Northwest. This followed the first Spanish expedition by Juan Pérez in 1774, who had failed to claim the Northwest Coast for Spain. The expedition consisted of two ships: the Santiago, commanded by Hezeta himself, and the schooner Sonora (La Señora), commanded by his second in command, Lieutenant Juan Francisco de la Bodega y Quadra. Bodega y Quadra was given the lesser position of second officer on the Sonora despite the fact that he outranked the others. Bodega y Quadra had all the training and qualifications necessary to be considered for a senior officer position, but as a non-Spaniard he was subject to the class prejudice common to Spain and the colonial Americas during that time. So he was passed over for promotions.
The Spaniards were given orders to explore the coast and to go ashore so that the newly discovered territories would be recognized as Spanish lands. Most important for the expedition was the identification of Russian settlements. The ships left San Blas on 16 March 1775. Illnesses (scurvy), storms, poor sailing capacities of the Sonora, and other incidents slowed their progress. On 13 July 1775, they reached the vicinity of Point Grenville and Destruction Island in the state of Washington. While searching for a safe place for the ships to anchor, which was one of the duties of the Sonora, Bodega y Quadra sailed over what is now called Sonora Reef. He immediately realized his mistake and signaled the Santiago to not follow. The wind direction and changing tide trapped the Sonora between Sonora Reef and Point Grenville. The Santiago anchored a few miles to the south, in Grenville Bay. The Sonora attracted the attention of a nearby Quinault village. Many Quinault visited the schooner, trading with the crew and giving gifts of food. Early the next day an armed party from the Santiago went ashore and quickly conducted a possession ceremony, which was observed by some Quinaults. Later that morning, Bodega y Quadra decided to sent six sailors ashore to collect water and wood. A large number of Quinaults appeared, attacked, and killed the shore party. Bodega y Quadra was unable to help as the party had taken the schooner's only boat. At noon he weighed anchor, hoping to escape the shoals at high tide. Progress was slow as the wind was low and the crew significantly reduced. Nine large canoes carrying about 30 Quinaults carrying bows and shields followed and came along side the Sonora. They made signs of friendship which Bodega y Quadra rejected. The Quinaults in one of the canoes approached in an attempt to board the Sonora, but once the canoe was in range of the schooner's two swivel guns and three muskets it was fired upon, killing "the greater number of them", according to Bodega's journal. Bodega wanted to avenge his lost sailors was overruled by Heceta, who pointed out the expedition had orders to use force only in self-defense. Quinault ethnologists have come up with theories about the sudden attack, one being that the land-claiming ceremony was understood for what it was. Of particular note was the placement of a large cross on the beach. The Quinault would have understood that the erecting of a tall pole with a crossbar during an obviously religious ritual was a symbolically powerful act.[1]
Shaken by this disaster, and with most of his crew suffering from scurvy, Hezeta decided to return to Mexico, but Bodega y Quadra refused to follow him without having completed the essential mission, which was to locate the Russians. He continued northward on the Sonora and got as far as what is now close to Sitka, Alaska, reaching 59° north latitude on August 15, 1775.[2] Failing to find any Russians, he returned southward. When returning he made sure that he landed once to claim the coast for Spain. This expedition made it clear to the Spanish that the Russians did not have a large presence in the Pacific Northwest.
On February 11, 1779 the corvettes Princesa and Favorita, under the command of Lieutenant Ignacio de Arteaga and his second in command, Lieutenant Bodega y Quadra, left San Blas again. Their mission was to explore the northwest coast, and not to intervene with the assumed English navigators there. They charted every bay and inlet in search of the Northwest Passage, going north to 58°30′ before turning back from Alaska due to bad weather. They completed the complex process begun earlier of claiming the Pacific Northwest for Spain.
The expedition anchored in Port Etches, near Prince William Sound. The harbor was given the name "Puerto de Santiago" on July 23, 1779. The name commemorated Saint James, the patron saint of Spain, whose feast day falls on July 25.[3] While the Spaniards were anchored in Port Etches they performed a formal possession ceremony. All the officers and chaplains went ashore in procession, raised a large cross while cannons and muskets fired salutes. The Te Deum was sung, followed by a litany and prayers. After a sermon was preached a formal deed of possession was drawn up and signed by the officers and chaplains. The title to Puerto de Santiago was important for years afterward, as it formed the basis of Spain's claim to sovereignty in the North Pacific up to 61°17′N.[4]
In 1780 Bodega y Quadra was promoted to Frigate Captain, and in 1785 to Ship Captain, at which time he returned to Spain for a few years.
Quadra was called as an expert witness in the aftermath of the Nootka Crisis[5]. In 1789, he was sent to Mexico, assumed command of the Spanish Northwest, based at San Blas, and sent out several new expeditions of exploration.
In 1791 he was appointed Spanish commissioner to negotiate and administer the implementation of the Nootka Conventions. At Nootka Sound, he welcomed British Captain George Vancouver in August 1792[6]. The two commanders swiftly established friendly relations, including joint explorations and the sharing of supplies and information. Vancouver provided the services of his surgeon, Archibald Menzies, to help Quadra with increasingly serious headaches. During their meetings Bodega y Quadra asked Vancouver to name "some port or Island after us both". Since Vancouver had determined that the land upon which Nootka stood was a great island, he proposed that they name it Quadra's and Vancouver's Island: "would name some port or island after us both in commemoration of our meeting and friendly intercourse that on that occasion had taken place (Vancouver had previously feted Quadra on his ship);....and conceiving no place more eligible than the place of our meeting, I have therefore named this land...The Island of Quadra and Vancouver." It was thus entered upon the explorer's charts, but this name was soon shortened to Vancouver Island.
However, the two commanders were unable to reconcile the conflicts in the instructions from their respective governments. At issue was whether the Spanish were to hand over only the small plot of land actually built upon by the adventurer John Meares, or the entire West Coast, or something in between. It is scarcely contested that Meares had exaggerated the extent of his discoveries. However, Bodega y Quadra in particular was handicapped by uncertainties as to how far his superiors' wished to maintain Spanish sovereignty in a part of the world that had limited strategic value. The two agreed to refer the points at issue back to their respective governments in Madrid and London; Quadra arranged passage for Vancouver's envoy through Mexico. Eventually, Spain and Great Britain signed an agreement on January 11, 1794[7], in which they agreed to abandon the region (the third Nootka Convention).
A fatal seizure cut short Quadra's career while he was in Mexico City.
Names used in the literature:
Places named after:
Places he named:
   | History of Southern Oregon: Pacific Coast -- by A. G. Walling 1884 - History of Southern Oregon: Pacific Coast -- by A. G. Walling 1884 |
| | History Ink: Spanish Exploration (1779) - HistoryLink.org- the Free Online Encyclopedia of Washington State History |
| | The Evacuation of Nootka - Canadian Military Heritage |
| | Spanish Place Names on the Face of Alaska - Spanish Place Names on the Face of Alaska - ExploreNorth |
| | American memory - American Memory from the Library of Congress |
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