Andrew Peterson What Really Made the World go Around?: Indio Contributions to the Acapulco-Manila Galleon Trade ANDREW PETERSON University of Hawaii at Manoa Introduction seventeenth centuries.4 Such numbers have led many The importance of the Manila-Acapulco trade to the world historians—Flynn and Girladez especially—to view silver as a commodity of utmost importance to the early development of the early-modern world economy is modern world economy. For Andre Gunder Frank, sil- undeniable. Many historians, foremost Dennis O. Flynn ver was the catalyst for the formation of a global eco- and Arturo Giráldez, have convincingly argued that the nomic network, and “silver money was the blood that arrival of the first Spanish settlers to the Philippines and the opening of the port of flowed thorough its circula- tory system and oiled the Manila in 1571 marked the wheels of production and inception of a globalized exchange.”5 In short, world economy.1 The trans- “Money went around [the Pacific trade route turned Manila into a center of world] and made the world go round.”6 The galleon global trade in a matter of trade was a vital link in this years. As early as the 1580s global silver exchange, con- the port city of Manila be- necting the rich mines at came a veritable clearing- house for goods from all Potosí and Lima to the silver-hungry markets of over East and Southeast East Asia. Asia. Spices, porcelains, gunpowder, rice, fruits, However, academic works exotic birds, silk, and gold that focus on the broader ornaments flowed through picture of trade, silver, and Manila Bay, as did Spanish, the global economic sig- Malay, Japanese, and Chi- nificance of Manila in the nese merchants.2 However, early modern period leave during the seventeenth cen- many aspects of Spain’s tury, the bulk of trade cen- presence in the Philippines tered around the exchange unexamined. Histories of of Spanish silver for Chinese the galleon trade should A Spanish Galleons in Southeast Asia silks, with as many as thirty to not allow the “silk-for- forty Chinese ocean-going silver” trade to command vessels arriving annually in Manila to trade.3 Though the too much attention, important though it was to the exact figures are impossible to calculate, it is likely that development of the global economy. Spaniards unloaded as much as 2,000,000 pesos (51.12 By looking past the macroeconomics and global tons) of silver at Manila annually in the late sixteenth and ramifications of the galleon trade this paper instead Volume 11, Issue 1, Spring 2011 3 Indio Contributions to the Acapulco-Manila Galleon Trade asks, what made the galleon trade possible in the first tion of Manila in the early seventeenth century at a place? How was Spain able to overcome the tremen- mere 300, and prior to 1700 Spaniards never num- dous logistical obstacles to establish and maintain a bered more than 2,000.8 But to maintain a foothold in foothold on the far side of the Pacific? One must ad- the East Indies required a strong navy, which required dress these questions by surveying the vital contribu- a large workforce. The need for ocean-going vessels tions the native indos of the Philippines made to the was all the more great in the Philippines, an archipel- galleon trade.7 The indios served as the laborers, ship- ago of hundreds of islands. To maintain a fleet as large wrights, mariners, navigators, deckhands, and sol- as Spain needed in the Philippines required thousands diers—often taking on duties the Spanish were either of laborers. After the arduous crossing of the Pacific, a unwilling or unable to fulfill. By the sixteenth century, distance of roughly 9,000 miles, most galleons that the indios’ intimate involvement with the galleon trade survived to reach Manila Bay from New Spain were in extended across the Pacific, with diaspora communities no condition to attempt a return voyage, with their of indio shipwrights, merchants, and runaway crewmen hulls split, swollen, and worm-eaten, and rotten rig- emerging along the coasts of México and California. ging and sails. Galleons looking to make the return While there can be no mistaking the fact that the voyage to Acapulco either faced months of extensive Spanish provided the impetus in inaugurating the renovations, or were scrapped, and any useful materi- als salvaged were put towards the construction of an trans-Pacific trade by setting out across the Mar del entirely new vessel. The , organized through the Sur and establishing a colonial presence at both ends of indios polo labor system imposed by the Spanish, were the the route, one must resist viewing the Acapulco-Manila galleon trade as wholly a Spanish enterprise. Likewise, ones who felled and transported all the timber, manned one must not allow the big picture, in this case the the shipyards, conducted repairs, and built the majority global trade in silver, to overwhelm history. While his- of Spain’s trans-Pacific galleons and inter-island craft. torians such as Frank, Flynn, and Giráldez have a right The practice of utilizing local Southeast Asian labor to draw our attention to the global dimensions of the and craftsmanship to repair Spanish vessels began from Acapulco-Manila trade and its place in the early mod- the start of Spain’s presence in the East Indies and ern world economy, this paper serves as a reminder stemmed from a dire need for manpower. Alvaro de that Spain’s presence in the Philippines and the suc- Saavedra Cerón led the first expedition to bridge the cess of the galleon trade was in many respects depend- Pacific from New Spain, departing from the port of ent upon the often overlooked indios. If silver made the Zihuatanejo on 31 October 1527 with three ships and world go around and the Spanish forged the last (Pa- 115 men.9 The policy of sending ships to the East Indies cific) link in the emergent global network of trade, then from the Pacific coast of New Spain was introduced the indios, who were instrumental in both these devel- after decades of disastrous voyages that departed from opments, deserve far greater attention than has typi- the distant port of Seville. Prior to Saavedra’s depar- cally been given by historians. ture, there had been three expeditions, totaling eleven ships, dispatched from Seville with orders to make for the Moluccas (Magellan’s expedition in 1519, Loaysa’s Indio Shipbuilders in 1525, and Cabot’s in 1526). Of these, only one ship Because of the immense distance and attrition in- with a surviving crew of nineteen men had met with volved in crossing the Pacific, Spaniards in the Philip- success, making it to the East Indies and returning to pines were constantly short of food, supplies, money, Spain. This failure rate is not surprising; voyaging to and manpower throughout much of the sixteenth and the Moluccas from Spain entailed sailing halfway seventeenth centuries. In order to sustain their colony, around the world and back, which was far too great a the Spanish relied upon Chinese traders for imports of distance for a sixteenth century galleon and crew to food and vital supplies, and upon the indios of the Phil- endure. It was from these combined experiences that in ippines to fill an ever-widening labor gap. This labor 1527 Saavedra inaugurated the outbound leg of what gap was a result of the fact that there simply were never was later to become the Acapulco-Manila galleon trade enough Spaniards in the Philippines to maintain the route. colony; some estimates put the total Spanish popula- 4 EXPLORATIONS a graduate student journal of southeast asian studies Andrew Peterson Left: A high seas rescue. Galleons plying Southeast Asia at the close of the 16th century. Unfortunately, the infrastructure, materials, and east Asian labor and materials, which would ultimately skilled craftsmen required to manufacture quality ves- prove decisive in maintaining Spain’s Pacific opera- sels capable of enduring a Pacific crossing were not tions and would carry over to Spain’s colony in the present in México in the 1520s (and would not be until Philippines.13 well into the eighteenth century). As such, Saavedra’s Following Saavedra, it would take two more trans- three small ships, the Florida, the Santiago, and Pacific voyages before Miguel Lopez de Legazpi man- Espíritu Santo, which were sloppily constructed in New aged to establish a permanent Spanish settlement in Spain at the exorbitant cost of 60,000 pesos, were 1565. Equally important, Legzapi successfully dis- literally torn apart in the Pacific. A mere fourteen days patched a ship to New Spain eastward across the Pa- into the voyage the flagship began taking on water to cific. With this done, the eastbound trans-Pacific link the extent that thirty quintales of food rations had to be was established, and Spain’s newly founded colony in 10 thrown overboard to keep the vessel afloat. Pushing the Philippines could be resupplied by roundtrips into on, it was less than a month later when a storm ran the and out of the Pacific ports of México. But as a flourish- Santiago and Espíritu Santo aground somewhere in the ing global trade opened at the port of Manila, almost Marshall Islands, destroying both ships and leaving no every ship the Spanish sent to the Philippines, upon 11 survivors. Once the leaky Florida reached the Moluc- arrival in Manila, was unfit for a return voyage. How cas, a complete overhaul was required if the vessel was then were Spaniards in the Philippines able to over- to have any chance of making the return voyage.