Second attempted Pueblo Revolt

On this day in 1696, the Pueblo people killed five missionaries and twenty-one settlers, as well as burning down a few churches. This revolt was three years after the reconquest of New Mexico by y Diego de Vargas Zapata Lujan Ponce de Leon. This revolt was centered at the Tewa pueblos, the Tano village of San Cristobal, and at San Diego de los Jemez. Although not as successful as the earlier revolt of 1680 which drove the Spanish out of the area for a decade, this rebellion lasted six months. Missionaries records do not identify specific Indian rebel leaders, other than one "El Pinjui" at San Cristobal, and Lucas Naranjo of Cochiti, who was killed at the battle of El Embudo on July 23, 1696. Fray Francisco de Jesus Maria Casanas, one of those killed on June 4, observed in his letter of April 18 that the Indians "find themselves better off with their liberty rather than under the yoke of the evangelical and Catholic law" and that "they still are drawn more by their idolatry and infidelity than by the Christian doctrine...." Thoughtfully and prophetically, he added: "if they do not revolt today, they will tomorrow."