Alonso de Mendoza

Alonso de Mendoza
Born	c. 1471 or 1476 Garrovillas de Alconétar, Spain
Died	June 26, 1549 Tipuani, Bolivia
Nationality	Spaniard

Alonso de Mendoza (Garrovillas de Alconétar, Spain), c. 1471–1476 – Tipuani, Bolivia, 1549) was a Spanish captain, conquistador, and the founder of the city of Nuestra Señora de La Paz, current capital city of Bolivia. He was appointed by Pedro de la Gasca, the "Peacemaker," to found the city to commemorate the peace in the Peruvian colonies after the defeat of the Pizarro brothers.

Alonso de Mendoza was born between 1471 and 1476 in Garrovillas de Alconétar (Cáceres, Spain). He left the peninsula attracted by the news about the wealth of the New World, and by the Adventures of Pizarro and Almagro, who had conquered the Inca empire.

Alonso de Mendoza fought as a soldier in Germany and Italy before moving to the New World. It is believed that he settled in Cuba when Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar was the governor, as the name of one Alonso de Mendoza appears in a document signed in Guanuco and dated 1520. Then he appears in Mexico serving under Hernán Cortés, and in San Sebastián del Puerto, from where he was later banished, accused of being an agitator.

Later Alonso de Mendoza moved to Peru, where his natural intelligence, people skills, and personal charm opened the doors of the headquarters of Pizarro, then at war with his partner Diego de Almagro. He fought in the battle of Las Salinas, against Almagro himself, and in the battle of Chupas, where "Diego, the Younger" died in action. After these actions, he was appointed governor of Chuquisaca. During the turbulent years of Gonzalo Pizarro's rebellion against king Charles V of Spain, he seems to have acted on both sides. By the end of the rebellion he was serving under Francisco de Carvajal, the "Demon of the Andes", who made him Captain and gave him different missions in a long campaign against the royalist Diego de Centeno.

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