Juan de Silva
| Juan de Silva | |
|---|---|
| 14th Governor-General of the Philippines | |
|
In office April 1609 – April 19, 1616 |
|
| Monarch | Philip III of Spain |
| Preceded by | Rodrigo de Vivero y Aberrucia |
| Succeeded by | Andrés Alcaraz |
| Personal details | |
| Died | April 19, 1616 |
Juan de Silva (died April 19, 1616, Malacca) was a Spanish military commander and governor of the Philippines, from April 1609 until his death on April 19, 1616.
De Silva was a native of Trujillo, Spain, and a knight of the Order of Santiago. He arrived in the Philippines as governor and captain general at Easter, 1609, bring with him five companies of reinforcements for the Spanish military in the colony. He developed a reputation for bravery and determination in his fight with the Dutch in the Far East.
On December 22, 1607 a Dutch fleet of the Company of the East Indies set sail from Texel to attack the Portuguese fleet and forts in the East. The fleet consisted of 13 vessels, 225 artillery pieces and more than 2,800 men. It was under the command of Admiral Pierre Willemsz., with François de Wittert as vice-admiral. The fleet fought with the Portuguese in Mozambique, Sumatra and Johore before building a fort at Near, in the Banda Islands (present-day Indonesia). Here on May 22, 1609 the admiral and some of his officers were killed in an attack by the natives, and Wittert assumed command.
Thereafter Wittert sailed to Manila to attack the Spanish there. (Spain and Portugal were ruled by the same king, Philip III of Spain (Philip II of Portugal), and thus were allies.) Wittert besieged Manila for five months, beginning in 1609. However, on April 24 or April 25, 1610, while supervising the unloading of junks, Wittert was surprised by at least 12 Spanish ships. His flagship, the Amsterdam, was captured after a lengthy fight, and the admiral was killed. Two ships apparently escaped, but the Spanish killed at least 85 Dutch and took 120 or more prisoners.
Also during the first part of Governor de Silva's term, the fourth archbishop of Manila, Diego Vazquez de Mercado, arrived there (June 4, 1610).
De Silva sent an unsuccessful expedition against the Dutch in the Moluccas in 1611, although the expedition did take Sabougo on Gilolo and establish a fort there. De Silva intended to secure Portuguese help to expel the Dutch from the area once and for all. To this end in 1612 he dispatched the former governor of Ternate, Cristobal de Azcueta to Portuguese India to make plans with the viceroy there for a joint assault. However Azcueta and the entire expedition were lost in a shipwreck between Manila and Macao.
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