During his years in
Mexico, Luna had served with
Francisco Vásquez de Coronado on his expedition to the
Seven Cities of Cíbola and crushed an
Indian rebellion in
Oaxaca. Luna was chosen by
Luís de Velasco,
Viceroy of New Spain (Mexico), to establish a settlement on the
Gulf Coast of what is now the United States, The party anchored in Pensacola Bay (known as "Ochuse" since the expeditions of Francisco Maldonado during the 1539–1543 expedition of
Hernando de Soto) and set up the settlement called Santa María de Ochuse during late August and September 1559. Luna dispatched the factor Luis Daza with a
galleon back to
Vera Cruz to announce his safe arrival, and plan for resupplying the site. He fitted two other vessels to sail to Spain, awaiting the return of two exploring parties. With much of the colony's stores waiting on the ships, Luna sent several exploring parties inland to scout the area; they returned after three weeks having found only one Indian town. Before they could unload the vessels, on the night of September 19, 1559, Back in Mexico, the Viceroy sent two relief ships in November, promising additional aid in the spring. UWF archaeologists identified a roughly 13–15 ha site as Tristán de Luna y Arellano's 1559–1561 settlement Santa María de Ochuse, making it the largest mid-16th-century Spanish site in the Southeast and the earliest multi-year European settlement in the entire United States. ==References==