In the two years following the founding of St. Augustine, Pedro Menendez had established seven settlements along Florida's east and west coasts. He returned to Spain a hero. His grateful king created for him the title Captain General of the West and named him Governor of Cuba.

    Further exploration and settlement of the vast new world awaited him, but holding the areas he had settled, and administering at Havana, also demanded attention. Within a year of his return to Spain, four of his seven settlements had been destroyed by hostile Indians and French corsairs, and promised supplies and troops were not reaching the other beleaguered settlements. Funds promised to Menendez were not forthcoming, and he spent what wealth he had accumulated supporting the Florida garrisons.

   In 1573, King Phillip announced Menendez would become Captain General of a massive armada to put down the English fleet. Menendez exhausted himself organizing the armada, and his heart was breaking as the work he had done in Florida was disintegrating.

   September 7, 1574, nine years shy a day of his founding of St. Augustine, amid more pomp and ceremony, Menendez was given charge of Spain's greatest armada: One hundred and fifty ships and twelve thousand troops.

   Ten days later, at the armada harbor of Santander near his birthplace of Aviles, Pedro Menendez de Aviles y Alonso de la Campa died. He was 55 years old.

   Inscribed on his monument in his hometown of Aviles:

   Here lies buried the illustrious Captain Pedro Menendez de Avilés, a native of this City, Adelantado of the Province of Florida, Knight Commander of Santa Cruz, of the Order of Santiago, and Captain General of the Oceanic Seas, and of the Armada which his Royal Highness collected at Santander in the year 1574, where he died on the 17th of September, of that year, in the fifty-fifth year of his age.

   Menéndez' original headboard and casket are now in the Mission of Nombre de Dios museum - the only tangible artifacts related to Menéndez outside of Spain. They were given to St. Augustine when Menéndez' remains were transferred to a tomb at San Nicholas Catholic Church in Avilés in 1924.

   Image: Menendez monument in Parque del Muelle at Aviles, Spain. A replica stands in front of St. Augustine's city hall.