Diego de Almagro

Biography

A foundling abandoned on a church step in Almagro, he rose to become Pizarro's partner in the enterprise of Peru — the man who raised the money, the ships, and the men while Pizarro marched. The partnership held through two failed expeditions and the terrible years on the mangrove coast, but it was poisoned from the moment Pizarro's envoy returned from Spain in 1529 with a royal contract that gave Pizarro the governorship and Almagro almost nothing. He arrived at Cajamarca after Atahualpa's capture, and his men were cut out of the ransom. He fought his way to Cuzco, rescued de Soto's cavalry at Vilcaconga, then took an expedition south into Chile in 1535 looking for an empire of his own — a two-year march of appalling suffering across the Atacama and the high Andes that found nothing. He returned to find Cuzco in revolt, seized the city for himself, and the conquistadors turned on each other. Pizarro's brothers beat him at Las Salinas in 1538 and had him garrotted in the city he had helped take. Three years later his son's supporters murdered Pizarro in revenge.

Key Battles