Gómez de Alvarado y Contreras

Gómez de Alvarado y Contreras (; 1482 – September 1542) was a Spanish conquistador and explorer. He was a member of the Alvarado family and the older brother of the famous conquistador Pedro de Alvarado.

Alvarado participated in the Spanish colonization of the Americas beginning in 1510. He held the rank of captain of the cavalry and served in the Spanish campaigns against the Aztec Empire, the Maya in Guatemala and El Salvador, and the Inca Empire. He founded the Peruvian city of Huánuco in 1539 and died of an illness shortly following the Battle of Chupas in 1542.

Early life and family

Gómez de Alvarado y Contreras was born in 1482 in Badajoz, Extremadura, Crown of Castile. He was a member of the Alvarado family, a notable Spanish family of conquistadors. His parents were Gómez de Alvarado y Mexía de Sandoval and Leonor Contreras Carvajal y Gutiérrez. His siblings were Jorge (b. 1460), Pedro (b. 1485), Sarra (b. 1485), Juan (b. 1490), and Gonzalo (b. 1490). Alvarado married Bernardina de Frias and fathered two children: Isabel and Ana.

Campaigns in New Spain

Alvarado left Extremadura for Spanish America in 1510 with his brothers Jorge, Pedro, and Gonzalo, their uncle Diego de Alvarado y Mexía de Sandoval, and their cousins Hernando, Diego, and Gonzalo. They served under Hernán Cortés during the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire. Pedro was known for his cruelness and ruthlessness during his conquest of Guatemala, and the same attributes were shared by his brothers, including Gómez. Atrocities, such as massacres, looting, village burning, rapes, and kidnapping indigenous people for slave labor, were commonly committed by their men.

By the end of 1524, Pedro, Jorge, and Gómez began the conquest of Cuzcatlan in modern-day El Salvador. In the Battle of Tacuzcalco, Alvarado commanded twenty cavalrymen against the left flank of the indigenous army under Atlácatl. During the conquest, the city of San Salvador was founded on 1 April 1525 at the current site of Ciudad Vieja with Diego de Holguín as the city's first mayor. The city was refounded on 1 April 1528 at its modern-day location and , Alvarado's nephew, became its mayor.

Campaigns in Peru

In 1532, Pedro left New Spain to join Francisco Pizarro in the conquest of the Inca Empire and Gómez joined him in 1534 after serving as mayor of San Salvador from 1532 until 1534. Alvarado served under Diego de Almagro in an expedition to Chile.

When civil war erupted between forces under Pizarro and Almagro in 1537, Alvarado sided with Almargo under the banner of Nueva Toledo against Pizarro's Nueva Castile. He refused to surrender his sword to a Spaniard, and instead gave it to an African slave. The city was abandoned and refounded in 1541 and later received the title of "Very Noble and Very Loyal" by the Spanish Emperor Carlos I in 1543. The assassination sparked a second civil war where Cristóbal Vaca de Castro sought to regain full control of Spanish Peru from Almagro who also sought to control the territory. The armies of Almagro and Vaca de Castro engaged at the Battle of Chupas with Alvarado serving under Almagro. The Almagrists were defeated in battle; Almagro fled but was later captured and executed, suffering the fate of many other captured Almagrists who were hanged by Vaca de Castro's forces.

Alvarado evaded capture by Vaca de Castro following the battle, but he was taken ill with a fever shortly after the battle. His health deteriorated and he died a few days after the battle in September 1542 in the town of Vilcashuamán. His body was transferred to Huamanga and he was buried in the local parish. Since his death, Alvarado has been confused with another Gómez de Alvarado, who is nicknamed "el Mozo," to distinguish him from Alvarado who is nicknamed "el Viejo."