Cancer de Barbastro, Luis

CANCER de BARBASTRO, LUIS. - One of the most illustrious and faithful collaborators of Las Casas (v.), b. at Barbastro in Aragon (date unknown) and d. at Tampa Bay (Florida) in 1549, killed by the natives. With Las Casas he was in Peru and then in Guatemala, and with him he returned to Spain in 1539 to obtain new fellow missionary brethren. In 1546 he took part in the conference of theologians assembled in Mexico by the visitor Tello de Sandoval for the study of the Indian question; the following year he traveled again to Spain, where he obtained permission to undertake the mission of Florida, adopting the method suggested by Las Casas. But, having returned to America (1549) with five other brethren, on the coasts of Florida, betrayed by the interpreter, he was killed together with all of them. He left, in manuscript: Varias copias, versos y himnos en lengua de Caban. Vera paz sobra los misterios para uso de los Neófitos de la dicha provincia. Many of his letters to Las Casas are published in the Collección de documentos inéditos (Madrid 1807).