The Villasur Expedition, 1720

This fight is the earliest known pictured event in what is now Nebraska. A hide painting known as Segesser II records the Pawnee and Otoe attack on Villasur's camp at the confluence of the Loup and Platte. Its date is unknown, but it goes back at least to the mid-1700s. The New Mexico History Museum in Santa Fe holds the faded original and believes it is the work of several indigenous New Mexican artists who had eyewitness descriptions. Nebraska State Historical Society artist Curt Peacock later painted a replica on cowhide in its natural-dye colors.

What the plaque says

The Villasur Expedition, 1720 In June 1720 a Spanish military force led by Sir Pedro de Villasur left Santa Fe, New Mexico, to gather information on French activities near the Mis- souri River. The force included 45 soldiers, 60 Pueblo Indian allies, some Apache scouts, and a priest. Indian trader Juan L'Archeveque and José Naranjo, a black explorer who had reconnoitered Nebraska's Platte River, accompanied the expedition. Near present Schuyler, Nebraska, Villasur's com- mand met large numbers of Pawnee and Oto Indians who were allies of the French. The Spanish withdrew to approximately this area and camped. The next morning, August 14, 1720, the Indians attacked. Within minutes Villasur, L'Archeveque, Naranjo, 31 soldiers, 11 Pueblo Indians, and the priest lay dead. The survivors fled across the prairie and reached Santa Fe September 6. Spanish losses were the great- est suffered by Europeans in any battle with Indians on Nebraska soil. The Villasur Expedition was the deepest Spanish penetration of the Great Plains until the 1790s, when Spanish fur traders ascended the Missouri River. After 1720 no Spanish military force reached Nebraska until the 1806 Melgares Expedition visited the Pawnee Village on the Republican River. Nebraska State Historical Society

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Genoa U.S. Indian School Museum — 18 mi
  The surviving trades building of a federal boarding school that ran from 1884 to 1934 on the Pawnee Nation's last Nebraska land, where at least 86 children died and the cemetery is still lost.

More markers nearby

• The North Brothers — steps away
• Andrew Jackson Higgins — 0.3 mi
• Frank Zybach - Inventor of Center-Pivot Irrigation Machine — 1.6 mi
• Agricultural Park — 1.7 mi