First Mission Period 1566 - 1587
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14. PALICAN or PALICA
This mission designated by Menéndez de Avilés before his return to Spain in 1567 as the site for a blockhouse to he built on an elevation on an island near the Matanzas River five leagues south of St. Augustine. Dogs trained to attack the Indians were to be set loose every night to keep the island clear of natives lest they kill the cattle set loose there. One hundred men were to be detached for this duty. It is not clear whether these orders were executed; for at the start of the seventeenth century there was a mission village named Palica about five leagues from St. Augustine and two from Capuaca. A church was built in the village at about this time. In the post 1706 period the site was occupied by Mocama and by people identified variously as Chachise and Chiluque or Chiluca. Some authorities have considered Chiluque to be a variant of Chalaque (Cherokee). But from the 1720s on Chiluque was the name used for the Mocama.
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REFERENCES Dr. John H. Hann
"Summary Guide to Spanish Florida Missions and Vistas with Churches in the
Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries"
© Copyright. John P. Walsh. April 21, 2002