What do we really know about Columbus? not much.
It's pretty much established that he was born in Genoa, Italy. He married Felipa Perestrello e Moniz of good family in Lisbon, Portugal. They had a son Diego. Did he walk out on her, taking the 4 or 5 year old Diego with him when he secretly left Portugal for Spain or had she died? We don't know.
He took a peasant woman, Beatriz Enriquez de Arana, as his mistress. In August 1488 she gave birth to their son Ferdinand (called Hernando). Hernando would write his father's biography and provide us with some primary source material.
Queen Isabella financed his expedition. Columbus fully intended to claim the Unchristian lands he found for the King and Queen of Spain, he fully intended to make a profit off his venture. Where did he first land? We don't know for sure.
Near present day Cap Haitien the Santa Maria ran aground and Columbus was forced to leave a garrison (location unknown to us), there among the friendly Tainos. He named the settlement La Navidad, when he returned on his second voyage as promised, the outpost had come to an ugly end.
He then established La Isabela (near the present city of Puerto Plata in the Dominican Republic), the first planned European town in the New World. At this point the Spanish engaged in all out war with the Tainos and other nearby tribes. The Tainos who were not shipped as slaves to Spain found themselves subjugated and required to pay tribute each quarter to the Spanish at La Isabela. When the Indians began to die off from strife, exhaustion, and disease they were replaced with slaves from Africa.
Why is America named after Amerigo Vespucci instead of Columbus? Columbus never accepted the fact that he found a 'New World' he insisted that he had landed in the 'Indies'. Vespucci seems to have been the first to accept that a 'New Continent' had been discovered.
Columbus died May 20, 1506 in Valladolid, Spain. He was probably no more then 55 years old. Where is he buried. We don't know, which seems to be a common refrain when dealing with Columbus.
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