Was Hernando de Soto evil or good?

Answer 1

Hernando De Soto was a villain. He was cruel and barbaric, forced his religion on native people, spread diseases to native people, and in the end he did no good because he was just greedy and unsuccessful. He is not a hero, unless a hero is someone who commits numerous homicides.

According to americanjourneys.org, Hernando De Soto and his men turned slaying natives into a game. He was a cruel man with no compassion for others. Though the natives were mostly kind to him he killed them and stole from them. He burned many innocent Indian villages. If someone disobeyed him he threw them to the dogs. De Soto brought war with him wherever he went.

Most of the fighting was due to his mission to spread the catholic faith. Hernando De Soto would speak to the Indians in HIS native tongue (Spanish), and the natives would not understand him. Because the natives did not comply to all his wishes he killed them and burned them to the ground. History.com states that "Spaniard killed hundreds of Indians and suffered casualties themselves." There were many bloody battles over religion, but bloody warfare was not the only thing that killed natives.

The greatest conquistadors of the New World were smallpox and influenza-not to mention typhoid, cholera, tuberculosis, measles, scarlet fever, yellow fever, and malaria. The native people lacked immunity to the diseases the conquistadors carried with them, so they spread more easily and were more deadly in the new world. Hernando De Soto's pigs and livestock were some of the main carriers of the diseases. When the epidemics struck, whole communities could be wiped out in a matter of days. So many people died for nothing in De Soto's expedition to America. He was blinded by greed.

All in all, Des Soto was just a greedy, unsuccessful man. He was a greedy and did a lot of bad in his life; he captured the Inca king, Atahualpa, and despite the huge ransom of gold paid to him, he executed Atahualpa. De Soto came back a wealthy (and undeserving) man. In the related link, it states that Hernando De Soto spent 4 years in America searching for gold and silver, but to no avail. He never found any gold.

Hernando De Soto failed in his mission top bring back gold from the New World, despite the bloodshed and disease. He died on a greedy quest for more gold, and was washed away down the Mississippi along with his hostility and brutality.

Answer 2

yes and no he was just a regular person who came from a family that just wanted him to become a lawyer but he found out is brother was going to get everything the family left for him and so he decided to go on a exploraton, from them on he did great things for hemselfand others.