acting as captain-general. On the 1st of December the marqués de Sonora, ministro universal de Indias, was officially apprised of these occurrences, and of the fact that the commissions issued by the late viceroy had all been endorsed by the present ruler. The audiencia on the same day petitioned the king to extend to the widow and her children the utmost liberality consistent with the condition of the royal treasury. To the chief secretary of state, conde de Floridablanca, a despatch was addressed, to be forwarded post-haste from Coruña, with the object of preparing the marqués de Sonora to hear of his nephew's death.[1]
December 12th at 1:15 in the night, the vicereine gave birth to a girl, who was christened on the 19th and given the names of María de Guadalupe, Bernarda, Felipa de Jesus, Isabel, Juana Nepomucena, and Felícitas, to which was added afterward that of Fernanda, as a compliment to one of the sponsors. The sponsors were the 'nobilísima ciudad de Mexico,' represented by the corregidor Colonel Francisco Crespo, a knight of Santiago, and Josefa Villanueva, wife of the senior oidor, José Angel de Aguirre. The godfather at the confirmation was Fernando José Mangino. Both baptism and confirmation were administered by the archbishop on the same day.[2] On
- ↑ The receipt of the first despatch was acknowledged on the 21st of February 1787, conveying the king's sorrow at the loss of so valuable a subject. Floridablanca on the 27th of the same month notified his colleague of the Indies department, of the king's high appreciation of the late count's distinguished services, and that provision in various ways had been decreed for his family. According to the marqués de Sonora's letter of February 28th to his niece, that provision was as follows: to the countess dowager, so long as she remained a widow, the yearly pension, sin ejemplar, of 50,000 reales de vellon ($2,500), free of media annata; to young Miguel de Galvez, heir to the title, the encomienda of Bolaños in the order of Calatrava; and to the other members of the family the following yearly pensions: to the posthumous child, $650 if a boy, or $300 if a girl; to Matilda de Galvez $300; and to the half-sister, Adelaida Detrehan, $200. Beleña, Recop., pref. 7-10.
- ↑ This was the grandest performance of the kind hitherto witnessed in Mexico. The city presented the vicereine a pearl necklace of the value of §11,000, and the babe another worth $4,000. The archbishop and Mangino
had in 1785, excepting Luyano, and adding Cosme de Mier y Trespalacios and Juan Francisco de Anda. Beleña, Recop., i. pref. 4; Ordenes de la Corona, MS., iii. 57, v. 4.
