Burial of Columbus.--Disappearance of epitaph.--Removal of remains in
1795.--Discovery of remains in 1877.--Resting place of Discoverer
of America.


The greatest pride of the Dominican people is that they are the
custodians of the mortal remains of Christopher Columbus. The same
honor is claimed by Spain, but a Dominican would consider it almost
treasonable to doubt the justice of the Dominican claim. It is a
strange freak of fate that not only should the great navigator have
been denied in life the rewards promised him, not only should the new
world he discovered have been given the name of another, but that his
very tomb is a matter of controversy. It is admitted that after his
death in Spain his remains were transferred to Santo Domingo City and
there deposited in the cathedral. In 1795, when the Spanish colony of
Santo Domingo was ceded to France, the Spaniards carried with them to
Cuba what they supposed were the remains of Columbus, and these were
in 1898 taken to Spain, but in the year 1877 another casket was
brought to light in the Santo Domingo cathedral, with inscriptions
which indicated that it contained the bones of the great Discoverer.

It was the desire of Columbus to be buried in Santo Domingo, his
favorite island. In his will, executed shortly before his death, he
called on his son Diego to found, if possible, a chapel dedicated to
the Holy Trinity, "and if this can be in the Island of Espanola, I
should like to have it there where I invoked the Trinity, which is in
La Vega, named Concepcion." Columbus died on May 20, 1506, in
Valladolid and his body was deposited in the church of Santa Maria de
la Antigua in that city. In 1513, or perhaps before, it was
transferred to the Carthusian monastery of Santa Maria de las Cuevas