Did you know that the first recorded Christian marriage, and the first interracial marriage, in the continental United States took place in Florida?
In the fall of 1565, the wedding ceremony of Luisa de Abrego, a 19-year-old domestic servant and free woman of color, and Miguel Rodríguez, a 25-year-old blacksmith from Segovia, was attended by the residents of St. Augustine. Some of the cities elites even acted as sponsors for the couple.
Luisa and Miguel were two of the original 800 settlers that established St. Augustine. They had met in Seville and made the long journey from Spain to Florida earlier that year. Unbeknownst to Miguel, however, her unresolved past there would later come back to haunt their happy union.
10 years into their marriage, after having resettled in Mexico, a guilt-stricken Luisa confessed to her husband and priest that their marriage may be invalid and that she had committed the sin of bigamy.
As a 15-year-old girl living in Jerez de la Frontera, Luisa was proposed to by another free domestic servant of color named Jordan. The two exchanged vows in a ceremony with no witnesses, but Luisa was adamant that the marriage was never consummated as she fell immediately ill and was bedridden for months. During that time, Jordan married another woman in a public ceremony. Heartbroken, Luisa left Jerez for Seville, where she soon met and fell in love with Miguel.
Luisa appeared on summon in 1575 to confess her crime, but after a one-year investigation, the bigamy charge against Luisa was dropped. Still, it was ultimately decided that her decade-long marriage to Miguel was invalid. This left Miguel able to remarry another woman, but Luisa was still technically married to a man who lived in across the Atlantic in Spain that she had not seen in almost 20 years.
What happened to Miguel and Luisa after this is unknown, as far as my research can tell. Despite the impact they had on history, the details of their lives have been lost to time. But at least the memory of the love they had can endure, so long as there are still people who will share their story…
Leave a Reply