1713. Carta de Bernardo Fadrique, platero de buril, para su cuñada María Francisca Serón.

Letter from Bernardo Fadrique, a burin silversmith, to his sister-in-law María Francisca Serón.

The author informs his sister-in-law María Francisca Serón on the whereabouts and the state of his brother, Pedro Fadrique.

The defendant of this process is Pedro Fadrique de Orellana, alias "Gachupín", a burin silversmith native to Puerto de Santa María (Cádiz) and resident in Veracruz (México). He was accused of bigamy for getting married twice: first in Sevilla to Juana Vázquez de Aguilar and later in Guatemala to María Francisca Serón. In order to get married a second time, he used three false witnesses who stated he was a single man. His brother Bernardo Fadrique, also a burin silversmith, tries to help him by writing a letter to María Francisca de Serón to make her believe that Josefa Salcedo had passed away. During the trial it is proved that Josefa Salcedo was alive in the moment the letter was written. The defendant was condemned to one hundred scourges and ten years imprisonment.

References:

Rocío Sánchez Rubio, Isabel Testón Núñez

El hilo que une. Las relaciones epistolares en el Viejo y en el Nuevo Mundo, siglos XVI-XVIII

Mérida

Universidad de Extremadura

1999