The ups and downs in American history of Christopher Columbus.

When Bickerstaff was in grade school, the received opinion of Christopher Columbus was positive; a man of stupendous courage who discovered, accidentally perhaps, the Americas, one part of them many years later becoming a safe haven for oppressed people everywhere, the United States.  Gradually l, and as left-wing revisionists took over our cultural institutions and schools, the received opinion of Columbus has changed radically, with him accused of a vast multitude of hideous crimes. A fine sampling of the man’s dastardly deeds may be found in the hard-left rag Vox, with the understated headline, 9 reasons Christopher Columbus was a murderer, tyrant, and scoundrel, by Dylan Matthews. A small sampling of the Columbian rap sheet:

1) Columbus kidnapped a Carib woman and gave her to a crew member to rape.

2) On Hispaniola, a member of Columbus’s crew publicly cut off an Indian’s ears to shock others into submission.

3) Columbus kidnapped and enslaved more than a thousand people on Hispaniola.

4) Columbus forced Indians to collect gold for him or else die.

5) About 50,000 Indians committed mass suicide rather than comply with the Spanish.

If you crave knowledge of the rest of the crimes attributed to Columbus, whatever their truth, by all means, click the link above, but be assured they are as grizzly, or even more so, than the ones listed here.

Captain Columbus was hardly the gentlest soul, but whatever the truth of his alleged crimes, they were likely no less horrendous than those practiced by the natives he dealt with, and survival was his priority.

Now Bill Donahue, the take-no-prisoners editor of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, writes in his journal of revisionists’ views of of Columbus and introduces readers to Carol Delaney, associate professor of Cultural and Social Anthropology, Emerita, at Stanford University. Prof. Delaney presents us with a Columbus much different from the boilerplate leftist description of him. In her book, Columbus and the Quest for Jerusalem, she writes of him:

Columbus set sail to find gold so he could ‘fund a crusade to take Jerusalem back from the Muslims before the end of the world. A lot of people at that time thought that the apocalypse was coming because of all the signs: the plague, famine, earthquakes and so forth. And it was believed that before the end, Jerusalem had to be back in Christian hands so that Christ could return in judgment.’

And when “asked in an interview about the way Columbus interacted with the Indians. Her answer is a far cry from what radical revisionists offer.”

‘His relations with the natives tended to be benign. He liked the natives and found them to be very intelligent.’ In fact, he instructed his followers to be kind to them.’ Columbus strictly told the crew not to do things like maraud, or rape, and instead to treat the native people with respect. There are many examples in his writings where he gave instructions to this effect. Most of the time when injustices occurred, Columbus wasn’t even there. There were terrible diseases that got communicated to the natives, but he can’t be blamed for that.’

Since the lefties tend to lie about all history that isn’t in accord with their Marxist interpretations, Professor Delaney’s portrait of Columbus seems eminently more believable than the status quo, fire breathing monster the Left would have us believe.

Happy Columbus Day.

h/t GWR.