On August 17, 1539, after Hernando de Soto’s scouts found the abandoned Indian village of Caliquen, Cavalry Captain Baltasar de Gallegos moved ahead to search for food and supplies, captured 17 Indians trying to flee into the woods, and took the daughter of Chief Aguacalequen prisoner. Later that day, the chief came with a group of Indians to negotiate for his daughter’s release, but when those efforts failed, he too was seized and both were held as hostages. De Soto then ordered Luis de Moscoso to set out at once from Cale and join him at Caliquen, forcing a difficult return from Apalachee through country already stripped bare of maize. Kinship was the most important connection in Native American culture at that time, and many of the tribes de Soto encountered traced ancestry through the female line. The army led by Luis Moscoso left Ocale starving because food was scarce, some men threw away their chain-mail armor to lighten their loads, and by the time they reached de Soto, most were on the verge of starvation because his scouting party had picked the crops clean weeks earlier.