In September 1539, Hernando de Soto’s army was forced by torrential rains to remain for three days at a small abandoned village that they called Muchas Aguas, or Many Waters. According to Rodrigo Rangel, the army left on Monday, September 15, crossed a very bad swamp and a very difficult road, and spent the night at Napituca, a very pleasant town that was well situated and had much food. As De Soto’s army moved through La Florida, the Spanish expeditions proved fatal for many Indian tribes because the army captured and enslaved many native people, and escaped captives unknowingly carried European diseases back to their villages, causing catastrophic sickness and death. Europeans had developed immunities to illnesses such as tuberculosis, measles, and smallpox, but these diseases, still carried by the conquistadors, proved fatal to Indian populations.