Born Francisco López Gascón in Rágama de Arévalo, Salamanca, Carvajal was admitted to the University of Salamanca only to return home in disgrace after a series of public scandals. Disinherited, Carvajal enlisted in the Castilian infantry bound for Italy to fight in Charles V's wars. He was present as an alférez when the mutinous Imperial army stormed Rome in 1527. However, instead competing in the violent plunder for gold and valuables, Carvajal seized legal documents belonging to a ranking Roman notary and ransomed them for a small fortune. Carvajal later used these funds to journey to Mexico as an aide to its first Spanish viceroy, Antonio de Mendoza. In 1535, he was dispatched to Peru to the relief of newly founded Lima, then under siege by an Inca army. Carvajal led reinforcements to Governor Francisco Pizarro and thereafter played a key role in reestablishing Pizarro's rule against the rival faction of conquistadors led by Almagro the Younger. He continued to lead his cavalry from the front ranks despite his age and obesity and became something of a local legend for his composure in battle. At Chupas, seeing the Imperial Spanish infantry giving way before a hail of fire from Almagro's massed cannons and harquebusiers, Carvajal is said to have ridden to the front of the line and, casting his helmet and cuirass to the ground, exclaimed, Inspired by their corpulent commander, Carvajal's men advanced on the enemy guns and carried Almagro's troops before them.
Campaign of 1546
When the royal authority moved against Pizarro in 1546, Carvajal, unable to quit the country due to the embargo on shipping, took command again in the field as Pizarro's lieutenant, or Maestro de Campo of Nueva Castilla's armies. In the campaign of 1546 Carvajal violently put down the royalist forces in the south of the colony, marching and countermarching from Quito to San Miguel, from Lima to Guamanga and back to Lima, from Lucanas to Cuzco, from Collao to Arequipa and from Arequipa to Charcas. In the 1540s Francisco de Carvajal's use of firearms in Peru prefigured the volley fire technique that developed in Europe many decades after. In the battle of Battle of Jaquijahuana Carvajal met Pedro de Valdivia, who just like him had also fought in Pavia, been at the Sack of Rome and helped to defeat Almagro. These two men were the only veterans of the Italian Wars in the battle. Other Spaniards in this battle had only military experience from the Americas.
Execution
Carvajal was sentenced to death by the royalists after being wounded and captured at the Battle of Jaquijahuana. American historian William H. Prescott collected a number of details about the execution, claiming that Carvajal was not gravely troubled by the sentence, remarking simply, "basta matar": "They can only kill me." He refused confession offered by the priests and did not accept his last rites, asking: According to Prescott, Carvajal did admit guests throughout his last day but treated his interlocutors to his usual cutting sarcasm. When a former enemy, once vanquished in battle by Carvajal, came to offer his services to the condemned rebel, Carvajal rebuked him caustically: Carvajal's only complaint emerged when his executioners arrived to carry him to the place of execution. Upon being bound and forced into a narrow basket, Carvajal exclaimed, "¡Niño en cuna y viejo en cuna!"—"Cradles for infants and now cradles for old men as well!" Carvajal's severed head was exhibited on a pike next to Pizarro's at the gates of Lima. Carvajal remains a folkloric character in Peru: One legend made him the illegitimate son of the Spanish-Italian tyrant Cesare Borgia; Ricardo Palma pointed out in the Tradiciones peruanas that Carvajal was in fact Borgia's senior by 10 years, their only parentage, he added, being "that of cruelty."
