He alludes to the dreadful storm that the twenty-four galleys under the command of Luis de Requesens encountered for three days on leaving the port of Marseilles; some were lost, others dispersed and went, disabled, to Sardinia. It was impossible for the Knight Commander to fulfil D. John's orders. Gian Antonio Doria was then instructed to come from Naples with his galleys and D. Álvaro de Bazán to bring his from Sardinia; but it was too late, and meanwhile the Moors could receive provisions and reinforcements of soldiers, Turks and Berbers.
Philip II approved of his brother's proposal and authorised him to expel all Moors over ten and under sixty from Granada.
They were to be assigned places of habitation in the villages of Andalucia and Castille, which the King indicated, and handed over lists to the justices there, that they might know about them.
The King also desired, to avoid scandal and to perform the matter more gently, that the exile should not be inflicted as a punishment, but that they were to be given to understand that they were taken away from danger for their own good and peace, and that, quiet being restored, they would be taken care of, and that the loyal and innocent would be rewarded. Few were so in their acts and none were so in their feelings.
As D. Philip said, it was a dangerous piece of work for two different reasons. It was to be feared that the Moors, seeing themselves found out, would try some last and supreme stroke; and it was equally probable that the populace of Granada, on seeing them captured and without arms, would rise against them and commit some barbarous injury to their persons and property. D. John foresaw all; with great prudence and secrecy he sent to warn first of all, the armed men in the towns and villages of the plain, and on the 23rd of June, the Eve of St. John's Day, he suddenly issued a proclamation, ordering that in two hours' time all the Moors who dwelt in the town of Granada, or its castle, and in the Albaicin, citizens as well as strangers, should repair to their respective parish churches.
The terror of the Moors was great, and fear and surprise stopped all idea of resistance; they knew themselves to be criminals worthy of the extreme penalty, and they were afraid that they were going to be imprisoned in order that they might be beheaded.