 In 1550, during the campaign to establish Concepción he led the cavalry charge that broke the leading division of the Mapuche army at the Battle of Penco.In 1552 Valdivia ordered Jerónimo de Alderete to go inland and establish a fort at Lake Villarrica and established a fort at the site of the present Villarrica.In late 1552, Pedro de Valdivia dispatched Alderete to negotiate the confirmation of his governorship with Charles V, but after he arrived back to Spain he discovered that the Emperor had transferred the suzerainty of Chile, and all his other territories, to his son Philip II, who was at the time living in England.