Narciso Botello's Annals of Southern California 1833 - 1847

By Brent C. Dickerson

This is the world premiere complete publication of Narciso Botellos important Annals of Southern California, a work focusing on the years 1833 - 1847 when California was emerging from its years of isolation and seclusion with dramatic turmoil, social change, political intrigues, and armed conflicts. Botello, living in that dusty pueblo Los Angeles, records a swirl of events and personalitiestragic love, crime, warfare, treachery, invasionall bound together by the characteristic bravado and intricate web of loyalties of the native Californios. This spirited English translation of the original, amplified by detailed notes and insightful commentary, draws the reader deep into the surprising events of the turbulent final years of Mexican California.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Apr 22, 2014
• ISBN: 9781491732601

Brent C. Dickerson

Brent C. Dickerson is the internationally-known author of the most influential modern works on old roses. This is the enlarged second edition of his acclaimed first book The Old Rose Advisor; also in print are his definitive works The Old Rose Adventurer, Roll Call: The Old Rose Breeder, and The Old Rose Informant, the latter two books also being available from iuniverse.

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Copyright © 2014 Brent C. Dickerson.

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ISBN: 978-1-4917-3261-8 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4917-3260-1 (e)

iUniverse rev. date: 04/16/2014

Table of Contents

Introduction

Annals of Southern California 1833-1847

Notes and Commentary

Appendix Californio Government

Bibliography

Introduction

Narciso Botello’s Anales del Sur de la California—which appears here in print for the first time in its entirety, translated into English—is a rich and fascinating narrative, focusing on Southern California, and on Los Angeles in particular, as the Mexican era went through its final spiralling evolutions, dictated by an observant and educated Angeleno who was a participant in many of the events recorded. If, along with graver moments, an air of whimsy or fairy tale seems at times to be present, if the reader occasionally has to check the title page to make sure that, what with such characters as, say, the choleric green-spectacled governor, or the startled guards who had occasion to jump out the barracks windows, this is not one of the Oz books; or with the commander who wept to think that the enemy might get hurt, or the 2nd Alcalde strutting about town in newly-acquired military finery, with a feather in his hat, and doubtlessly plucky and adventury, this is not something out of Gilbert & Sullivan, it can only be replied that such is the everlasting nature of Los Angeles and California in general.

Like many readers, Botello arrives here in a largely unfamiliar land. At this time, California was still cut off and remote. To the east were mountains and desert replete with native tribes, sometimes friendly, sometimes not; but the weather and conditions in general were always uncertain and dangerous. Trappers and trading parties would now and then make their way to California from the east; but their appearances were infrequent, and uncomfortable to the suspicious Californian and Mexican governmental authorities. To the south was bleak Baja California, often a waystation to and from inner Mexico despite being a challenging trek. The ocean glinted to the west, hosting occasional ships not only from the homeland but also from maritime traders Mexican, American, British, and so on. To the north, beyond San Francisco Bay, were little-settled forests, rivers, and lands disputed less now by the Russians, more now by the British and Americans, the vagueness of these threats from the outside only increasing the wariness of the native Californios. Cut off like this, the internal Californian dynamics were undiluted and potent. A matrix of interconnected families did not prevent distrust and a sharp rivalry between north and south. The reader will become familiar with the terms Norteño—those of the north, centered on what was, as we begin, California’s capital, Monterey, well supported by Sonoma, farther north—and Sureño, those of the south, centered on California’s most populous settlement, Los Angeles, San Diegans also playing their part, making up in Sureño spirit what they lacked in numbers. The reasons for this rivalry between north and south will become clear in the course of Botello’s narrative.

More familiar to students of California history will be some of the figures we will meet in the following pages, and some of the incidents. And yet, we will see them here with new eyes, which will often discern a new wrinkle. Received opinion will sometimes be found to have been more pat than appropriate. Botello will also bring to our attention some characters and occurrences new to most readers, sometimes totally new to all. As, usually, a mid-level governmental clerk and functionary, he was well positioned to observe, reflect, and remember. These dictations, taken down over six days in Old Town San Diego in January, 1878, by H.H. Bancroft’s worker Thomas Savage, gathering material for Bancroft’s monumental History of California, draw on Botello’s experience, which was first-hand in many cases, as also they draw on the access he had, by virtue of his position, to the news of the day and how the powerful and influential were reacting to it.

Following along in Bancroft’s History of California as one proceeds through Botello’s story is of course frequently very rewarding as providing yet further context, and recommending this is the only way I can excuse myself from quoting Bancroft in the notes at even greater length than I do. But Bancroft, though, rich as his work is, is only a beginning. He often passes over minutiæ in his sources, minutiæ which are not germane to his goals; sometimes he is unaware of past personal events which might motivate subsequent public behavior; sometimes his good understanding of human nature doesn’t extend quite far enough. Zephyrin Engelhardt’s tomes of Missions and Missionaries of California, both the larger work and his separate volumes on the individual missons, provide augmentation to Bancroft, and indeed corrective matter; and the splendid Frontier Settlement in Mexican California, by C. Alan Hutchinson (Yale, 1969), conveys the governmental background and lets us see the general situation with the eyes of Mexican administrators. One can turn from these to the other reminiscences of the era—Lugo, Vejar, Janssens, Arnaz, Osio, Mrs. Ord, Wilson, Coronel, White, Pico, and so on; and one will often be struck by how different eyes can see in different ways, and how different minds focus on different details. As Bacon writes, ‘What is truth?’, said jesting Pilate; and would not stay for an answer. But perhaps there is not one truth in this pluralistic world; perhaps there are many competing truths.

This presentation of Botello’s reminiscences is offered in the hope that, through Botello’s text as well as my accompanying annotations and remarks, the reader will enter more fully into experiencing not only Botello’s adventures but also the Californio spirit and savor of the time. While not intending this to be an academic treatment per se with a traditional textual apparatus, I nevertheless hope that researchers will find here scattered items of interest assisting them to make connections heretofore unsuspected, or giving in some cases a wider perspective on, in other cases a more concentrated and enlightened view of, Botello’s California. Some events in world history can be handled in broad and simple brush-strokes, the direction of their progress being largely straightforward and unequivocal. California history is not like this. The larger image is usually unclear, confused, perhaps amorphous; the observer can only come to any understanding of it by achieving focus on its smaller elements—its people, their personalities, their aspirations, their loyalties, all of these often conflicting. To assist the reader, then, in order to convey the significance of what they form not only in themselves but also en masse, I have supplied notes in perhaps larger proportion than one might anticipate. Annotations and remarks, in their own separate section so that the reader may enjoy Botello’s story as an entity unto itself, without interruption, are keyed by the paragraph numbers (as ¶1) which I impose for ease of reference. Paragraph breaks frequently but not inevitably follow those in the original manuscript. The p. 1 (or whatever number) which follows the paragraph number indicates the page of the original manuscript on which the material is found. This is followed, to the degree possible, by some indication of the time period of the main action taking place in the paragraph. As mentioned, notes, reflections, and background matter are confined to the Notes and Commentary section in the latter part of the book, except in such cases as when simple comprehension of Botello’s meaning or intent in a sentence requires a bracketed word or two in the running text. A précis of the structure of Californio government is given in the Appendix, as an understanding of this will help cast light on the machinations and turmoil experienced in these turbulent years.

The Knight of the Woeful Countenance, by which I mean the ingenioso Don Quixote de la Mancha, puts it well when he tells us that a translation is like looking at a Flemish tapestry from the wrong side. Each language has its own logic, its own assumptions, its own dynamics of thought, all or any of which may or may not find a good fit in another language. I had the good fortune to engage Sofia Aguilera to provide the initial version of the translation for me—her splendid dedication and reliability meant that this effort got off to the best and most promising start—which I then worked on myself in a number of ways, first by checking obscure or difficult passages against the original manuscript, with the goal of producing a narrative not only faithful to Botello but also expressed as it would have been expressed had Botello been a native speaker of English (or at least a native speaker of English as I speak English). When English does not accommodate in a clear and natural way the fabric of ideas as woven in Spanish by Botello, I have conservatively made minor adjustments as necessary to serve clarity. There will always be outliers and exceptions in attempts at translation and in attempts to establish rules for translation. In either case, it is a disservice to the original author’s intent to be resolutely dogmatic; like the loyalties of the Californios, the writer’s loyalties are often in conflict, one side urging a translation to the utmost degree literal, the other urging a translation to the utmost degree literary. I offer, for instance, the original’s "alcalde either as mayor or alcalde, intending no distinction between the two in meaning, opting for mayor sometimes simply to avoid unæsthetic repetition or somehow clashing with another word, sometimes to avoid a distracting false exoticism. Botello uses el interior—in the sense, presumably, of the heartland—for non-territorial Mexico; I usually present this simply as Mexico in the text, lest readers suppose that people going to the interior"—usually for redress of some sort—are visiting the Central Valley or the Mojave Desert rather than what we know as Mexico. California was part of Mexico in the era covered, you say? Yes and no. As Botello’s text makes clear, most of los Californios in their remote land were proudly, even fiercely, Californios rather than Mexicanos, and could be counted on to express themselves as living not in Mexico but rather in California, with an air of the begrudging about admitting to Mexico’s usually parsimonious, remote, ineffective, and uncomprehending governance. The memoir commences in third-person, but almost immediately—and in mid-sentence—changes to a first-person narrative. Now and then, in relating an episode, we will find that Botello lets slip a we in the middle of a tale of theys, showing us that he was personally involved in the incident. Sometimes he has gone back and inserted material or made corrections, which I deal with on a case by case basis as to placement in the text. Here and there it appears that a hand other than that of Bancroft’s original transcriber Thomas Savage has made a note or correction (as Keith for Kid; Kid is how Savage heard Botello pronounce Keith); the hand was likely that of Botello himself.

Further remarks from me are better relegated to the Notes and Commentary portion of the book, with its headnote. Botello has an organized mind and a sharp eye, a penetrating understanding and a professional’s ability to assess events and people and see them in a larger context. The moment has come for us to join him as he travels for the first time to that strange land, California…

Annals of

Southern California 1833-1847

[¶ 1; p. 1; ca. 1813 to September, 1833] Narciso Botello, born in Alamos in the state of Sonora, 63 years old [in January, 1878, when this was dictated], was educated in his birthplace. He came to California in 1833, in the month of September, at the age of 23 years, in order to attend to family matters and find a sister who had married our first cousin Don Rafael Guirado. On this journey, by the Colorado River route, I was accompanied by Mr. John Forster (owner [later] of Rancho Santa Margarita). In Cavorca, we found a certain Peña (the blond) who had made a trip to California six years earlier. Since he was an old soldier and a man with a lot of knowledge of the countryside, he led us the right way without a paved road or trail.

[¶ 2; pp.1-2; September, 1833, to January 5 or so, 1834] We arrived in Los Angeles at the end of September, and on December 1st I left that pueblo for Sonora, accompanied by Mr. James (Santiago) Johnson. We arrived in Hermosillo on the 31st of the month at 8 pm. I remember that the first day of 1834 dawned rainy. Because of the rain, we could not set out on our trip to Guaymas until the 4th. Arriving in Guaymas, I had the experience of finding out from my wife and little sister named Brigida that my older sister Señora Guirado had passed away days earlier, and had been buried.

[¶ 3; p.2; January to mid-March, 1834] I stayed there while Mr. Johnson made his preparations for his family to sail to California. This went forward approximately the middle of March, 1834, in an English brigantine owned by an Englishman named Mr. Richard York and Don Manuel Requena, who was to be a citizen of Los Angeles for many years until his death. Requena was a native of Campeche in Yucatan. He had arrived from Mexico City appointed to the administration of the customs office of Guaymas, but did not take the job because he didn’t want to serve under Commissioner-General Riesgo.

[¶ 4; p. 2; March to July, 1834] Requena had remained there simply as a member of the public. Awhile later, he and York bought a brigantine with the idea of being partners on a shipment of cattle hides and tallow to Chile, so they sailed to California.

[¶ 5; pp. 2-3; July, 1834] The ship arrived at San Pedro with Johnson’s family and the partners York and Requena. Requena had suffered a lot from seasickness on the trip, so he resolved not to continue to Chile but instead to stay here. He and York dissolved the partnership, and the latter became the sole owner of the ship and cargo and sailed away bound for Valparaiso.

[¶ 6; p. 3; March, 1834, to late April, 1834] Johnson and I boarded a boat owned by John Slaughter, English resident of Puerto Escondido, and we disembarked in San Lucas, a little outside Mulege (Baja California), where we obtained mules from a ranch named St. Agueda, owned by another Englishman, to continue our journey by land to California. We proceeded on our trip without anything in particular to tell, except that our trip was very long due to our taking the wrong trail. We walked for 35 days, and arrived in Los Angeles towards the end of April.

[¶ 7; pp. 3-4; March to April, 1834] Ahead of us (by 4 or 5 days) was Don Angel Ramirez with his family. Ramirez had been appointed by the Mexican government to be customs administrator in Monterey, and upon his arrival he took charge. A little east of Calamajué, we found a mule that had been poisoned by the poisonous grass there. As much as we tried to hurry, we could not catch up with Ramirez.

[¶ 8; p. 4; late April to July, 1834] Mr. Johnson and I lodged in the house of Mr. Abel Stearns; and we remained there until our families arrived. I must tell you that Johnson’s wife Carmen Guirado was my first cousin—rather I should say is because she is still alive.

[¶ 9; p. 4; May to July, 1834] It came to be that I was in charge of a billiards table owned by Mr. George Rice and his family and other businessmen who were not able to look after it. I remained in charge of the billiards table until the family arrived in July.

[¶10; pp. 4-5; 1834] Back then, Los Angeles was a poorly organized town. There was but one street worthy of the name (today it is Main); the rest were helter-skelter, houses planted here and there without order. The best, and the only house with two stories (or, as they say, de alto), was the one belonging to Don Vicente Sanchez; later, the best was the one that belonged to the Portuguese Don Antonio Rocha, which was really large and had a tiled roof. Later, the big one was that of Señores Rice and Temple, who had consolidated it, forming a block. The edifice of the city hall was very large, like about twenty yards, of adobe and tile without a porch. The rectory was very large and ordinary, adjacent to the church of adobe and tile. The house of Antonio Maria Lugo was ordinary and of adobe and tile. The roof was tar. It appeared much longer than it actually was because it was connected to that of Antonio Reyes. All the other houses were no more than mere shacks, except for that of Jose Antonio Carrillo, [the site of] which is now the Pico House. It was built of adobe and tile, and of regular size. It was the one with the best appearance, aside from that of Sanchez, because it had an adobe wall at the back [of the property] towards the interior [of the block]. There were fifty families, more or less. The society was partly good and partly bad, due to corruption and drunkenness in the men. There was a little of everything, like in the vineyards of the Lord.

[¶ 11; pp. 5-6; 1833 through 1834] In the year 1833, the mayor was Jose Antonio Carrillo, and in 1834 it was Jose Perez.

[¶ 12; p. 6; July, 1834, to 1835 and on] When the families arrived in the middle of July (1834), I left billiards behind and rented a house from Mr. John Temple in the old plaza, as they called it. It was further north of the church. This plaza no longer exists. There, I established a grocery store, and in the year 1835, I was elected síndico of the ayuntamiento. Ever since, I have constantly been employed in public posts.

[¶ 13; pp. 6-7; September, 1835] While I was síndico (around the middle of 1835), an unpleasant incident occurred in Los Angeles. A man called Day, who had a bar, ran out of wine. He went to buy some from Stearns, who had it in stock and ready for sale by the barrel. He asked Stearns for a sample, and was given good wine. Day settled on a price and paid $20 for a barrel of that sort. He went home and sent a couple of Indians with some poles to carry the barrels back to him. When he received it, he opened it to dispense it. He gave it a taste, and found it sour. Feeling cheated, he went over to Stearns’ house to complain that he had sold him sour wine instead of what he had tasted. Stearns insisted that it was the same wine. They argued to the point that Stearns demanded that he leave. Day refused. Stearns grabbed a yardstick and hit him on the chest. Day, feeling as if he was under attack, pulled out a knife and stabbed Stearns three times, once in the hand, once in the shoulder, and the third time cut a piece from the middle of his tongue. Stearns began to bleed heavily, and his life was in grave danger. He would have died were it not for the skill of Dr. Guillermo Kid (Keith).

[¶ 14; pp. 7-8; ca. 1828 to September, 1835] Before coming to California, Dr. Kid was in Sonora. I met him when he arrived in Hermosillo from the United States (I think he was from Boston). From there, he was called to be town doctor in the town of Alamos; and he remained there in Alamos for three years, gaining the public’s esteem for his skill as a doctor, and for his many personal talents and accomplishments. From Alamos, he returned to Hermosillo, and set up a good pharmacy. That’s where I left him when I came to California in 1834. A year later, he left for California by sea, having shipped from Mazatlan. He disembarked at San Pedro, and from that port came to Los Angeles. I had the opportunity to get to know Kid; we had been good friends in Hermosillo.

[¶ 15; pp. 8-9; September, 1835, to latter 1836] He remained in Los Angeles until about the end of 1836, and then returned to Sonora. In Los Angeles, he took care of all kinds of people due to his knowledge, graciousness, and good nature. He never rejected a poor person seeking medical attention, and always gave it at once without compensation. He became so highly thought of that the ayuntamiento spontaneously gave him a vote of thanks. Well, it had become known that he continually bought with his own money medicine from the medicine chests of Stearns, Temple, and Rice (Los Angeles had no real pharmacy; the first one established was that of Dr. McFarland and Dr. Juan G. Downey) to give to those who needed it as a last resort. The treatment that he gave Stearns was quite out of the ordinary. Everyone expected him to die. Aside from God, he owed his life to Dr. Kid.

[¶ 16; p. 9; September, 1835, to approximately September, 1836] Because of this, Day was arrested, taken to prison, put in a cell, and shackled. What is more, contrary to Mexican law, which he felt had failed to protect him, Stearns insisted that Day also be handcuffed. The authorities wanted to please Stearns, so they placed handcuffs on Day. (Let me tell you that Stearns was a tall man, and Day—like me—was small and thick-set.)

[¶ 17; pp. 9-11, plus an insert; around September-October, 1835; May, 1834, for the dismissal of Moraga] Some Los Angeles Mexicans found out that the authorities broke the law in the way they treated Day, so there was an uprising headed by Manuel Arzaga (secretary of the ayuntamiento at the time), Miguel Hidalgo, and I think a fellow named Zelaya, both from Sonora. Arzaga was originally from the capital of Mexico, and was a man of much education and knowledge of the law, and also a full-time official. He was besides a personal friend of Day. Hidalgo was also a man of much intelligence. Arzaga and Hidalgo mainly got the Sonorans and some Californios to get together to assault the guards and take the handcuffs off of Day; and that’s just what they did. They appropriated the key from the captain of the guard, entered the jail, and took the handcuffs off of Day, leaving only the shackles. They only took the handcuffs off because they were illegal. The result of this was that the mayors Francisco Javier Alvarado (First Alcalde) and Don Domingo Romero (Second) considered the act to constitute contempt of authority, and had the three arrested to face criminal charges. At this, it was decided that the position of secretary of the ayuntamiento was left vacant, and remained so for some days until they found another person capable of carrying out the task—difficult in those days. What had happened to [Arzaga’s predecessor as secretary] Vicente Moraga was that the ayuntamiento removed him from the office of secretary and public school teacher because he was lackadaisical about the first post. It was said that his scholars were very advanced in their work, [but that] Moraga was an alcoholic. A very timid, sensitive man. He was grandson of the founder of San Francisco, and the son of Lieutenant Gabriel Moraga. His wife, Doña Antonia Dominguez, is still alive. I don’t know if they had any children.

[¶ 18; p. 11-12; around October, 1835] [Back to the question of Arzaga’s successor:] In the meantime, they solicited a certain Francisco Suastegui, a silversmith from Sonora who lived in town, who was believed competent because he sang in church and expressed himself in an educated manner. When he responded to the ayuntamiento about the offer, he said, "Mr. Mayor, if you want to hear a song during Mass, that I can do; but I’m uneasy about this other position. I have a very sensitive ear. If I am writing, and happen to hear a rooster crow, I will write cock-a-doodle-do. Listen to what happened to me in the town of Guadalupe—Altar, I mean—in Sonora. The mayor wrote me to get me to undertake the office of military leader of the neighborhood. I started writing my reply. A woodcutter stopped in the street with his donkeys loaded; and just outside the window of the room where I was writing, one of the donkeys fell with his load. The woodcutter began to pull the donkey up and beat him, using vulgar and absurd words. I heard the words but kept on writing without thinking; and when I finished I visited the mayor to obtain his approval. He began to read, and found a great portion, like this (and he gestured with his hands), consisted of the woodcutter’s words. So you see how sharp my ear is." These comments of Suastegui made us laugh heartily, and the mayor allowed him to decline the position. Such was the state of things when the ayuntamiento decided that I was to take charge of things as secretary for the time being. That’s how I came to be working two positions, síndico and secretary.

[¶ 19; pp. 12-13; 1835-36] My term ended in the year 1835. In 1836, Don Manuel Requena became mayor, with Don Tiburcio Tapia as second. The insisted that I stay on as property secretary; and I was elected by the ayuntamiento. The salary was then $25, and in addition to being secretary of the ayuntamiento, I was also court clerk. For the latter, I received no compensation at all. Later, when Don Carlos Antonio Carrillo was Governor, I informed him of the situation (because I had a lot of work with all the criminal cases that there were), and he ordered me compensated at $35 monthly.

[¶ 20; p. 13-14; latter 1834] To return: In the year 1834, the political chief [jefe political] and military commander [comandante general] of the territory of California was Brigadier-General Don Jose Figueroa, whom I saw in Los Angeles presiding over the ayuntamiento. He had come because of what the mayor had told him about the prisoners Arzaga, Hidalgo, and Zelaya. These men had made complaints about bad treatment by the local Los Angeles authorities. Señor Figueroa was a man over fifty years old, beardless, olive complexion, regular stature, chubby, rather strong-shouldered, clear-headed, very courteous and affable, of excellent education and many talents, without ostentation or pride, and very easygoing in his dealings. Once Figueroa returned to Monterey, the case against the prisoners for having excited a public uprising continued; and they were sentenced to exile to Mazatlan. The sentence took effect that same year.

[¶ 21; pp. 14-15; August, 1834, into 1835] In the month of August (1834), the brigantine Natalia landed in San Diego with a part of the Colony sent to California by the Mexican government. The other part of the Colony went to Monterey in the military corvette Morelos. In the Natalia were Don Jose Híjar, who had been named jefe politico and also director of the Colony, and who was to take possession of the mission lands and to distribute the animals, tools, supplies, and whatever else might be needed. Señor Figueroa was ready and willing to hand over the post to Híjar when he received a countermand from the government (brought by land from Mexico City in 40 days by a courier’s extraordinary effort; I heard that later he died, during the return, from an injury he had suffered) not to deliver up command nor let Híjar interfere with the missions. The accusations and replies between Híjar, Figueroa, and the diputación [territorial assembly] resulted in the plans for the Colony being frustrated. Híjar was recognized as the Colony director, with $4,000 per year; but the diputación, with the consent of Figueroa, refused to put into his hands the secularization of the missions. Initially with the help of the territory’s governor, part of the Colony was established in the Sonoma valley; but in 1835, Señor Figueroa expelled Híjar, vice-director Don Jose Maria Padrés, and other employees of the company; they were accused of conspiring to remove Figueroa from office.

[¶ 22; p. 15; March, 1835] In 1835, various Angeleno Sonorans were incited by Antonio Apalátegui (a Spaniard coming from Sonora; tall and thin), Francisco Torres (physician; young, beardless, olive complexion, regular size and height), and another whose name I don’t remember to make a public declaration against General Figueroa, whom they accused of abusing his authority, the purpose being to remove him from command. The next morning in the town plaza, there was an armed force of 80 to 100 men, and they had a piece of artillery which they had taken from the guard.

[¶ 23; pp. 16-17; March, 1835, on; Híjar sent back to Mexico May 10, 1835] Mayor Francisco Javier Alvarado, president of the ayuntamiento, summoned that body as well as the citizens to acquaint them with the plan presented by the armed force, which was led by Juan Gallardo and Felipe Castillo. Once they saw that the ayuntamiento and the citizens refused to see things their way, they changed their minds and surrendered to the town authorities; later they turned in the ring-leaders or organizers of the uprising, who were put in chains at once and confined to jail, and later sent by ship [to Monterey] to be left to the disposition of the Governor—who threw them out of California, along with the Colony bosses. The majority of the Colony members remained in California, settling wherever they could find a livelihood. Several of them, such as Don Ignacio Coronel and his large family, Victor Prudon, Jose Maria Covarrubias, and several others, settled in the Southland. The colony had very few laborers. They were schoolteachers, artisans, and men without a trade, as well as some dancers. Several were men who had training in a variety of professions.

[¶ 24; p. 17; September 29, 1835] That same year, shortly after everything had settled down in California, General Figueroa in Monterey surrendered his soul to the Creator. The widespread feeling of all the inhabitants of the territory was that he had striven to bring about the country’s well-being. He had been a good friend and protector of the Californios; and his affability earned him the affection of the men who looked up to him, particularly in the north.

[¶ 25; p. 17-19; September, 1835, to May, 1836] At the time of Señor Figueroa’s death, he had by his own inclination kept from undertaking the civilian military command. He had invited