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GEN
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY
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Gc 979.402 Sa52s Sugranes, Eugene Joseph, 1878- The old San Gabriel mission
THE
History of Mission SAN GABRIEL
OLD FRANCISCAN MISSION . NEAR LOS ANGELES , CALIFORNIA
Allen County Public Library
For Me,
DEN
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SAN GABRIEL CAMPANILE
THE OLD SAN GABRIEL MISSION
Historical Notes Taken From Old Manuscripts and Records, Accurately Compiled After Diligent Research, With Mention of the Other California Franciscan Missions and Their Founders
BY REV. EUGENE SUGRANES, C. M. F. SAN GABRIEL, CALIFORNIA
.C
THE RIGHT REV. JOHN J. CANTWELL, D. D., Bishop of Monterey and Los Angeles, to whose devoted interest and labor, the restoration of our California Missions is chiefly due.
CONTENTS
Page
Foreword 7 Commendation 9
The Bells of San Gabriel. 10
CHAPTER 1-Founding of this Mission. Those who founded it. Dates of found-
ing. Motives for its establishing. 13
CHAPTER 11-Life at the Missions. The occupations and pastimes of the inmates. Romance of a Beata. How matrimony was effected. 30
CHAPTER III-The educational system of the Franciscans. They were more than two centuries ahead of the present educators in instituting methods now considered most modern. Industries and development. 40
CHAPTER IV-Art treasures at San Gabriel. Many Murillos. Some made by the Indians. They gave the features and dress of their tribe to the portraits and images they made. 44
CHAPTER V-The soldiers who guarded the Missions. The troubles they caused. Their gambling propensities and other immoralities. The massacre of Rivera and his companions. Battle of San Gabriel. Other military matters .. 53
CHAPTER VI-Administration of the Missionary Sons of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. They have taken up and are carrying on the unfinished work of the Franciscans, preserving their traditions. They are restoring San Gabriel to its original condition, developing and improving this venerable landmark. Other California Missions. .. 66
CHAPTER VII-Story of a marvelous Indian crucifix. The Mission Play amid replicas of the old Missions. It attracts many thousands to San Gabriel's vicinity 74
CHAPTER VIII-Founding of Los Angeles. Her old Plaza Church. Her many beauties and charms. 83
Containing Eighteen Illustrations of the Art, Antiquity, and Architecture of the Mission San Gabriel
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NIHIL OBSTAT LEON MONASTERIO, C. M. F. CENSOR DEPUTATUS
PRELO MANDARI POTEST DOMINIC ZALDIVAR, C. M. F. SUPERIOR PROVINCIALIS
IMPRIMATUR + ARTHURUS HIERONYMUS EPISCOPUS SANCTI ANTONII
COPYRIGHTED 1921 BY FATHER EUGENE SUGRANES, C. M. F. LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
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FOREWORD.
¢
This is a glorious year for old San Gabriel, long to be remembered. The year 1921 marks the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of San Gabriel Mission. One hundred and fifty years ago the brown- robed Sons of St. Francis came here not in quest of gold but to conquer for Christ the souls of the natives given up to pagan practices and lost to God. A band of these Missionaries, led by the Saintly Father Junipero Serra, in their excursions across the land halted here and being most favorably impressed by the beauty of the spot, selected it as the center of their future apostolic activities. Here they erected our peerless Mission; here they planted the Cross of Christ and started with undaunted zeal the arduous task of converting the Indians to Christianity. What labors, what amount of suffering they had to un- dergo in this superhuman enterprise it is hard to describe. Living in an age of refinement and comfort with every faculty at our command to satisfy the most fastidious taste, we cannot properly picture to ourselves the extent of self-sacrifice involved in the conquest of the savage to religion, especially at a time when civilization had made little or no inroads into this part of the New World. There is one, however, who did fully measure the extent of their hardships; it is the Divine Master whom they so faithfully served and followed.
They have long since gone to their reward but the frag- rance of their holy examples we still perceive; they are here no more, but their generous sacrifices are left behind for us to admire, and their splendid virtues for us to emulate. Their bodies rest somewhere in this land of perennial sunshine, but the fruits of their labor, their wondrous achievements, survive them.
No, not all is gone with their passing out of this earth. Their mighty deeds speak to us even after their death. The Missions founded by them stand yet; sermons in stones as someone has called them, they loudly tell us of
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their courage, patience, devotion to God and man. In justice we must say that the Missions have been the cradle of our civilization. Within their sacred walls the Indians gained the knowledge of the true God; they were taught to serve Him and to love their fellow-men; their hands were trained to manual labor and useful trades. And who will not admit that under the wise direction of the Mission Padres, they succeeded in becoming skillful mechanics and even good artists? Witness the Missions, and the remarkable structures about them, some of which have stubbornly withstood the test of time.
Our very town of San Gabriel owes its birth to the good old Padres whose energies were devoted not only to God's glory but also to man's welfare, who in consequence built up along with sacred edifices, dwellings for their charges, the Indians, community houses, schools, workshops, in a word, whole villages and towns. Look over the California map and see how many cities sprang up by the Missions that still bear their names. Those sweet, musical names were given them with exquisite taste by the founders of the Missions.
For all this we owe those pioneer Missionaries an immense debt of gratitude, a gratitude which should be expressed by public festivities during the present year in recognition of their part in the upbuilding of our State. It is but proper that we should do this in order to fittingly celebrate the one hundred and fiftieth anniver- sary of the foundation of this Mission which is also the anniversary of the birth of old San Gabriel.
RAPHAEL SERRANO, C. M. F.,
Rector of San Gabriel Mission.
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COMMENDATION.
This book, I believe, constitutes the most elaborate and complete history of the Mission San Gabriel that has yet appeared in print in a single volume. It is compiled from the Mission records handed down by the Franciscans who built it and held possession of it until secularization and after. The facts herein set forth may, therefore, be relied on as being absolutely accurate.
The work of compiling and arranging and writing this work was done by a hand well worthy the task. Fr. Eugene Sugranes is eminently fitted by education, training and experience to be the historian of San Gabriel. Moreover, his whole nature and his sacred profession of the mission- ary priesthood and his nationality makes him a sure inter- preter of Mission history and tradition.
We may all rejoice that, after the wreck and ruin of the centuries, the Mission San Gabriel is still intact and in charge of those who are of the same blood and religion as the brown-robed Franciscans who founded and erected San Gabriel-those splendid men of the past who came to California with the immortal Junipero Serra to convert the savage from heathenism to the faith of Christ, and to make the desert blossom as the rose.
JOHN S. McGROARTY.
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THE BELLS OF SAN GABRIEL. BY CHARLES W. STODDARD
Thine was the corn and the wine, The blood of the grape that nourished; The blossom and fruit of the vine, That was heralded far away. These were Thy gifts and Thine, When the vine and the fig tree flourished, The promise of peace and of glad increase Forever and ever and aye. What then wert Thou, and what art now ? Answer me, oh! I pray. And every note of every bell Sang: "Gabriel!" Rang: "Gabriel!" In the tower that is left the tale to tell Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Oil of the olive was thine; Flood of the wine-press flowing; Blood o' the Christ was the wine - Blood o' the Lamb that was slain. Thy gifts were fat o' the kine Forever coming and going Far over the hills, the thousand hills, Their lowing a soft refrain. What then wert Thou, and what art now? Answer me, once again! And every note of every bell Sang: "Gabriel!" Rang: "Gabriel!" In the tower that is left the tale to tell Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
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Seed o' the corn was thine- Body of Him thus broken And mingled with blood o' the vine -. The bread and the wine of life; Out of the good sunshine
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They were given to thee as a token- The body of Him, and the blood of Him, When the gifts of God were rife. What then wert Thou, and what art now, After the weary strife? And every note of every bell Sang: "Gabriel!" Rang: "Gabriel!"
In the tower that is left the tale to tell Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Where are they now, oh! bells? Where are the fruits o' the Mission ? Garnered, where no one dwells, Shepherd and flock are fled. O'er the Lord's vineyard swells The tide that with fell perdition
Sounded their doom and fashioned their tomb And buried them with the dead. What then wert Thou, and what art now? The answer is still unsaid. And every note of every bell Sang: "Gabriel!" Rang: "Gabriel!" In the tower that is left the tale to tell Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
Where are they now, oh! tower, The locusts and wild honey? Where is the sacred dower That the bride of Christ was given? Gone to the wielders of power, The misers and minters of money;
Gone for the greed that is their creed- And these in the land have thriven, What then wert Thou, and what art now, And wherefore hast Thou striven ? And every note of every bell Sang: "Gabriel!" Rang: "Gabriel!" In the tower that is left the tale to tell Of Gabriel, the Archangel.
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O
O
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ano 1778%,
For Junipero Serra Prevede
THE FATHER AND FOUNDER OF THE OLD SAN GABRIEL FRANCISCAN MISSION
The History of Mission San Gabriel
CHAPTER I.
Founding of This Mission. Those Who Founded It. Dates of Founding. Motives for Its Establishing.
ITH noblest motives impelling them, the W men who bore the Cross to and planted it in California, carried Christianity and civilization to a then wild region, in- fested by barbarous beings. On a site previously selected by them they reared the Cross with the ritualistic ceremonies of their Church. Here they were soon after to erect their Mission Structures, both ecclesiastic and secular. These cere- monies were impressive to a high degree. They were characterized by the loftiest spiritual reverence and devotion. This sacred spot was con- secrated to the grand purpose to which it was dedicated.
San Gabriel has a feature peculiar to itself. It stands unique among the Missions of California. Go anywhere else over the Golden State, even among the other Missions, and you will find the old customs exchanged for modern ones. It has never been-it never will be so with San Gabriel. While welcoming whatever means progress and improvement, it will unhesitatingly rebuke any attempt to change the old Pueblo and its typical ways.
Hence in this place must remain the old adobe huts, the old fashioned people and their antique institutions and mode of life. I venture to say, the Americans and Euro- peans coming here become so intensely and thoroughly imbued with the spirit of the place, that their anxiety is to keep alive the old traditions. The melodious songs of
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the Mission, the old popular Indian airs, arts, sports. amusements, etc., must forever remain San Gabriel's most charming and attractive features.
Within the sacred mures of the church the harmonious accents and sweet cadence of the language of Cervantes still thrill the souls of the faithful. While our official tongue, the language of Shakespeare, is used in the church services, yet the pious old Doñas say their prayers and tell their beads in the rhythmic and sibilant Spanish language. Even the children, while reared and educated after our wonderful American school system, when at play, must use the tongue of the pioneer missionaries that first scat- tered the blessed seed of Christian civilization.
Any. visitor at Corpus Christi Day may see the solemn procession, as of old, with its typical songs and the Holy Eucharist carried along amidst clouds of incense and flow- ers, escorted by hundreds of pueblanos and rancheros, bearing lighted tapers. This imposing line stops at the temporary altars, or ermitas, as it used to do in the cen- turies past. The melodious, angelical salutation, the "Dios te salve," so many times sung around the old Plaza Church in the City of Angels, is still heard in this Mission, espe- cially when the Angelus Bell summons the faithful to greet the Mother of God.
Such is San Gabriel in the midst of modern environ- ment. Thus while anxious to keep alive the typical physi- ognomy of the Mission, the watchful Fathers in charge of it are wide awake to the necessities of modern times. Hence the work of restoration in the Mission-the better- ing of its grounds,-the beautifying of the old cemetery- the renewing of the old ovens, living witnesses to the cul- ture and industrial enterprise, go hand in hand with the moral upbuilding of this interesting community.
Those who founded the California Missions were Fran- ciscan Friars. They followed others of their order who had previously come with the Conquistadores of Cortes in May 3, 1535. These former had unsuccessfully attempted to found such institutions, yet they had held religious ser-
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THE HISTORY OF MISSION SAN GABRIEL
vices and preached to the Indians. The real founders of the Franciscan Missions there did not reach Upper Cali- fornia until more than a century later.
The power to found Missions in California was vested in a prominent and peerless personage, Fra Junipero Serra, who was president of the Franciscan group who accom- panied him and came to found them. In this work he had associated and working with and under him several other members of this Holy Order.
Those directly connected with the founding and estab- lishing of this particular Mission of San Gabriel were the Friars Pedro Benito Cambon and Angel Fernandez de la Somera, whose noble attributes of most admirable charac- ter, especially their undaunted courage and perseverance, enabled them and their followers and associates to success- fully contend against and overcome many adverse obsta- cles that confronted them and so long delayed them in their worthy work.
Tempests, pestilences and exposure, attacks by savages, shipwrecks and other untoward occurrences, hampered and delayed them unduly, but persistence finally prevailed and triumphed
They had to undergo persecutions and privations such as seldom befall mission expeditions of peaceful purpose. But they were sustained by the conviction that the worthy objects for which they strove must prevail. This was why they won.
They were the spiritual messengers of Our Savior, heralding the Gospel of Christ. They were animated by the purposes of educating, reforming, and uplifting human savages, and of securing safety for them, a tolerable amount of comfort during their temporal existence, and the salvation of their immortal souls hereafter.
Miracles happened at critical moments to save these holy men when upon the brink of destruction.
THE INFLUENCE OF A FLAG.
Of these was one that occurred while those missionaries
THE FATHERS' NEW RESIDENCE
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THE HISTORY OF MISSION SAN GABRIEL
and their party were on their way to the founding of this Mission of San Gabriel. It happened while the party were in consultation over the selection of a site for this Mission. At such a juncture they were surrounded by hostile Indi- ans who made an attempt to attack the missionary train.
Just as the savages were making an onslaught, one of the Friars seized, raised aloft and waver the banner on which was a portrait of the Blessed Virgin. Immediately the Indians became abashed. In a sudden transition from hate to humility, they knelt and joined in the worship. They then came forward to be baptized and embraced the Holy Catholic faith, after which they joined the train of the missionary pilgrimage onward to the spot that was chosen for the location of this Mission. This miracle is recorded by Fray Francisco Palou in his "Vida del V. P. Junipero Serra."
The memorable date for the original founding was September 8, 1771. This was but a few days after the miracle mentioned. When the Cross was raised, this same blessed banner was again unfurled and waved in the breeze of that sunny region. Then was presented and enacted a superb scene in a most important and eventful historic drama.
After a period of experimentation, the site first selected proved unsuitable for the purposes required, but the first ceremonies indicated took place at this location, and the first temporary structures were placed there. This site was near the San Gabriel River, then known as the River Temblores, or "Earthquake" River. That site was between five and six miles southeast of the present one on which the Mission of San Gabriel is now located.
The first structures consisted of poles, or saplings and reeds whose interstices were chinked with mud. They were roofed with thatches of tule, or rushes, and were enclosed within a stout stockade of heavy posts. This was for defense against attack from without.
The present site is more centrally located, nearer the Sierra Madre Mountains and within less than nine miles of
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the city of Los Angeles. The Angelus Bell at this Mission can be heard in the city of Los Angeles. Wisely was it selected where the soil is fertile, water is abundant, timber plentiful and accessible, where the place is sheltered from tempest and secure against flood. It is in a lovely valley about twelve miles in length and nine miles in breadth. The buildings erected here are permanent ones of stone. These include the sacred church structure and other eccle- iastic edifices for quartering the clergy, their monastery, and the secular ones for the soldiery, forming the escolta, or guard, and the dwellings for the servants and converts. As is characteristic with most of the Franciscan missionary institutions this one forms a group enclosed in a high and massive wall. The group constituted a square ranging about a court or inner patio.
FRANCISCAN ORDER'S FOUNDER.
St. Francis of Assisi was born in Umbria, Italy, in 1182. He founded the Franciscan Order about February 24, 1204. While he was preaching in the Chapel of St. Mary of the Angels, the Gospel of the day told him the disciples of Christ were to neither possess gold, nor silver, nor scrip for their journey, nor two coats, nor shoes, nor a staff, and that they were to exhort sinners to repentance and announce the Kingdom of God. Francis was then liv- ing in a small hut he had built near this chapel. He took these words as if spoken directly to himself. So, as soon as Mass was over, he threw away the poor fragment left him of the world's goods, his shoes, his cloak, his pilgrim's staff and empty wallet. At last he had found his vocation. Having obtained a coarse woolen tunic of "beast color," the dress worn by the poorest Umbrian peasants, and tied it around with a knotted rope, he went forth at once ex- horting the people of the country-side to penance, broth- erly love, and peace. Companions soon began to follow and join him in his life work. All of them procured rough, brown habits like his. They built huts near his at the Porciuncula, located in Umbria, near Assisi. When the
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number of his companions had increased until there were eleven of them, Francis found it expedient to draw up a set of written rules for their government. When this was ready, the Penitents of Assisi, as Francis and his followers styled themselves, set out for Rome to seek the approval of the Holy See.
From Pope Innocent III they met with opposition. He deemed their mode of life uncertain and unsafe. This Pope was later moved by a dream to change his mind. In that vision he saw these Poor Men of Assisi upholding the tottering Lateran Basilica. After the Friars Minor, as Francis next named his brethren, returned to Assisi, they found shelter in a deserted hut at Rivo Torto in the valley or plain below the city, but were forced from this poor abode by a rough peasant who drove his donkey in upon them.
The first general chapter of the Friars Minor was held in 1217, at Porciuncula, the members of the Order being assigned diferent provinces and stations in the then known and civilized portions of the world, where Fran- ciscan Missions were to be established by the members of the Holy Order.
The gentle Francis was at once chivalrous and poetic in nature, which gave an added charm to his other at- tributes and rendered him a romantic and a beautiful character. He delighted in the Songs of Provence, rejoic- ing in the new born freedom of his native city. He cher- ished what Dante terms "that pleasant sound of his dear land." This exquisite human element in Francis' career was the key to that far reaching, all embracing sympathy which may almost be called his characteristic gift. In his heart the whole world, as an old chronicler puts it, found refuge. The poor, the sick, and the fallen were the objects of his solicitude.
Once, as we are told, the whole Friary was aroused by . cries : "I am dying!"
"Who are you?" exclaimed Francis, "and why are you dying?"
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"I am dying of hunger," answered the voice of one who had been too prone to fasting. Thereupon Francis had a table laid out for the fasting Friar, and that he might not be ashamed to eat alone he ordered all of the other brethren to join him in the repast.
The very animals found a friend in Francis, for he even plead with the inhabitants of Gubbio to feed the famishing wolves, that had been ravaging their flocks. The early legends have left us many idyllic pictures of how bees and birds, alike susceptible of the charms of Francis' gentle ways, entered into loving companionship with him, how the hunted leveret sought to attract his notice, how the half frozen bees crawled towards him in the winter to be fed, how the wild falcon fluttered around him, how the nightingale sang about him in sweetest content in the lovely grove at Carceri, how his little brethren, the birds, listened so devoutly to his sermon by the roadside, that he chid himself for not having thought of preaching to them before.
His love of nature also stands out in bold relief in the world he moved in. He delighted to commune with the wild flowers, the crystal springs, and the friendly fire, and to greet the sun as it rose upon the Umbrian vale.
After the Columbian discovery of the New World, Fran- ciscan missionaries were sent to it with the adventurous soldiery, the originator of their order having died in October, 1226.
FATHER JUNIPERO SERRA.
This illustrious empire builder, the founder of the Fran- ciscan Missions of California, Father Junipero Serra, was born at Petra on the island of Majorca, November 24, 1713. He entered the Franciscan Order September 14, 1730, and made his vows on September 15th of the following year. Before receiving holy orders, he was made a Doctor of Divinity. He asked that he be accorded the privilege of devoting himself to the Missions in America. His petition having been granted, he sailed from Cadiz, on August 28,
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1749, with his friend, Father Palou. They landed at Vera Cruz and made their journey on foot from there to the City of Mexico. January 1, 1750, was the date of their arrival at the College of San Fernando in that city. He preached there. On his own request he was sent with Father Palou to the Indians of Sierra Gorda among whom they remained for nine years. Then he was assigned to the Apache Indians in the San Saba country in Texas with Father Palou, but the death of the Viceroy at that time prevented their going to those charges, so Father Serra and Palou remained at the College of San Fernando and were engaged in preaching to the Indians in that locality for seven years. While so engaged he received the appointment to the presi- dency of the California Missions.
On July 14, 1767, accompanied by eight other Friars, with the blessing of the Father Guardian, he left for his new field. On his way from Mexico he reached Tepic December 1, 1767. In March, 1768, they left the Mexican mainland, crossed the Gulf and arrived at Loreto Mission April 1, 1768. After appointing Father Palou, Superior of the Lower California Missions, Father Serra proceeded with a land expedition to Alta California. Four different expeditions had been planned, two to go by land, and the other two by water. One of the land expeditions was per- sonally conducted by Father Junipero Serra, it having left Loreto March 28, 1769. Father Junipero founded the first of the Upper California Missions at San Diego on July 16, 1769. The next founded by him was the San Carlos Mission located near Monterey, California, on June 3, 1770. The third was the one of San Antonio, on July 14, 1771.
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