USA > California > San Diego County > San Diego > History of San Diego, 1542-1908 : an account of the rise and progress of the pioneer settlement on the Pacific coast of the United States, Volume I > Part 16
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ROCHA, Juan José. Mexican lieutenant who came with Echeandía in 1825. under sentenee of banishment from Mexico for two years. Held different commands, at Monterey and else- where. Gave a ball in honor of the Hijar colony, 1834. Mar- ried Elena Dominguez. Spent his last years in San Diego. Father of Manuel Rocha, who was a member of the first grand jury at San Diego, in September, 1850.
RUIZ, Francisco María. Native of Lower California. At Santa Barbara from 1795. and from 1806 commandant at San Diego. Made captain in 1820 and retired in 1827. Grantee of the Peñasquitas Rancho, and died in 1839. at age of about 85. Never married.
Ile was the son of Juan Maria Ruiz and Isabel Carrillo, both of distinguished families. His father was killed by a lion. His brother; José Manuel, was governor of Lower California. IIe was a man of violent temper and quarrelsome disposition. and had serious difficulty with his relative, Captain de la Guerra y Noriega, whom he knocked down. He was also somewhat dis- sipated. He seems to have been well liked locally, notwithstand- ing his many faults.
SERRANO. José Antonio, son of Leandro Serrano. Married Rafaela, daughter of Rosario Aguilar. Their children were: Jesus, who is about seventy-five years of age and lives at Ven- tura : Luis, born March 12, 1846, married Serafina Stewart. daughter of John C. Stewart. and lives in San Diego; Rosa, who was married to Andrew Cassidy; and Adelaide, who was the first wife of Sam Ames, of Old Town.
José Antonio Serrano was a horse and cattle man. He served under Pico in the Mexican War, and was engaged at the battle of San Pasqual.
UBACH, Father Antonio D. Native of Catalonia. Edu- cated for a missionary priest at Cape Girardeau, Missouri, and had traveled thousands of miles as a missionary among the Indi- ans. He came to San Diego in 1866, and had been in charge of the Catholic parish here ever since. Had a dispensation which allowed him to wear a beard. He had Moorish blood in his veins. He brought the first organ to San Diego. In early days after the morning services were over, he would bring out a football which he brought with him here, and play with the boys on the plaza. He had the dagger of the celebrated bandit, Joaquin Marietta. He had also had charge of a large number of valuable relies of early Spanish days, including vestments, books of record, etc., from the old mission.
He was the "Father Gaspara" of Mrs. Jackson's Ramona, a eireumstance which gave him wide fame and made him an
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object of extraordinary interest to all strangers. For many years he refused to discuss the truth of the incidents of the story, but in the San Diego Union of June 25, 1905, he spoke of the marriage of Ramona as follows :
"Although it took place forty years ago, I remember it very well-how the couple came to me and asked me to marry them and how I was impressed with them. But it was not in the long adobe building which everybody points out as the place .- that is the Estudillo place-but it took place in the little church which stands not far away, near the old cemetery where the old mission bells are. Why, I would not marry them out- side of the church; Catholics know that. Mrs. Jackson herself says that the wedding took place in the chapel, and I can't imagine why the other building is the one that is usually pointed out.
"Do I know who Alessandro and Ramona were? Yes, but those were not their real names. I know what their right names were, but I do not care to tell. Mrs. Jackson suppressed them because she did not care to subject the families to the notoriety that they would be sure to get from the publication of the book. They were native families who lived in the coun- try, and I was well acquainted with them. I have never men- tioned their names to anyone and of course I don't want to do so now."
In 1874 he laid out the present Catholic cemetery on the hill back of old San Diego. In 1878-80, he went home and visited his people in Catalonia. A large part of his work here has been among the Indians, with whom he has had great influ- ence. The corner stone of the unfinished church at Old Town was laid in July, 1869, but he was destined to be unable to finish it. Three years later, a movement for a new building in new San Diego was commenced, and in 1875 he had the satis- faction of occupying a comfortable building on what was then mesa lands west of the new town. The present brick church was completed and occupied in 1894.
Father Ubach died at St. Joseph's Hospital on the afternoon of Saturday, March 27, 1907. He had been in failing health for several months, but insisted upon pursuing his accustomed tasks until he could no longer appear in public. His death. though not unexpected, impressed the community profoundly. It was the sundering of the last link which connected the new day with the olden time, for Father Ubach was in truth "the last of the padres." ITis funeral, which occurred in his church on the forenoon of Wednesday, April 2d, was exceed- ingly impressive. Bishop Conaty conducted the elaborate cer- emonies and pronounced the eulogy. The church was filled to overflowing, while thousands of mourners remained outside the
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building. Among the mass of floral emblems nothing was more touching than the wild flowers sent by the Indians from the mountains. The historic priest sleeps in the Catholic cemetery on the mesa, which overlooks the seene of his labors.
ZAMORANO, Augustin Vicente. Was a native of Florida, his parents being Spaniards. He received a good education and entered the army May 1. 1821, as a cadet. After service in Mexico he came to California in 1825 with Echeandía, and served as the governor's secretary for five years. In February, 1827, he married María Luisa, daughter of Santiago Arguello. In 1831, he was made captain of the Monterey company. He left California in 1838, but returned in 1842 and died the same year in San Diego. His children were: Dolores, born 1827, married to J. M. Flores; Luis, born in 1829 and now lives in San Diego; Gonzalo, born in 1832; Guadalupe, born in 1833, married to Henry Dalton : Josefa, born in 1834; Augustin, 1836; Eulalia, married to Vicente Estudillo.
His political career was an active and stormy one. In 1827-8 he was a district eleetor for San Diego; candidate for congress 1830; secretary to Figueroa in 1833-5. Proclaimed commander general and governor ad interim in 1837, and divided the juris- diction of the territory with Echeandía for a time. He left Cali- fornia at the fall of Guiterez, but returned to take part in the campaign against Alvarado, without achieving anything of consequence.
CHAPTER VII
THE INDIANS' RELATIONS WITH THE SETTLERS
HE relations of the Indian population with the T Mission Fathers have been sketched in earlier chapters, but we have still to study the natives as they appeared to the people of Old San Diego. The general observations made upon the Indian character hold good in both eases, and we must never forget that the course of local history might have been very different if the natives of this region had possessed the warlike traits and organizing genius of their brothers in most other parts of North America. In that case, San Diego could not have been settled at the time and in the manner it was. It would have taken more than a handful of indifferent soldiers to hold it against sneh pressure from without.
The Indians of this locality belonged to a number of tribes, varying somewhat in language and enstoms. Those living around the bay furnished most of the mission converts, and proved far more tractable than the hill tribes. The latter were "rounded up" and brought in by force occasionally, but had a habit of escaping at the first opportunity. The destruction of the Mission in 1775 was due to these half-wild Indians, and they also provided the Spanish and Mexican soldiers with their exense for being, in the brief intervals between their own petty revolutions. But the Indians were slow to give up their own language, mueh as it has been derided. It is of record that the friars failed utterly for several years to teach them Spanish, and had to resort to the expedient of learning the Indian dia- lect, themselves. Some of them became somewhat expert and able to preach to the Indians in their own language. An inter- esting relie of this eireumstance exists in the shape of the Lord's Prayer done into Dieguino, as follows :
.
Nagua anall amai tacagnach naguanetuuxp mamamulpo enynaca amaibo mamatam meyayam, cannaao amat amaibo quexuie echasau naguagui nanacachon naquin nipil meneque pao echeyuehapo nagua quexuic naguaich nacagnaihpo, nama- chamelan upchneh-gnelich-euiapo. Naeninchpampenehlich cuitpo- namat. Nepeuja.
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In Bartlett's Personal Narrative, is a brief account of his struggle with this language, while here in 1852:
No event that is worthy of mention occurred, except a visit from a band of Diegueno Indians. The chief and several of his tribe were sent to me at my request by a Californian gen- tleman. They were a miserable, ill-looking set, with dark- brown complexions and emaciated bodies; and, though the weatlı- er was cold, they were but slightly clad. Articles of old and cast-off clothing, such as a tattered shirt and pantaloons, were all that the best could boast of. One, I think the chief, had a piece of horse-blanket around his cadaverous-looking body. I managed to get from them a vocabulary of their language; though I must confess that, with the exception of the Apache, I never found one so difficult to express, in consequence of the gutturals and nasals with which it abounded. I finally got the words so correct, that the Indians could recognize them, and give me the Spanish equivalents. I tried to write down some short sentences, but was obliged to give up the attempt as un- successful. I could not combine the words so as to be under- stood, in a single instance. These Indians occupy the coast for some fifty miles above, and about the same distance below San Diego, and extend about a hundred miles into the interior. They are the same who were known to the first settlers as the Comeva tribe.
Dana has also left his opinion on record, which is worth reproducing : "The language of these people . . is the most brutish, without any exception, that I ever heard, or that could be conceived of. It is a complete slabber. The words fall off at the ends of their tongues, and a continual slabbering sound is made in the cheeks outside the teeth."
Not only had they no written language of their own, but they were provided with no facilities for acquiring one from their new masters. The friars were not merely indifferent to the edu- cation of the Indians-they were inflexibly opposed to it. Not even their favorite neophytes were permitted to learn to read, and their servants learned only such things as would aid them in providing for their masters' comfort. At a time when the territorial governors were utterly unable to provide for the edu- cation of the gente de razon, it was scarcely to be expected that they could do anything for the Indians, who were under the especial care and jurisdiction of the missionaries. To the sol- diers, the Indians were despised foes; to the citizens, they were inefficient and troublesome servants.
The employment of Indians as house servants was general, for they were very cheap. They were held under a strict dis- cipline and not infrequently thrashed, as it was claimed that in many cases they would not work without their regular casti- gation. While Wm. H. Davis and Captain Paty were dining with Captain Thomas W. Robbins at Santa Barbara in 1842. he
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told them about an Indian cook whom he had had in his employ for years, but who had to be soundly thrashed about twice a year to keep him in order the rest of the time. To prove this to his incredulous guests, he called the cook, a man weighing 200 pounds or more, who laughingly confessed the truth of the statement. It is related that Philip Crosthwaite had a number of Indians working for him, and sometimes they grew lazy and refused to work. Then he tied them up one at a time, and gave them a good whipping, whereupon they went to work again. They did not appear to resent such treatment, but acquiesced in its necessity. It seems to have been the custom to beat them for other causes, without "due process of law," in earlier days. In 1843, a San Diego man was fined fifty dollars because his wife had severely beaten an Indian servant. The missionaries did not hesitate to punish them for a variety of trivial offenses. Solitary confinement was a favorite form of discipline, but sometimes the good fathers would take them across their knees and administer the sort of castigation that is supposed to be the exclusive perquisite of small boys. In a few instances, the mission discipline was so severe as to lead to bloody rebellions, but nothing of this kind occurred at San Diego.
The story of the Indian, since known to white men, is largely a story of insurrections, crimes, and executions. There were men of good character among them, but they were "as two grains of wheat hid in a bushel of chaff." The story of these early troubles can only be briefly sketched.
Their first raid on the Mission seems to have been inspired by. a desire to plunder, coupled with profound ignorance of the white man's methods of warfare.
The destruction of the first mission, in 1775, was followed by an aftermath of troubles of various kinds. An Indian called Carlos, who had been a leader in the revolt, professed repent- ance and took refuge in the Presidio church. General Rivera ordered Father Fuster to deny the fugitive the right of asylum. and upon his refusal, forcibly entered the church and carried the Indian off. Fuster thereupon exeommunicated Rivera and was sustained by Serra when the matter came to his attention at Monterey. An excommunication was a very serious thing, in those days, even with the military, and Rivera was finally obliged to submit and return the Indian to Fuster.
Four Pamo chiefs concerned in this uprising, named Aaaran, Aalenirin, Aachil, and Taguagui, were convicted but pardoned upon promise of good behavior. Two years later, at the time of an Indian scare, when it was reported that the hill tribes were making arrows with the intention of again attacking the whites, Commandant Ortega sent a message of warning. and Aaaran defiantly invited him to send his soldiers into the hills
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to be slain. Eight soldiers went forth, surprised the savages at Pamo, killed two of them, burned a few more, and flogged the rest. The four chiefs were taken to San Diego for trial, along with 80 bows, 1500 arrows, and a large number of clubs. The men were condemned to death and executed by shooting on the 11th day of April, 1778-the first publie execution in California. It turned out that this first execution was illegal, Ortega having no right to inflict the death penalty without the approval of the governor.
After this, matters seem to have been quiet for several years. On October 30, 1824, an Indian was exeented by shooting, his offense not being disclosed by the records. Two years later,
VIEW OF OLD SAN DIEGO
Panorama of Old Town from Presidio Hill, taken soon after the fire of 1872, showing the river running into San Diego Bay
Lieutenant Ybarra, with a small force of Mazatlan men, had a battle with the Indians and lost three men, while killing twenty-eight of the foe. After the barbarous custom of the time, he sent in twenty pairs of ears. On April 23rd of this year, an Indian who was an accompliee to the killing of three soldiers and a neophyte was publicly exeented. There was also a battle between the Indians of San Felipe Valley and gentiles from the surrounding rancherías, in which eighteen of the hill Indi- ans were killed and their ears cut off.
The troubles and petty wars with the Indians during these years were chiefly due to their raids on the missions and ranehos for the purpose of stealing horses and cattle. Occasionally
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some of their number who had been at the missions returned to their old haunts and led these raids. The rancheros got together after such a raid, and went into the hills in parties of ten or twelve, well armed, to punish the thieves and recover the live stock. They were usually successful in recovering the stolen property, but often had fierce fights in which as many as eight or ten of the Indians were killed, as well as an occasional ranchero. After the secularization of the missions, the condi- tion of the Indians became very miserable, and while large numbers of them continued to live in rancherías and to practice the rude arts which they had learned of the missionaries, others were forced by want, and doubtless also led by inclination, to get their living by joining in these raids. When Alfred Robin- son was here in January, 1832, they were in a miserable condi- tion and daily reports were received of robberies and murders. From February to June of the following year there was much excitement due to rumors of a plot on the part of the Indians to unite and seize the mission property. A corporal was sent with a small force to El Cajon, where he seized Chief Jajochi and other malcontents, who were sentenced to terms of imprisonment.
Between the years 1836 and 1840, nearly all the ranchos in the country were phidered, at one time or another, and agri- culture fell to a very low ebb. In the spring of 1836, there were loud complaints and the soldiers could furnish no protec- tion, being without arms and ammunition. Juan María Marron was attacked in January, on the Cueros de Venado rancho, but the hostiles were driven off with the help of friendly Indians, and several of them killed. The savages became so bold that they even made raids into the town. An unsuccessful effort was made to have a garrison established at Santa Ysabel. In March, Don Sylvestre Portilla proposed to conquer the Indians at his own expense, on condition that he be allowed to keep those made prisoner, for servants.
The year 1837 was one of great anxiety for the San Diego people-a year of blood and terror. One of the best accounts of some of these disturbances is that in Davis's book, his wife having resided here as a girl at the time of their occurrence. It gives us such a vivid picture of the life of the times that it is worth quoting :
About the year 1837 there was an Indian outbreak in what is now San Diego county. A family by the name of Ybarra, consisting of the father, the mother, two young daughters, and a son abont twelve years of age, lived at the rancho San Ysidro. They had in their employ an old Indian woman, who had been christianized at the Mission, a very faithful and good woman, a. comadre to her mistress, the godmother of one of the Indian woman's children. This relation was frequently assumed by the California ladies, it being a mandate of the Catholic church
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MURDER OF YBARRA
everywhere, that any child that is christened shall be attended by a godfather and a godmother, and the Californians performed this religious duty toward the children of the poorer classes, including the Indians. The serving woman got information of an attack on the rancho which had been planned by Indians in the mountains, and a week before the occurrences here men- tioned she warned the family of their approach. She urged and begged that they at onee remove to the Presidio of San Diego for protection. Her mistress was anxious to follow the advice, but Ybarra himself disregarded it. He did not believe that the Indians contemplated a movement. The Californians were a brave people, especially in opposition to the Indians, whether they went out in pursuit of them to recover stolen horses, or otherwise. They were always prepared to resist an attack by them in their own homes, and did not fear them, but considered that three or four, or eight or ten of their number were suf- ficient to vanquish ten times that many Indians. Ybarra had with him two vaqueros on the ranch, and did not think it necessary to pay heed to the statement of the woman, who, the night before the attack, repeated, with emphasis, her advice for the family to leave, saving the next day the Indians would surely be there and carry out their plans.
The next morning at nine o'clock, while Ybarra and his vaqueros were at the corral, about 150 yards from the house, engaged in lassoing horses, with the intention of starting for San Diego, the Indians stealthily approached, to the number of 75 or 100. The three men in the corral, seeing them very near, immediately ran toward the house to secure arms. This design, however, was thwarted by a little Indian boy employed in the family, who, seeing them coming as they neared the house, shut and barred the door and prevented them from entering. He must have had knowledge of the designs of the Indians, and been in complicity with them, as by this act of the little villain, the three unarmed men were left outside at the mercy of the misereant savages, and were speedily killed. The Indians then broke into the house, and made a movement immediately to kill Doña Juana, the mistress, but the old Indian woman de- fended her at the peril of her own life; interceded with the In- dians and supplicated them to spare her mistress. This they did. The two daughters were also captured by the Indians and made prisoners. All the houses of the rancho were also burned. The mother was ordered by the savages to leave the house, and go on foot to San Diego. She set forth entirely disrobed. On approaching San Diego Mission she was clothed by a friendly woman, who came out and met her. In proceeding through a wheat field on the rancho she met her little son, who had gone out in the morning and had not encountered the savages. He now learned from his mother of the murder of his father and the two vaqueros, and the capture of his sisters. He was sent ahead to give information of the attack to the first Californian he might meet.
News of what had happened was immediately communicated to the Rancho Tia Juana, owned and occupied by Don Santiago Argüello, a beautiful piece of land having a fine stream of liv- ing water running through it. At that time several California families were encamped there, spending a portion of the sum-
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mer; the Bandinis, Alvarados and others. There were also sev- eral young ladies and girls, one of them Miss Estudillo.
At the Rancho Tia Juana the intelligence created much con- sternation, and the camps of the several families were im- mediately broken up. They proceeded to San Diego, accom- panied by the Arguello family, who took with them as many of their horses as they conveniently could. The Indians shortly after reached the place, burned the houses, and secured the stock which the owner had left behind in the fields.
The third night the Indians intended to fall upon the Rancho Jesus María, occupied by Don José Lopez with his wife and two daughters. News of the Indian outbreak reaching San Diego, it was resolved to send out a force for his protection and to reseue, if possible, the two girls captured at San Ysidro.
Don José Lopez had a large vineyard and manufactured wine, of which he occasionally imbibed more than was consistent with a well-regulated head. On the evening when the Indians were to attack him he was filled with wine, which led him to some extraordinary demonstrations. He went out and built a num- ber of large bonfires in the vicinity of his house, and then com- meneed shouting vociferously, making a great noise for his own entertainment only. As the Indians approached the place they sent out a spy in advance to reconnoitre and ascertain if every- thing was favorable for attack. The spy seeing the fires burn- ing, and hearing this loud and continued shouting, concluded that the Californians were there in force, and so reported to the main body of Indians, who deemed it prudent to re- tire. The next day the force arrived, and Lopez and family were escorted to San Diego, the main body of the troops going in pursuit of the Indians.
Ybarra, at the time he was murdered, had in San Diego two sons, who joined the company in pursuit, as they were anxious to learn everything possible regarding the fate of their sisters. They were soon informed by a captured spy that two of the chiefs had made them their wives. The company followed into the mountains, until they reached a rugged and broken country wholly inaccessible to horses, and were obliged to stop, the nar- row defiles affording innumerable hiding places for Indians and giving them an advantage over the approaching enemy. Had the Californians attempted to advance on foot they would have met with certain death, for the Indians swarmed in foree, knew the region intimately, and would have picked the troops off one by one. The two brothers Ybarra, however, urged on by desire to rescue their sisters, advanced further into the monn- tains than the rest of the company, actually saw the girls in the midst of the savages, and got within a short distance of them, but were so badly wounded by the arrows showered upon them that they were compelled to return. After that, up to the time Miss Estndillo left San Diego in 1842, nothing further was heard of the two girls.
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