USA > California > San Luis Obispo County > History of San Luis Obispo County, California, with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 24
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ARTILLERY COMPANY .- Louis McLane, of the navy, Captain (afterwards Major); John K. Wilson, Ist Lieuten- ant, appointed Captain in January, 1847; Wm. Black-
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THE CONQUEST.
burn,* 2d Lieutenant (afterward Alcalde of Santa Cruz).
BATTLE OF NATIVIDAD.
The battalion was organized during the month of November and was ready to commence its southward march on the 28th of November, 1846. On the 15th of November a party of Californians captured Mr. Larkin, former Consul, while en route from Monterey to San Juan, and attempted to force him to write a note to different persons of the battalion at San Juan to call upon him, the object being to thus capture the party in detail. Larkin repelled the proposition with scorn, although threatened with death. He was kept their prisoner, forced to accompany them in their retreat to Los Angeles, where he was at last restored to liberty by the defeat of the Californians. While a prisoner, the Californians, numbering 130, attacked and surrounded at Natividad a party of seven or eight Americans, and ordered Mr. Larkin to go and call them out, promising them liberty and safety if they would give up their arms and ammunition. This he refused to do, and while consulting on the matter they were attacked by fifty Americans and Walla Wallas, under Captain Burroughs, who were escorting a band of 400 horses to Fremont's camp at Monterey. The Californians fired upon the Americans, killing Captain Burroughs, Captain Foster, and Mr. Eames, all late-coming immigrants from St. Louis, Missouri. Three others were wounded. The Californians lost three killed and seven wounded. t
A BRAVE INDIAN FEAT.
The Californian, of November 21, 1846, published at Monterey, by Walter Colton and Robert Semple, reported the following :-
Burroughs and Foster were killed at the first onset. The Americans fired and then charged with their empty rifles, and ran them off. However, they still kept rally- ing, and firing now and then a musket at the Americans, until about eleven o'clock at night, when one of the Walla Walla Indians offered his services to come into Monterey and give Colonel Fremont notice of what was passing. Soon after he started he was pursued by a party of the enemy. The foremost in pursuit drove a lance at the Indian, who, trying to parry it, received the lance through his hand; he immediately, with the other hand, seized his tomahawk and struck a blow at his opponent, which split his head from the crown to the mouth. By this time the others had come up, and with the utmost dexterity and bravery, the Indian vanquished two more, and the rest ran away. He rode on towards this town as far as his horse was able to carry him, and then left his horse and saddle and came in on foot. He arrived here about eight o'clock on Tuesday morning, December 17th.
THE BATTALION ON THE MARCH.
Fremont marched with his force from Monterey in pursuit of the Californians, but they had fled to the south. This party was composed of some inhabitants of the pueblos and a few rancheros who had been forced by the former to join them. Fremont arrived at San Juan two days after the engagement at Natividad. He then
determined to march south as soon as some reinforce- ments reached him from the north, which he was expect- ing. On the 28th of November he left San Juan, and arrived at the mission of San Miguel on the Ioth of December. The stock of cattle which had been col- lected from the ranchos on the road being exhausted, the battalion feasted on mutton, as sheep were more abun- dant than cattle in that neighborhood. The horses were becoming weak from exhaustion, as the grass was insuffi- cient for their proper sustenance, and in order to relieve them, the entire battalion, officers and men, marched on foot, turning their horses loose with saddles and bridles upon them, to be driven along by the horse guard.
A SHOCKING EXECUTION.
On the 15th of December an Indian was captured at a rancho by the advance guard. On the day following he was condemned to be shot as a spy. He was tied to a tree, where he stood twenty minutes, until the Indians from a neighboring rancheria could be driven up to witness the execution. A file of soldiers was then ordered to fire upon him. It would seem difficult to justify an act of this nature under the circumstances of the case. A spy is presumed to have intelligence sufficient, at least, to understand the character of the obligation he assumes, which could not be alleged in this instance, as the victim was simply an ignorant California rancho Indian. It was said, in justification of the act, that a letter was found upon his person from his patron (master) directed to some prominent Californian, presumably in regard to the war.
VORACIOUS SOLDIERS.
On December 14th the battalion commenced its march on foot, the rain pouring down in torrents. There was a halt made at noon and cattle slaughtered and cooked for dinner. Beef was now their only food. The sheep had all been killed, and no more could be found. Four- teen to fifteen beeves were slaughtered every afternoon for the consumption of the battalion. It was stated that the average consumption per man of fresh beef was ten pounds per day.
CAPTURE OF SAN LUIS OBISPO.
The march was resumed late in the afternoon of the 14th, and the foot of the Cuesta reached in the night; it was raining heavily. A family in the cañada, Don J. Mariano Bonilla's, were taken prisoners by the advance party, to prevent an alarm being given to the enemy that was supposed to be in San Luis. The place was ap- proached in great confusion on account of the darkness, the men straying along in loose order. A small force, if properly disposed and handled skillfully, could have re- pulsed the battalion with severe loss. But there was no military force at the town. A halt was made on the im- mediate outskirts of the place, to collect together the scattered files of men stretching along the road for half a mile. The artillery under Lieutenant Mclane and the pack-animals with an escort, were yet in the rear, struggling slowly along through mud and water and darkness.
A solitary light was seen to flicker for a moment in the direction of the town and then disappear. It seemed to
+ Brother of D. D. and J. H. Blackburn, of Paso Robles. +Letter of T. O. Larkin.
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HISTORY OF SAN LUIS OBISPO COUNTY.
indicate the exact position of the place. The enemy, it was supposed, had extinguished their lights purposely, in order to conceal their position from the Americans, and were anxiously awaiting their approach, anticipating an easy victory, under cover of the impenetrable darkness of the night. The American force formed in column, the men awaiting the signal to charge. The bugle sounded. And 300 horsemen galloped furiously down the main street, the Walla Walla Indians shouting their fierce war-whoop. The town was taken. The inhabitants, who were all in their beds fast asleep, were greatly alarmed upon being suddenly awakened by the terrible uproar. They made no resistance, and the entire population were taken pris- oners, except two who managed to escape and fled in great terror, through the darkness of the night. No acts of violence were reported, however. The soldiers were quartered in some of the adobe buildings of the mission. These not affording sufficient accommodations for the troops, a large number were quartered in the church. A guard was placed, however, day and night, to prevent the altar and the decorations of the church from sacrilegious hands.
PICO TAKEN PRISONER.
Don José de Jesus Pico, a prominent ranchero who had held important positions of trust under the Mexican Government, and who had also figured conspicuously in several California revolutions, was brought in a prisoner. He was found at the house of a friend in the neighbor- hood. It was supposed by the American commander that he had been using his great influence to incite a gen- eral uprising against the American cause.
On the following day earthworks were thrown up on the hill near the present lines of Morro and Mill Streets. The artillery was placed so as to command the approaches to the town, as a large force of the enemy was supposed to be somewhere in the neighborhood. A court martial was convened on the 16th, for the trial of Pico on a charge of the forfeiture of his parole, which, it was alleged, had been taken on a previous occasion. It appeared at the trial that the letter which had been found on the per- son of the Indian who had been executed on the 13th, was written by Pico to one of his countrymen. The con- tents of the letter were not made public. But it was stated that they denounced in severe terms the manner in which the war was then being conducted on the part of the Americans, or to that effect. That it was not in ac- cordance with the rules of civilized warfare to plunder the property of neutrals or non-combatants, as the Americans were doing, in driving off stock from the ranchos, and leaving the owners, by the deprivation of their horses, without the means of taking care of the cattle that were left to them, and thus reducing themselves and their fam- ilies to want if not absolute distress That this was the course pursued by Fremont is undeniable. That it was a flagrant violation of the rules of civilized warfare is also true. Hence it is apparent that, as the American commander habitually disregarded in this manner the plainest princi- ples of right and justice prescribed by the usages of civil. ized nations in the conduct of their wars with each other,
he was himself estopped from exacting a strict compliance with them, by those whom he was then injuring. The result, however, of the court martial was that Pico was
4
CONDEMNED TO BE SHOT
On the following day. The sentence of the court was unjust in every respect, for independent of the circum- stances above related, Pico, when taken, was not in arms, nor was he engaged in raising a force to oppose the Americans.
RESCUED BY FAIR LADIES.
On the morning of the 17th a procession was seen pas- sing slowly along the corridor of the mission buildings, composed of matronly looking ladies leading by the hand several little children. The leader was a lady of fine ap- pearance, with uncovered head. The countenances of the others were concealed by their rebosas, their heads bowed, and many of them sobbing audibly. They pro- ceeded to the quarters of Colonel Fremont, and falling upon their knees before him, and amid tears and sobs, entreated for the pardon of Pico. Fremont received them kindly, and listened with patience to their earnest solicitations. For a long time he remained obdurate; but at last relented-a few minutes only before the time fixed for the sentence of the court martial to be carried into effect. Pico was pardoned. The leader of the pro- cession of matrons was Doña Ramona Wilson, the mother of Governor Romualdo Pacheco.
THE BATTALION IN SAN LUIS OBISPO.
Upon the arrival of the foraging parties with steers and bands of fresh horses from the neighboring ranchos, the mud batteries were abandoned, all the prisoners dis- charged and the order to saddle up given. The battalion presented a unique appearance. First came the men of the exploring party, who had crossed the plains with Fremont. They were clad in buckskin suits ornamented with fringes of the same material. They wore moccasins, and many had caps made of the skins of the panther and catamount, beneath which their long hair fell streaming over their shoulders. They were men of approved cour- age and were capable of sustaining any fatigue or priva- tion. Broad leathern girdles surrounded their waists, from which were suspended a bowie and hunter's knife, with a brace of pistols. These, with the rifle and holster pistols, were the arms carried by officers and privates. Next followed the volunteers from American settlers, with broad-brimmed, low-crowned hats, shirts of blue flannel, and buckskin or cloth pantaloons, some wearing moccasins and others brogans, and carrying the same arms as the exploring party, and many of them wearing their hair in a similar manner. Then came the Walla Wallas, a band of Oregon Indians. They had a pecul- iarly sallow look, as the rain had washed off their war- paint. They were dressed in buckskin garments, and their hair, matted and unkempt, had draggling feathers stuck in it here and there. They carried rifles, and at their girdles a large knife and tomahawk. Following these was a small band of California Indians from the
DAIRY RANCH & RESIDENCE OF MARIANO ESTRADA, NEAR CAMBRIA, SAN LUIS OBISPO CO. CAL.
DAIRY RANCH & RESIDENCE OF L. NELSON, 4 MILES SOUTH OF CAMBRIA. SAN LUIS OBISPO CO.CAL.
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THE CONQUEST.
Cosumnes River under their Chief, Antonio. They were a scurvy looking set of savages, half-clothed and exceed- ingly dirty. They were armed with bows and arrows. The artillery, consisting of two pieces, was under the command of Lieutenant McLane of the navy. The order to march was given at ten o'clock on the morning of the 17th December, 1846. The bugle sounded the note, and the battalion took up its line of march to the south.
A PICTURE OF DESOLATION.
One of the participants in that famous campaign re- lates the following vivid reminiscence of the march from San Luis Obispo and the passage of the Santa Ynez Mountains :-
For three days after that surprising night attack on San Luis Mission, we remained in camp and "let it rain." The favored companies of the battalion were quartered in the mission buildings, and the others improvised such shelter as they could, until they were fairly washed out of tents and from behind adobe walls, and apparently in danger of being floated from off the solid land out to sea, and then the order was given to open the church doors, and the drowning rats rushed in and spread their dripping blankets on the stone floor. The deluge pre- vailed three days, or until the 18th, when the battalion was set in motion again, and we waded four leagues to the sea-shore, probably with some faint thought in the Colonel's mind that we should yet be compelled to com- mit ourselves to rafts. While at the mission he performed the second act of military prowess during the campaign, or, perhaps I should say, the third, counting from, the execution of the poor Digger Indian. Our only military prisoner of rank taken during the war, Don Tortorio* José de Jesus Pico, was tried by a court martial, and sentenced to be shot. His offense was breaking his pa- role, Pico having been concerned in the first insurrection against the new authorities, and when resistance seemed hopeless, given his parole of honor not to take up arms against the United States again. He was a relativeof Don Andreas Pico, one of the leaders of the insurgents against whom we were now marching, and it was said that his visit to San Luis had some connection with Don Andreas Pico's operations in the south. But Tortorio was born under a luckier star than his poor Digger dispatch-bearer, for the next morning his countrywomen living at the mission sought an audience with Fremont, and pleaded with such success that his life was spared, and he was permitted to accompany the expedition.
GOLD AGAINST .SUGAR.
It was at the mission of San Luis Obispo, also, that I effected one of the important exchanges of my life, judg- ing from the satisfaction it afforded me at the time, and the willingness with which I submitted to the extortion. I paid my last gold coin, a quarter-eagle, for an ounce of Mexican panoche, a little black, dirty lump of native sugar. But no nectar was ever half so sweet, nor was there ever a sweetness so long drawn out; my memory has fed upon it ever since.
FREMONT'S STRATEGY.
After a week of wearisome watches and hungry biv ouacs, we reached the base of the Santa Barbara Mount" ains, and encamped on the grounds of the Santa Ynez Mission. It was said to be Fremont's intention to baffle the enemy, who were supposed to still hold possession
of Santa Barbara, by a flank movement, crossing the mountains above the town while they watched for them by the main road, and so, sweeping down along the sea-shore, surprise them. This, to be sure, was about what we had been doing ever since the battalion marched southward, and if we had not surprised the enemy at any point we had been ourselves astonished, and I ought to add, dis- gusted more than once.
The theory of Fremont's campaign was so absurd that it dropped below criticism at our camp-fires. Every man, down to the Digger horse-thief Indians, knew that we were beating the air in our roundabout marches ; that while we were wearing out our animals and exhausting the strength of our hardiest men, by seeking out the roughest and most impracticable starvation routes south- ward, in the vain hope of stealing a march on the foe, his well-mounted spies knew all about our movements, and where we encamped every night. However, the surprise maggot in our leader's brain was about to hatch out again, and we lighted our camp-fires at Santa Ynez, and killed the last of our lean beeves. Sitting around the side of ribs staked against the glowing embers, we mood- ily watched the play of the flames shining through the thin roast, and envied the greedy tongues of fire that licked up the few drops of fat that fell from it. It was the night before Christmas eve, and there came forth from out of the fire garlanded oxen and prize beeves, larding the lean earth as they came along, like those well-favored kine, perhaps, which Pharaoh saw come out of the Nile in his dream, only these latter were types of fat things to come, while our bovine procession was made up of well-preserved shadows of former Christmases. From these dreams of the past we turned to our present reality of skinny roasts, eaten without salt, of butterless bread and breadless butter.
CROSSING THE MOUNTAIN.
The morning of Christmas eve broke cheerily for all our troublés, and gave promise of a clear day. Enlivened by the prospects of a Christmas dinner of frijoles, and possibly a fat ox from the plains around Santa Barbara, the camp awoke in good spirits at the first blast of Miller's bugle. The order had been issued the night before that we were to cross the mountains that day, and it soon transpired that we were to attempt the passage by a narrow path which had been used in former times when the missions were in their glory, but had of late years been abandoned. It was only a bridle path up steep ascents, and though it presented no serious hardships to foot soldiers, and was even traveled with tolerable ease by our skeleton mules and horses, it was a road full of difficulties to our company of improvised artillerymen. The field-pieces were dragged up by ropes, and our progress was so delayed by the frequent halts, where the acclivities seemed insurmountable, that the day was well- nigh gone before we reached the summit of the mountain. A cold wind swept the heights, the sun went down in a bank of ominous clouds, but there was no help for it. We must pass the night on this rocky crest. The fierce blasts almost blew away our little fires of light manzanita brush, and our larder was as bare as the crags around us. But we had our songs and stories for the night before Christmas, and when the bugle sounded stretched our aching bones and empty bellies under the lee of rocks, wherever a thin layer of earth or a softer stratum of granite than the rest offered a couch, spreading our tat- tered and muddy blankets between us and the weather.
A TERRIBLE STORM.
At midnight the heavens were overspread with clouds, and the wind, which had freshened to a gale, bore to our ears the hoarse, prolonged roar of ocean. Our sailor
*Tortorio, a nickname.
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HISTORY OF SAN LUIS OBISPO COUNTY.
men lay awake and listened, and predicted the roughest und nastiest kind of weather. At morn the tempest broke. One glimpse of the great, white, wild sea was vouchsafed to those who were first up, and then the clouds closed over it and we were enveloped in mist and driving rain, and nearly caught up into the air by the fury of the pitiless wind.
Out from the clefts of the rocks and from behind sheltering crags crept the haggard soldiers at the com- mand, "Fall in! Forward!" But there was no forward, for the exulting gale fairly pinned us to the rocks when we essayed to move. Our route lay down the mountain by a path almost as difficult as the ascent had been the day before. For a few moments the men stood irreso- lute and cowering, and then the column began to melt away and disappear in the driving scud like phantoms. Order and discipline were at an end, and every individual must fight a battle for self. Only two organizations remained intact the artillery company and the men detailed for the horse guard. The latter strove in vain to compel the horses and mules to face the blinding storm. They wandered hither and thither along the slippery steeps, conscious of their danger, shivering with cold and terror, but unable to go forward. A few were led down the path and a few more followed and were forced to go down the descent. The plucky gunners stuck to their field-pieces as long as there was a chance in their favor. But now new difficulties and dangers beset us. The hurricane raging above our heads began to form torrents and cascades along our track. The narrow mule-path we were following became the bed of a foaming mountain river, which loosened stones and bowklers and unrooted young trees in its course. Men and animals were swept before it. For human life there was a foothold, by clinging to the face of projecting rocks and crawling up the steep gully sides; but horses and mules were actually crushed over precipices, and either killed outright or crippled beyond cure. In their half-famished state the strength of our soldiers soon gave out. Shoeless and coatless, and hugging their arms under their thin, ragged blankets, many of them sank down, benumbed and exhausted, wherever they could find shelter.
As to the youth who writes these veracious pages, his condition was not such as would have made glad the heart of his mother or graced a Christmas party in a parlor. Early in the day he had parted with the rem- nant of his hat, wishing it a Merry Christmas as it sped away on the wings of the rejoicing winds in the direction of Yerba Buena. Attired in blue flannel shirt, sailor trowsers, and moccasins, he was in proper trim to test the Irish proverb of "a light heart and a thin pair of breeches." The whole of the future of that long-haired youth seemed to condense itself, on that day, into two distinct propositions which it seemed his bounden duty to fulfill at all hazards. 'The first was to get down out of that mountain, and the second to keep fast hold of his gun -very simple and obvious requirements, one would say. But it certainly does make a difference, in looking upon our simple duties, whether we view them from the front of a grate, full of glowing embers, or from the midst of a roaring tornado on the top of Santa Ynez Mountain, with blinding sheets of rain enveloping your freezing body, pouring cataracts on your path, and ruffian gales disputing possession of your last garment. I have never been able to recall exactly the process by which I slid like an icicle down those merciless heights. I remember once making a clear leap some twelve or fif- teen feet, and again endeavoring to extricate my legs from between rocks and mud, drawing my feet out of my moccasins.
The foot-hills were reached at last, and on the first
strip of level ground the sorry fragments of the now famous battalion huddled together and made their miser- able camp. By indefatigable labor and perseverance a few fires were lighted. Some of the veteran frontiersmen had led their company pack-mules down the mountain, starting very early in the morning. A few other animals had been washed down the rocks and were grouped, more dead than alive, in a place of partial shelter. 'The rain still fell and the wind raved, nor did the storm abate until morning.
All night long men straggled into camp. Those who had found tolerable shelter, where they could light fires to keep themselves from freezing, remained on the mountain-side; a few had found caves and holes, into which they crept and passed the night. The horse guard battled all the morning with a threefold enemy- the perils of the weather and road, the obstinacy of the mules, and the perversity of horse instinct. They were compelled, in order to save their own lives, to abandon them at last, and numbers of the poor beasts perished on the mountains. The gallant artillerists made a desperate struggle to bring off their pieces with them, but in the final sauve qui peut they left them high and wet, stuck fast in the perilous pathway.
The writer found himself at night at the foot of the hill of difficulty, bareheaded, sore-footed, with one leg of his trowsers slashed up to the thigh, calcinero fashion, but grimly holding on to that gun. We lay down in the sheets of water which overspread the earth everywhere, and supperless and fireless shivered the long night away. I have ever looked kindly on the wet-sheet treatment of hydropathists since that Christmas when we were envel- oped by day and swathed by night in drenching sheets.
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