USA > California > San Francisco County > San Francisco > The annals of San Francisco; containing a summary of the history of California, and a complete history of its great city: to which are added, biographical memoirs of some prominent citizens > Part 3
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That honor was reserved to Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo, one of the pilots of Cortez. Cabrillo was a Portuguese by birth, and a man of great courage and honor. On the 27th June, 1542, under instructions from the then viceroy of Spain, Antonio de Mendoza, he sailed from the port of Navidad in Mexico, on an expedition of discovery of the coast towards the north. He touched at various places on the voyage. The large cape between the fortieth and forty-first degrees of latitude he named Cope Mendoza, or Mendocino, in honor of the viceroy. Cabrillo reached 44° lat. N., where he found the cold (10th March) intense. This, the want of provisions, and the bad condition of his ships, compelled him to return to Navidad, the harbor of which place he re-entered on 14th April, 1543. This is according to the authority of Venegas. Other accounts say that Cabrillo, who had been long sick, and was overcome at last by the fatigues of the voyage, died at Port Possession, in the Island of San Ber- nardo, one of the Santa Barbara group, about the thirty-fourth parallel, upon the 3d January, 1543, leaving the subsequent guidance of the expedition farther northwards to Bartolomé Ferrelo, his pilot. Ferrelo is said to have named a promon- tory about the forty-first degree of latitude, Cabo de Fortunas (Cape of Perils, or Stormy Cape), from the rough weather and dangers encountered in its vicinity. This promontory is supposed to be the same, already noticed, which was called Cape Men- docino. There is therefore some discrepancy between the accounts of the voyage under the command of Cabrillo, or successively of him and his pilot Ferrelo. Neither of these navigators,
27
EXPEDITION OF SIR FRANCIS DRAKE.
however, while they noticed and named various prominent points of the coast, seem to have discovered the entrance to the great Bay of San Francisco.
DEHL SCHLAGER SE
SIR FRANCIS DRAKE-From an old English Painting.
In 1577, Sir Francis, then only Captain Drake, already dis- tinguished as an experienced navigator, fitted out, with the pecu- niary aid of some friends, a buccaneering expedition against the
28
ANNALS OF SAN FRANCISCO.
Spaniards, which ultimately led him round the globe. In those days, and for a long time afterwards, the rich Spanish ships, which bore over so many seas the wealth of their new-found world, were the natural prey of the English buccaneers-or, to give them a more honorable title, since they generally sailed under formal license from the government, of the English privateers. Drake, Cavendish, Dampier, and many other famous early navigators, were all of that class. The wealth of the Philippines was gen- erally conveyed by a single annual galleon from Manilla to Acapulco, on its way to Europe. To intercept this particular ship was one great aim of these privateers. Drake, in his expe- dition of 1577, after safely threading the Straits of Magellan, reached, at length, the Pacific, north of the equator, and appears, in 1579, to have sailed along the shores of California. All along the west coast of the Americas he had been capturing and plun- dering the newly settled Spanish towns, and such ships as came in his way. Wishing at length to return home, and afraid lest the Spaniards might be waiting to catch him off the Straits of Magellan, he tried to sail westward, and so reach England by the Cape of Good Hope. This was in the autumn of 1579. Con- trary winds preventing that course, "he was obliged," to use the language of an old chronicler of the voyage, " to sail towards the north ; in which course, having continued at least six hundred leagues, and being got into forty-three degrees north latitude, they found it intolerably cold ; upon which they steered south- wards, till they got into thirty-eight degrees north latitude, where they discovered a country, which, from its white cliffs they called NOVA ALBION, though it is now known by the name of California.
" They here discovered a bay, which entering with a favorable gale, they found several huts by the water side, well defended from the severity of the weather. Going on shore, they found a fire in the middle of each house, and the people lying round it upon rushes. The men go quite naked, but the women have a deer skin over their shoulders, and round their waist a covering of bulrushes after the manner of hemp.
" These people bringing the admiral (Drake) a present of feathers and cauls of network, he entertained them so kindly
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DESCRIPTION OF THE NATIVES.
and generously, that they were extremely pleased, and soon after- wards they sent him a present of feathers and bags of tobacco. A number of them coming to deliver it, gathered themselves together at the top of a small hill, from the highest point of which one of them harangued the admiral, whose tent was placed at the bottom. When the speech was ended, they laid down their arms and came down, offering their presents ; at the same time returning what the admiral had given them. The women remaining on the hill, tearing their hair and making dreadful howlings, the admiral supposed them engaged in making sacri- fices, and thereupon ordered divine service to be performed at his tent, at which these people attended with astonishment.
HOVIELL CEL.
Sir Francis Drake and the California Indians.
" The arrival of the English in California being soon known through the country, two persons in the character of ambassadors came to the admiral, and informed him, in the best manner they
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ANNALS OF SAN FRANCISCO.
were able, that the king would visit him, if he might be assured of coming in safety. Being satisfied on this point, a numerous company soon appeared, in front of which was a very comely person, bearing a kind of sceptre, on which hung two crowns, and three chains of great length. The chains were of bones, and the crowns of net work, curiously wrought with feathers of many colors.
"Next to the sceptre-bearer came the king, a handsome majestic person, surrounded by a number of tall men, dressed in skins, who were followed by the common people, who, to make the grander appearance, had painted their faces of various colors, and all of them, even the children, being loaded with presents.
" The men being drawn up in line of battle, the admiral stood ready to receive the king within the fences of his tent. The company having halted at a distance, the sceptre-bearer made a speech, half an hour long, at the end of which he began sing- ing and dancing, in which he was followed by the king and all the people ; who, continuing to sing and dance, came quite up to the tent ; when sitting down, the king took off his crown of feathers, placed it on the admiral's head, and put on him the other ensigns of royalty ; and it is said that he made him a solemn tender of his whole kingdom ; all which the admiral accepted in the name of the queen his sovereign, in hopes that these proceedings might, one time or other, contribute to the advantage of England.
" The common people, dispersing themselves among the admi- ral's tents, professed the utmost admiration and esteem for the English, whom they considered as more than mortal ; and accord- ingly prepared to offer sacrifices to them, which the English rejected with abhorrence, directing them, by signs, that their religious worship was alone due to the Supreme Maker and Preserver of all things.
" The admiral and some of his people, travelling to a distance in the country, saw such a quantity of rabbits, that it appeared an entire warren ; they also saw deer in such plenty as to run a thousand in a herd. THE EARTH OF THE COUNTRY SEEMED TO PROMISE RICH VEINS OF GOLD AND SILVER, SOME OF THE ORE BEING CONSTANTLY FOUND ON DIGGING.
31
BODEGA, SAN FRANCISCO, AND DRAKE'S BAYS.
" The admiral, at his departure, set up a pillar with a large plate on it, on which was engraved her majesty's name, picture, arms, and title to the country ; together with the admiral's name, and the time of his arrival there."
This is a curious and interesting picture of the aborigines of California. From the description of their naked bodies and painted faces, their howlings, singing and dancing, the girdles of bulrushes of the women, and the "kind of sceptre, on which hung" the chains of bone and the crowns of network "curiously wrought with feathers of many colors," of the king, it may be presumed that the people were in the rudest state of barbarism. Though the earth seemed streaked with gold, or, as Pinkerton says in his description of Drake's voyage, "the land is so rich in gold and silver, that upon the slightest turning it up with a spade or pick-axe, these rich metals plainly appear mixed with the mould," yet the natives do not appear to have worn any orna- ments made of these metals, which has usually been the case with other savages when they had access to them. The beauty and purity of the metals named, especially of gold, and the ease of working in them, naturally render them precious in the eyes of the most barbarous tribes. Unless, therefore, we suppose the Indians to have been the most stupid and helpless people exist- ing, it may be reasonably doubted whether so extensive indica- tions of gold and silver were found as the broad statements of the chroniclers seem to imply. Certainly, however, the traces of the precious metals discovered by Drake were the first authentic intimation of the mineral wealth of the country.
There is no reason to suppose that Drake knew of the previ- ous discovery of the country by the Spaniards ; and accordingly long afterwards, and even with people to this day, it has been believed that he was the first discoverer of California. Queen Elizabeth afterwards knighted him for his services in this and previous expeditions, " telling him, at the same time," in the words of the writer of his voyages already quoted, "that his ac- ticns did him more honor than his title." The queen, however, took no steps to secure the country which her admiral had discov- ered : and the " pillar, with a large plate on it," and all its rusted
32
ANNALS OF SAN FRANCISCO.
engravings, may peradventure be yet some day discovered by the antiquary.
In popular estimation the bay which Drake entered is believ- ed to be that of San Francisco ; while many who might have had opportunities to examine into the subject have hastily concluded
Sir Francis Drake's Bay, or Jack's Harbor
that it must have been Bodega Bay. There is, however, another bay not far from these, and lying between them, known formerly under the very name of Sir Francis Drake's Bay, though better now as Jack's Harbor. This, on a careful examination of the subject, seems to have been the true and only bay which Drake ever visited on the coast. There is a sad confusion, even among recent writers and geographers, as to the names and relative positions of these bays. Most of them seem to think that Bodega and Drake's Bays are the same. Thus Humboldt says, " This port (San Francisco) is frequently confounded by geogra-
1
33
SIR FRANCIS DRAKE'S BAY.
phers with the Port of Drake farther north, under the 38º 10' of latitude, called by the Spaniards the Puerto de Bodega." The latitude of Jack's Harbor, or Drake's Bay, is 37° 59' 5" (longitude 122° 573'), thus corresponding exactly with the statement of the chronicler ; while San Francisco and Bodega Bays are a good many miles to the south and north respectively of the parallel named by him. If Drake had really entered San Francisco Bay, it is more than likely that he, or his chronicler, would have said something more of its peculiarities-its unusual excellence, and the great arms which it stretches both to south and north. In the English maps, constructed after Drake's voyage, there is a bay laid down bearing his name ; although, owing to the general ignorance of the coast and the confusion in regard to particular bays alluded to, this bay has been often held to be the same as that of Bodega. There is, therefore, every probability that the Bay of San Francisco had never been seen at all by either the Spanish or the English navigators (for there were others of the latter nation after Drake along the California coast), but that, in reality, it was discovered by travellers on land, and most pro- bably first by the missionaries in 1769. It may also be remarked in corroboration of these opinions, that the white cliffs and the abundance of rabbits seen by Drake, closely correspond to the present description of Punta de los Reyes (Cape of Kings), and the country around Jack's Harbor. The cliffs about this part of the coast, for a space of nearly forty miles, resemble in height and color, those of Great Britain in the English Channel, at Brighton and Dover. Hence the propriety of the old designation of the country, New Albion. We give an illustration of these cliffs and of Drake's Bay. This bay has somehow grown out of most people's remembrance, or at least their appreciation, since it is a very safe and most important port of refuge along a foggy and dangerous coast. A number of fishing vessels have made use of it during the last few years, and it was their crews who dubbed it Jack's Harbor, in ignorance of its previous name. It is likely that public attention will be called to its peculiar advantages before long. We think, however, that no new name should be allowed to supersede the historical one of "Sir Francis Drake's
3
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ANNALS OF SAN FRANCISCO.
Bay." It would be a pity not to preserve some such remembrance of one of the greatest and earliest navigators along our coasts.
On the 14th of October, 1587, Captain Thomas Cavendish, afterwards knighted by Queen Elizabeth, when in a privateering expedition against the Spaniards, fell in with Cape St. Lucas, at the extremity of California. A fine bay, named by the Span- iards Aguada Segura, is within this cape, and there Cavendish lay in wait for the Acapulco galleon, laden with the wealth of the Philippines. At length she appeared, and after a severe fight, was taken possession of by the English admiral. "This prize," says the relator of the voyage, " contained one hundred and twenty-two thousand pezoes of gold, besides great quantities of rich silks, satins, damask and musk, and a good stock of provi- sions." Pretty fair all that for an English adventurer ! In those days, piracy was honorable, and legalized by formal license, though the spoil was only gold and silver and light moveable goods-booty of the common robber. After all, the old buccaneers were poor grovelling souls. In our own times, pirates-called "filibusters," whose business is notoriously unlawful, have much grander views of glory and profit. Cuba and Sonora, which are countries equal to Italy of the old world in beauty, fertility and real wealth, are certainly prizes worth stealing and fighting for-the rewards of Alexanders, Cæsars and Bonapartes. But then, principles of action being nearly the same, " Young America" is very much smarter than " Old England."
The next Englishman who is specially recorded to have touched the California coast is Captain Woodes Rogers, who was in command of the usual filibustering or privateering expeditions. This was in November, 1709. He describes the aborigines of the peninsula as being " quite naked, and strangers to the European manner of trafficking. They lived in huts made of boughs and leaves, erected in the form of bowers, with a fire before the door, round which they lay and slept. The men were quite naked, and the women had only a short petticoat reaching scarcely to the knce, made of silk grass, or the skins of pelicans or deers. Some of them wore pearls about their necks, which they fastened with a string of silk grass, having first notched them round : and Captain Rogers imagined that they did not know how to bore
35
CAPTAIN WOODES ROGERS.
them. These pearls were mixed with sticks, bits of shells and little red berries, which they thought so great an ornament that they would not accept of glass beads of various colors, which the English would have given thein. The men are straight and well built, having long black hair, and are of a dark brown complexion. They live by hunting and fishing. They use bows and arrows,
Landing of Captain Woodes Rogers,-from an old English engraving.
and are excellent marksmen. The women, whose features are rather disagreeable, are employed in making fishing lines, or in gathering grain (doubtless what grew spontaneously), which they grind upon a stone. The people were willing to assist the English in filling water, and would supply them with whatever they could get ; they were a very honest people, and would not take the least thing without permission." This description, and that already given from Drake's voyage, make up a pretty complete picture of the aborigines of the Californias. They appear to have been a simple, honest, good-natured, stupid race of people, and,
1148460
36
ANNALS OF SAN FRANCISCO.
in most respects, resemble the savages which we find in other newly discovered countries.
Captain Rogers was, of course, lying in ambush for the " great Manilla ship ; " and, in due course of time, she appeared and was captured. " The prize was called Nuestra Señora de la Incarnacion, commanded by Sir Jolm Pichberty, a gallant French- mau ; and the prisoners said that the cargo in India amounted to two millions of dollars. She carried one hundred and ninety- three men, and mounted twenty guns."
As illustrating the career of these English buccaneers, and the state of terror in which the Spaniards were constantly kept by their depredations, and which was one of the chief eanses that induced the Spanish Government, as we shall afterwards sec, strennously to prosecute farther discoveries and settlements along the coast of California, we shall give a copy of a deed, or instru- ment, executed between the said Captain Rogers and the town of Guiaquil. The exploits of Rogers and his men are indeed much later in date than some of the expeditions yet to be noticed, of the Spanish navigators along the California coast ; still, as they forcibly explain one reason, at least, why such expeditions were undertaken on the part of the Spaniards, it appears better to notice them here than in mere chronological order. The notices of the voyages of Drake, Cavendish and Rogers, are taken from accounts contained in an old folio volume of voyages and travels kindly placed at our disposal by the " Society of California Pio- neers."
The "high contracting parties " entered into the following agreement :
" CONTRACT FOR THE RANSOM OF THE TOWN OF GUIAQUIL:
" Whereas the City of Guiaquil, lately in subjection to Philip V., King of Spain, is now taken by storm, and in possession of the Captains Thomas Dover, Woodes Rogers, and Stephen Courtney,"-[the expedition, fitted out at the cost of some "British gentlemen," consisted of the Duke, a ship of three hundred tons burthen, thirty guns and one hundred and seventy inen, commanded by Rogers, and the Duchess, of two hundred and seventy tons, twenty-six guns, and one hundred and fifty-one men, under the command of Courtney]- " commanding a body of her Majesty of Great Britain's subjects ; we, the underwritten, are content to become hostages for the said city, and to continue in the custody of the said Captains Thomas Dover, Woodes Rogers and Stephen Courtney, till thirty thousand pieces of gold should be paid to them
37
RANSOM OF GUIAQUIL.
for the ransom of the said city, two new ships, and six barks; during which time no hostility is to be committed on either side, between this and Puna : the said sum to be paid at Puna, within six days from the date hereof; and then the hostages to be discharged, and all the prisoners to be delivered im- mediately; otherwise the said hostages do agree to remain prisoners till the said suin is discharged in any other part of the world.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, We have voluntarily set our hands, this twenty- seventh day of April, old stile, in the year of our Lord, 1709."
This ransom seems to have been punctually paid, and the hostages faithfully liberated. However, Captains Thomas Dover, Woodes Rogers and Stephen Courtney appear, in addition, to have plundered the town pretty thoroughly.
.
CHAPTER 1I.
Expeditions of Viscaino .- Admiral Otondo and Father Kino .- First settlement, and introduction of the priest rule in the Californias .- Failure and withdrawal of the first missions .- Renewed at- tempts to make settlements .- Father Salva-Tierra and his coadjutors. - Final establishment of the Jesuits in the country .- Geographical discoveries of Father Kino .- Jesuits expelled and super- seded by Franciscan Friars ; these, in turn, by the Dominican Monks .- Population and physical character of Old or Lower California.
WE shall now return to the progress of the Spaniards in dis- covering and settling the coast of California :- In 1596 Gaspar de Zuniga, Count de Monte-rey, then viceroy of Mexico, received an order from Philip II. to make farther discoveries and settle- ments on the coast of California. The visit of Drake, and his naming and claiming the country as first discoverer, for Queen Elizabeth, had struck the inhabitants of the coast lower down with consternation ; and already Englishmen, particularly the famous Thomas Cavendish, and others, had fortified themselves on the coast, and molested the rich Spanish ships which yearly sailed between the Philippine Islands and New Spain, and which generally made the coast of California about Cape Mendocino. At that period, there was much talk of a north-east passage from the Pacific to the old world by the Straits of Anian (Behring's Straits), and the Spanish Government in Europe was considerably alarmed lest the English should, by that probable route, strike a deadly blow at their unprotected colonies on the west coast of the Americas. An expedition to make fresh discoveries was accord- ingly undertaken, and put under the command of General Sebas- tian Viscaino, a man of great and tried abilities.
Viscaino accordingly sailed from Acapulco, but does not appear to have proceeded far northwards ; for, in the same year (1596), we find him returned to New Spain. Want of provisions and unfortunate disputes with the Indians, produced this speedy
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EXPEDITIONS OF VISCAINO.
result. The Spanish Government, however, was keeping the matter in view. In 1599 another order was dispatched from Europe to Count Monte-rey to fit out a new expedition for the purposes already mentioned. This again was placed under the command of General Viscaino. In May, 1602, Viscaino, in pursuance of his instructions, sailed from Acapulco, and proceeded
View in the Interior of California.
northwards till he reached the forty-second degree of latitude. Up to the twenty-sixth parallel, he appears to have surveyed the coast minutely ; but between that degree and the most northern limits of his voyage, he seems to have been satisfied with merely keeping the land in sight. He discovered the ports of San Diego and Monterey, which latter was so named in honor of the viceroy. Still not a word of San Francisco Bay. Indeed it is quite evident that up to this period that great harbor had escaped the observation of all the navigators who had attempted to explore the coast. Viscaino, excited by his imperfect dis- coveries, and full of hope of making more important ones on a fresh expedition, solicited the viceroy for permission to pur- sue it at his own expense ; but the viceroy referred him to the
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ANNALS OF SAN FRANCISCO.
Court at Madrid, who seemed to have taken the business into their own hands. Viscaino therefore visited Spain, and pressed his suit, but in vain. At last, in 1606, after Viscaino, wearied and sick at heart with "hope deferred," had retired, moody and discontented, to Mexico, another ordinance was issued by Philip, commanding a fresh expedition of discovery and settlement to be undertaken. The conduct of this was bestowed upon Viscaino, who accepted the charge with alacrity ; but before any progress was made in the matter, he was seized with a fatal distemper. After his death nothing was done or said about the expedition.
Various attempts on a moderate scale, partly by adventurers at their own cost, and partly under royal ordinances, were subse- quently made to prosecute the survey and settlement of the coast. In 1615, in 1633 and 1634, in 1640, 1642, 1648, 1665, and 1668, several fruitless efforts were made for these purposes. In the interval, the public mind was filled with magnificent views of the wealth of the scarcely discovered country. It was known that pearls, of great beauty and value, were found at various places in the gulf and along the coast. Perhaps also the glowing statements made by Sir Francis Drake of the golden sands and other mineral riches which he saw there, helped to fire the ima- ginations of the Spaniards. Omne ignotum pro magnifico. Cali- fornia was long viewed as the Dorado of New Spain ; and was believed not merely to be abounding in pearls and gold and silver, but also in diamonds, and all manner of other precious metals and gems. Our own days have justified these sparkling fancies, though scarcely perhaps in the exact manner and localities of which the old Spaniards dreamed.
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