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LOS CONQUISTADORES
THE STORY OF SANTA CRUZ CHURCH
Richard C. Campbell
FROM THE LIBRARY OF JOHN STEVEN O'MALLEY
LOS CONQUISTADORES
The Story of Santa Cruz Evangelical United Brethren Church Santa Cruz, New Mexico
By RICHARD C. CAMPBELL Pastor
To Steve, from Dolph Pring 9/21/73
Revised Edition 1968
Dedicated to
MISS MARY E. BRAWNER MRS. LILLIAN KENDIG COLE and DR. AND MRS. J. R. OVERMILLER
"Conquistadores" still living from the early years to whom so many owe so much gratitude.
PREFACE
This project was launched with great enthusiasm in the fall of 1964, then languished for months in the limbo of a dusty office, revived in the enforced idleness of a week's illness, and completed in the feverish activity of recent days and a few late nights and wee morning hours.
I want to thank the many who helped: My very patient wife; Dr. John H. Ness, Jr., Secretary and Curator of The Archives and Library of the Historical Society of The EUB Church; the offices of The Division of National Missions, and The Women's Society of World Service for sending what historical material they had; the library of the Gov- ernor's Palace in Santa Fe for use of their microfilm facilities; all those whose printed publications gave needed information; Mrs. Cole whose correspondence has been most helpful; particularly the local people who have spent hours answering my questions - Mrs. C. O. Mardorf, Dr. and Mrs. Glen McCracken, Mrs. J. B. Johnson, Miss Irene Bachman, Miss Zella Herrick, Mrs. David Cruz, Sr., Rev. A. L. Brandstetter, Mrs. E. T. Martinez, Rev. Harold Megill, Miss Delia Herrick, and Mrs. Celestino Gallegos; and, last but not least, Mrs. Maurice Bonecutter who typed the copy for the printer.
These pages have been an excitement to produce. The story needs to be told, for out of a feeling for the past comes so much of the strength for the present and a mood for the future.
RICHARD C. CAMPBELL
Santa Cruz, New Mexico May 20, 1965
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2014
https://archive.org/details/losconquistadore00camp
CONTENTS
I. Out of the Past
1
II. Exploration
3
III. Discovery
10
IV. Through the Years
20
V. Horizons .
30
VI. Appendix A ---
The Spanish Heritage in America . 31
VII. Appendix B-
Oñate and San Gabriel
36
VIII. Appendix C-
The Pueblo Indians
37
IX. Footnotes
39
U
Chapter One OUT OF THE PAST
Land of Enchantment
"Land of Enchantment!"1 Dramatic "mesas" towering above weird sand hills that appear transplanted from the moon. Everywhere the strange botanical world of yucca, juniper, chamisa, sage, cactus and piñon.2 East and west the majestic mountains - dull-blue in afternoon's light, deep scarlet at sunset,3 brilliant aspen-yellow in autumn, snow- capped in winter. Clean, dry air.4 Brilliant sunlight. Deep blue sky. Cool nights. Fruit orchards. Chili fields. A long valley, and through its trough the meandering Rio Grande5 - turbulent and swift in its northern canyon, muddy and shallow toward the south. Ah, enchanting, indeed, is this north-central Valley of the Rio Grande in southwest's New Mexico.
Enchanting it is, not only in its natural beauty but also in its haunt- ing feeling of history. The original inhabitants were Indians dwelling in pueblos or villages. While Europe lay in the Dark Ages, this pueblo cul- ture was at its peak.6 These tribes remain in the Valley to this day, in many ways absolutely unchanged from times five hundred years ago. Then, in the Sixteenth Century came the Spaniard in the high excite- ment of Spain's Golden Age. "One small remnant of the culture of that once virile empire lies among the hills and 'mesa' lands of New Mexico."7
"For more than two centuries they were a 'lost people,' iso- lated in the hinterlands of New Spain, forgotten by warring Mother Spain in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, neglected by Mexico with its newly-won independence after 1821, and finally all but ignored for three quarters of a century after we had gobbled them up in 1848. Then in the latter part of the Nineteenth Century came the squatters and the cattle- men and the outlaws from the states and competition and exploitation. Progress plodded its inevitable, stubborn way. A militant, forceful, reckless race of men met a proud, lost remnant of landed barons grown soft with easy living. In less than fifty years, much of the land and other property had changed hands. The Spanish settlers were ill-equipped to meet the issue, for many reasons - the type of decadent life they had fallen into, lack of a driving response to the challenge of an expanding frontier, limited resources and credit for new enterprises, lack of functional education and others. The result has been a gradual increase of poverty with its attendant ills."8
Finally came the scientists and technicians at Los Alamos, "The Atomic City," with its laboratories that helped end World War II and begin our nuclear age. " . the blending of these three proud and worthy
1
cultures - Indian, Spanish, and Anglo - there has emerged a culture all its own - New Mexican, Valley culture.
Los Conquistadores
Do you hear them? Yes! Listen. The footsteps of marching men. They are the footsteps and hoofbeats of a hundred expeditions of con- quistadores - Spanish conquerors, explorers, and adventurers.
Listen to the footsteps of Coronado. Although bulging Spanish gal- leons hauled immense cargos of gold and silver across the ocean to fill the hungry vaults of the empire, such hunger could never be satisfied. Rumors of "Seven Cities of Cibola" gleaming with gold sent Coronado and the expedition worming their way up the Rio Grande Valley toward the Zuñi pueblo. The expedition's chronicler, Casteñada, reported that this group was "the most brilliant company ever collected in the Indies to go in search of new lands."9 But no gold was found at Zuñi, nor at any of the other pueblos. However, at Pecos a man described as the "Turk" was discovered. This half-mad Indian spun a tale about an Eldorado, far to the east, where gold bells hung from trees and dishes, jugs, and bowls were fashioned from gold. Eastward headed the expedi- tion, their guide trying all the while to lose them. They reached present- day Wichita in eastern Kansas, called by the Turk Quivira. But still no gold! That was enough to make Coronado slit a Turkish throat!10
Listen to the foosteps of the second conquistador - Captain Juan de Oñate. At San Gabriel de los Españoles, near the San Juan Pueblo, Oñate on July 11, 1598, planted the Spanish flag over the first capital of New Spain - "a thousand miles from any other civilized community, . . . the capital of a New Mexico extending from Mexico to the North Pole and from the eastern coast ranges to the Pacific."11 After a thousand- mile journey with 400 people, including 120 soldiers, 83 ox-drawn carts, 150 mares and colts, burros, 300 black cattle, sheep, 1,000 goats, hogs and "chickens of Castille" - over a tortuous route called the Jornado del Muerte or "Journey of Death" - an outpost of Spain was established that ranks as the first capital in the United States area. This was nine years before the founding of Jamestown, twenty-two years before Plymouth Rock. The name was later shortened to Española, and the name remains to this day for the city a few miles from the colony's loca- tion. After a dozen years, for unknown reasons, the headquarters of the capital was changed to Santa Fe.12 "Oñate Street" in Santa Fe and in Espanola is named for this man whom one New Mexico historian classes with Columbus and Cortez and worthy of a monument describing him as " .. . hombre de buenos partes, descubridor, conquistador y poblador."13
Thereafter, for over seventy-five years, the Spanish colonists dotted the Valley with small farms and communities, with Santa Cruz the most important, other than Santa Fe. This means, also, that Santa Cruz ranks with Santa Fe among the very oldest cities in the United States. Then, 1680's bloody Indian revolt forced Santa Cruz settlers to flee to Santa Fe and subsequently to El Paso. Indians appeased tribal gods by sacrificing a young Indian girl atop Black Mesa near San Ildefonso, and also scrubbed their bodies to wash away the pollution of Christian religion.14
21
Listen, then, to the footsteps of the third conquistador - Don Diego de Vargas Zapata y Lujan Ponce de Leon. De Vargas marched north from El Paso and received the meek surrender of the Indian rebels on September 3, 1592.15 In 1695 he led settlers from Santa Fe to Santa Cruz, chasing the Tano Indians to Chimayo and San Juan 16 and re-naming the community La Villa Nueva de Santa Cruz de los Españoles Mexicanos del rey nuestro Don Carlos Segundo - the "second" village because the first one, built by Oñate's colonists, had been destroyed by the rebels.17.
These, then, were the conquistadores, a hardy breed of adventurers, probing the unknown "for God and gold," braving hardships, risking death, under the royal banner of their sovereign and empire.
Chapter Two EXPLORATION
"A Lonesome Valley"
Across the years, the lonesome little Española Valley existed pretty much unnoticed by the rest of the world. But there were PEOPLE in this quiet region of adobe houses and red chili. They were people living amid the crosses of a Faith that generally had failed to touch people with genu- ine personal and social redemption. The touch of Christ on the inside and the outside of a man's life was more a theory than a fact. The devo- tion, zeal, and bravery of those early Franciscan missionaries contrasted sharply with the spiritual sluggishness two hundred years later.
One person described things this way:
"When I walk out on Sundays and see a gang (pardon the word, but it is most applicable) of from twenty to thirty boys of all ages and sizes, either loafing around the saloon or wander- ing aimlessly up and down the streets, and groups of girls in practically the same circumstances, with nothing to employ minds or hands - no social life, but much that is destructive -
I wonder what there is in life for them at all. . . . It is no uncommon thing here to find children of six or seven using the cigaret as though it were as common to them as candy. . . . Most children ... grow up like some wild thing, with no care or over- sight, and sometimes without any knowledge of love. Their days of hard work being very early, and, as for their life, it is not worthy of note."18
In fact, all of New Mexico was a land of need and opportunity. Into this scene came the forces of the Protestant Church. In many ways, what was done resembles the conquistadores of the past - not this time for gold - but certainly for God - brave, hardy, persistent - exploring the hope of finding people who could be led to know God abundantly through Jesus Christ. After the war with Mexico and the American occu-
3
pation, word spread about these people with their need for churches and schools. Protestant denominations answered the call immediately.19
But how did The Evangelical United Brethren Church ever get involved in "The Land of Enchantment" and spiritual need? There were really two magnets that drew this denomination into the area.
The first magnet was the huge group of United Brethren homesteaders from the East who had moved westward into Oklahoma, Texas, and New Mexico. Appeals were sent to the denomination's headquarters in Dayton, Ohio, for help in organizing congregations. Action followed. A church was established out on the eastern plains of New Mexico - in the Childress Schoolhouse near Amistad. Later, churches were planted in Wagon Mound, Cone, Onava, and Sedan. In 1909, the General Conference created a new Annual Conference - The North Texas Conference - embracing the vast expanse of the Oklahoma "Strip," the Texas "Pan- handle," and all of New Mexico.20
The second magnet was the ecumenical church agreement which assigned to this small denomination the sizeable responsibility for ministry to Spanish-speaking people from Santa Fe in New Mexico northward to Antonito, Colorado - an area 115 miles north and south, 75 miles east and west.21
In 1910, a minister by the name of Rev. C. A. Schlotterbeck made a six hundred mile journey by horseback into northern New Mexico. The trip took two months. But he found United Brethren homesteaders. And he found Spanish-speaking people in need of the Gospel. After returning home, he. reported what he had seen. Rev. George Brandstetter was present and took part in the discussion.22 Small wonder, then, that the North Texas Conference, meeting in Hartville, Oklahoma, on November 3, 1911, discussed the possibility of work among the people beyond Wagon Mound - across the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in the Española Valley.23
Velarde
The time had now arrived for conquistadores to carry the Gospel into that Valley. Interestingly enough, the Church's explorers were not always a tough Coronado - but sometimes a woman - such as Miss Mellie Perkins, a deaconess who had come west for her health and who in 1909 had been assigned to the North Texas Conference to work with Rev. Schlotterbeck.24
One winter, Miss Perkins visited the Española Valley with a Rev. Caldwell to buy fruit.
"They entered the Valley by mule train over a mountain pass into Velarde. Miss Perkins began to talk to the children who gathered near. They told her there had been Mission teachers there for the Baptist Church, but they had gone away. They had had no school for about four years, and they missed their teachers. Miss Perkins appealed to the Board to buy the property and let her be the missionary."25
The Board agreed to use her services - though not sure where. To prepare for such work, she enrolled at Campbell College in Holton,
4 ]
MISS MELLIE PERKINS Founder of the Mission
Kansas, for training in Spanish under Miss Edith McCurdy, instructor in the school of oratory. This was to prove a significant relationship six years later.26
Miss Perkins wrote to the women of the denomination in February, 1912:
I offered myself at conference time to cast my lot among these people and sow seed of industry, morality, and righteousness, trusting God for the sprouting and growth of the same. The reaping will be left to workers who follow, but I praise the Lord for the opportunity of sowing. With this object in view, I am now at Campbell College, taking a short course in Spanish, so that I may be able to converse and read to these people in their own language. Am also taking some Bible work and studying in my course of study ... we hope to gather in the wandering lambs and shelter them in the bosom of United Brethernism (sic) ."27
Finally, in June of 1912, Miss Perkins left Fort Wayne, Indiana, for the West, spending some time at Wagon Mound and surrounding area. In her Diary, she entered these thoughts as she waited definite assignment:
". .. I have been waiting appointment. Supt. Schlotterbeck was out hunting for a suitable location. Finding several it was
[5
necessary for the Board to consider action on it before we could decide where I'm to go. Must go slow so there will be nothing to regret afterwards."28
It was not until October 7 that she received word to move to Velarde.29 These are her words as recorded in her Diary:
"9. At 12:45 Muriel and I took the train to Santa Fe. Changed cars at Lamy. Got to Santa Fe at 6:30 and went to Capitol Hotel. ... 11. At 10:05 we took the D. & R. G. for Velarde. The trip was rough but the scenery was grand. Arrived in Velarde at 1:15 P.M. Crossed the river on the R. R. bridge. Came on up to the Mission House. Called at Mr. Lujan and Mr. Martinez. They brought the keys and finally after some debate turned them over to us. Trunks came (awful charge $1.75 for bringing them up). Changed clothes. Looked around more and went to Mr. Lujan where we spent the night. Good night's rest."30
Yes, she looked around all right! And what did she see? An aban- doned Baptist mission property - "an adobe chapel, dwelling house, and necessary outbuildings with three and one-half acres of land, convenient of irrigation from the Rio Grande River."31 A thousand dollar gift from Mr. and Mrs. Hauser, retired laymen from Amistad, had purchased the property for The Board of Missions. The chapel became known thereafter as Hauser Chapel, as one can read for himself on the church sign that stands today in front of the church.32 Thus begins an effort worthy of the ancient conquistadores! Let Miss Perkins tell the story:
"12. Up late. Breakfast soon over and we came to the house and went to cleaning. Scrubbed and cleaned until freight came, then we unpacked and straightened up the house as best we could. Took bath and went to bed early. So very tired."33
This was Saturday. On Sunday she did some writing and reading, then pondered her situation with the words . . .
"A lonely day but feel that I am where I can do great good so shall not mind the loneliness. Am now in my chosen work and may the Lord help me to do my best to win souls to Christ, and give me strength for the task that is before me. . . . "
On the following Sunday, services were held - "just Bible study" - with only seven present. School opened the next day, Monday, October 21. Four pupils showed up. To most of New Mexico, 1912 was the year of statehood in the Union, but to our Church it was also the year when a mission program took root in Española Valley - at Velarde - under the leadership of a deaconess named Mellie Perkins. A few weeks later, the situation looked this way:
"November 19. Up early. Cleaned in primary room and put it and store room in shape and then had to carry rock and fill in
61
the trench around house until I played out and then took bath, read papers and studied for Sunday. Very tired. To bed early.
"January, 1913. 3. Up early. Taught school. Boys very bad. wrote notes and cut up in general and then told such falsehoods. Must rule by force and not by love, I see ... worked late at night.
"10 ... Rev. Rendon visited the school. Gave talk. He and his daughter took supper with me and he preached for us at night. An all-Spanish service. Good crowd and good interest. Cramps very bad at night. Tired but happy.34
"May, 1913. 2 . . . Thus closed my first term of school in the Mission. I feel as tho there have been many mistakes made, yet I can say conscientiously, I have done what I could. ... God has blessed my efforts and crowned them with success."'
As one scans this little Diary, many phrases keep appearing again and again: "Tired but happy," "up early," "callers all afternoon," "very tired at night," "cleaned up the house," "felt bad all night," "wrote letters all evening," "taught school all day," "sick at night," "worked hard all day," "read and wrote." Though a large, bigboned woman, Miss Perkins seems to have fought constant bouts with illness (which may have accounted for some irritability at times). These phrases, too, kept reappearing: "Headache," "back hurt," "tired," "nervous," "cramps," "faint," "coughed nearly all night," "terrible pain in shoulder and chest," "foot hurt bad," "plourisy," "neuralgia," "heart," "awful dreams." Yet, in spite of these physical and emotional troubles, she was able to record, for example, this report for February, 1913:
"22 calls, 16 sick calls, 13 services, 3 addresses, 15 taught, 20 days taught."
A bit of humor occasionally showed itself, as Miss Perkins remarked that . . .
"The one who teaches school five full days out of the week, keeps house, attends the sick, fills all the places in religious serv- ices, and writes from 60 to 110 letters and cards a month cannot do much at preaching. How tired they must get of hearing me five days out of the week and three times on Sunday! I often wonder how they keep up interest enough to come, much less being attentive."36
Sometimes a day's work went this way:
"The day was very cold, with snow flurries flying frequently. I went to the chapel at 8:00 A.M., as usual, to build my fires and put the room in order to be ready to receive the pupils as they came. At 8:45 a call came to go and visit a sick child. Leav- ing the school in charge of one of the older boys, I went and did what I could for the child, returning to the school at ten. At 10:45 another call came to visit a very sick lady. I dismissed the school and again went to 'cure' the sick. Found her very ill, and
[7
did not get back until 12:50. I hastily ate a lunch and again took up my duties and continued the work without interruption until 3:45, when I was called to visit a very sick baby. . . . As I . . (returned home) I was very weary, but I thought of one of my pupils whom they told me was quite ill from what I sup- posed was sore throat, and I felt I really ought to go see him yet, so I replenished my medicine bag and started out. It meant a climb of a mile and a quarter uphill, all the way through sand, snow, and slush. I finally reached the house and found my boy was very ill, indeed; not sore throat but what I presumed was - - - . His face and head were so swollen that no one would
have recognized him. I didn't know what to do, as I had never had any experience with that disease. I had taken antiphlogistine for his throat, and, his face being so swollen and hot, I thought it would do no harm, so after urging in vain for the father to get a physician, I proceeded to plaster his face and forehead with that, and left an ointment to be used next day if he still lived, for I fully expected him to die before morning. I left him with a sad heart and again took up journey home, which I reached at 7:00 P.M., cold and hungry, but I thanked God for the privilege of ministering, as I realized more fully the Scrip- ture, 'Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.' Perhaps it might be well to add that none of my patients died. Strange!"37
All this is the spirit of the old conquistadores - reduced to such stark statistical simplicity in the records of the 1913 North Texas Conference where the appointment read, " Santa Fe, N. H. Huffman; Velarde, Mellie Perkins (with Bessie Haffner) ."38
CHURCH AND SCHOOL AT VELARDE -Photo courtesy Richard Brown
81
Santa Cruz
Meanwhile, another development was about to begin. At the 1913 Annual Conference. Rev. N. H. Huffman was listed with his appointment to Santa Fe. That was in October. Four months later he reported to the readers of WOMEN'S EVANGEL on his situation in the state capital and also on a significant trip he took with Rev. Schlotterbeck into the Española Valley north of Santa Fe - to Santa Cruz and Velarde. Try to imagine these men as latter-day conquistadores exploring for treasure :
"It may be news to some of the EVANGEL readers that we are located in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Providentially guided, as we believe, we were able to secure a house in this city that will serve both as a residence and a chapel. On Sunday, January 4, the first service was held, with an attendance of eighteen. A small beginning! Yes, but it might have been smaller, and, under God's blessing, will grow larger. On Monday, accom- panied by Elder Schlotterbeck, I started out on my circuit. We drove about twenty miles to a Mexican (Spanish-American) 39 home I had visited once before. ... His wife gathered the fam- ily together after supper for a service of song, and they all tried to learn the gospel songs. I think this home will become a preach- ing place. Tuesday morning we drove on to an Indian village, called San Ildefonso. A group of men were standing on the sunny side of a building, and I asked them if there was any serv- ice in the church that day. On being informed that there was not, I said that we would tie our team and hold one. At the singing of the hymns about thirty persons, Mexicans (Spanish- Americans) and Indians, gathered about, and all listened atten- tively both to the singing and the preaching. This was my first experience in preaching to the Indians. Their bright-hued blan- kets lent a picturesqueness to the congregation that would not have been surpassed by an array of Easter hats. At the close of the service we proceeded to Santa Cruz. In the valley about this village live a number of Americans (Anglos), and I had an appointment for this date for an English service. We arrived in time to make a few pastoral calls and let the people know that we were there. In the evening we were more than delighted to have at the service almost the entire American colony. The elder preached one of his best sermons. The interest manifested makes us believe that something will come out of this opening. This point is our next objective for another mission school. Don't for- get Santa Cruz, which means 'Holy Cross'."40
Forget it, indeed! The Home Missions Board in Dayton apparently reached a decision. In June of 1915, Miss Mellie Perkins left Velarde and moved to Santa Cruz. A new journey of discovery was about to begin!
9
Chapter Three DISCOVERY
Borrego House
The ghosts of Coronado and Oñate and De Vargas probably stirred on that first day of June in 191541 as they watched Miss Perkins and Angelica Romero42 journey down the dusty road from Velarde to Santa Cruz. Something new began that day - a little village became a big out- post of God's Kingdom.
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