Memorias de cosas pasadas (Esquer 1878)

On April 29, 1878, Thomas Savage, an assistant of historian Hubert H. Bancroft, interviewed my great-great-great-great-grandfather, Ignacio Esquer (c1816-1882), in San Luis Obispo. The resulting dictation includes priceless details about Esquer's involvement in Mexican and American California for the 45 years beginning in 1833. Annika Sendrey, the in-law of a distant cousin also descendant from Esquer, was kind enough to translate the Spanish original into English last year.  What follows is an exact copy of her translation.

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Don Ignacio Ezquer, born in Ures, Sonora, must have been about 15 years old when he arrived in San Diego in October 1833 on a sloop that had once been an English warship. On the same ship came Don Jose Maria Castañares with his wife Doña Ana Gonzalez, and Pablo Vejar, the latter being one of the deportees to Mexico in 1830 for his complicity in the Solis revolt.

At that time Don Rafael Gonzalez, son-in-law of said Castañares, was Commissioner of California. The Captain did not want to let him and his wife disembark, because they had not paid the 300 dollars for the passage. In the end they disembarked by means of security posted by Captain Don Santiago Argüello. The whole fortune of this couple was a small suitcase that contained a tunic belonging to the wife. The husband did not have any luggage except the clothes he was wearing and no money at all.

I stayed in the home of the Argüellos for about three months as a clerk for my food only.

Don Ricardo Palacio picked me up from there and brought me to Los Angeles. I was employed in the home of Don Abel Stearns for two or three months. Then Señor Palacio offered me a position as bookkeeper at Rancho Dominguez in San Pedro, whose majordomo was Don Rafael Guirado. I stayed in this position for a few months and moved to Los Angeles. We are already in 1834, the latter half of the year.

When I was in San Diego in 1833, we went to the fiestas at the mission by the same name. On the very day of San Diego (November 12th) around midnight, when I was attending a dance at the Indian rancheria with Andres Pico, Luis Arenas and Lorenzo Soto, gambling with the Indians, we suddenly saw a huge light. We lifted our eyes towards the sky, and saw a shower of big meteors that lasted for about half an hour. Andres Pico grabbed his serape where the money was and threw it over his shoulder. We all started running to the church, the people of reason and the Indians, because that phenomenon was terrifying. We were praying for mercy from Heaven, since we did not know what kind of consequences a phenomenon like that might have. Especially the women were extremely alarmed. When the meteor shower was over, we left. At that time Andres Pico said, "We have been unfortunate, all the money fell out through the armhole." So the money was lost with what they were playing with the Indians. These Indians had enough money between them, and had a great inclination for fire.

The colonization started in the year 1834. I was now in San Gabriel, where I had gone after leaving Rancho Dominguez. That year General Figueroa gave the order to secularize the missions and commissioned Don Nicolas Gutierrez to secularize the one in San Gabriel. Said Lieutenant Colonel Gutierrez offered me a position in his office.

This same year an order came to Alferez Jose Antonio Pico from Figueroa to secularize Mission San Juan Capistrano. Pico brought me along to take inventory.

When I was in San Juan, I was offered a position as a clerk in San Fernando in the service of Lieutenant Colonel Antonio del Valle, commissioned to secularize this mission.

In 1835 we went to the fiestas in San Buenaventura. Lieutenant Colonel Gutierrez and some others were present when Gutierrez received the news of General Figueroa's death and was called to Monterey to take over the military command of the territory. Señor Gutierrez left for Monterey, and Don Antonio del Valle and I returned to San Fernando. Valle and I had some disagreements and I quit the job returning to Los Angeles to the home of Don Luis Arenas.

Since I did not have a job and was not good at doing fieldwork, I devoted myself to learning a trade. I learned the hatter's trade from some Americans in Los Angeles. I worked with them for a few months, and then I moved to San Juan Capistrano in 1836. There I found out about the revolt in Monterey against Comandante General Gutierrez. The revolt was led by Don Juan Bautista Alvarado and Don Jose Castro.

In the beginning of 1837, I moved to Santa Ana where some Mexican hatters were working. I was there for a few months and returned again to San Juan Capistrano to stay with Don Francisco Sepulveda who was administrator there.

In 1838 Sepulveda handed over the administration of San Juan Capistrano to Captain Santiago Argüello. While I was in San Juan, Alvarado and Castro were coming from the north with 200 to 300 mounted men. Don Santiago Argüello hurried to join Don Carlos Antonio and Don Jose Antonio Carrillo who came from the south with the forces supporting Governor Carlos Antonio Carrillo under the command of Captain Jose Tovar. The southern forces camped at Rancho Las Flores. During the absence of Captain Argüello I was now left in charge of the administration of San Juan Capistrano. The northern forces had not yet reached San Juan, but Governor Carrillo's advance patrol, under the command of his brother Jose Antonio, arrived as far as Rancho Los Alisos of Don Juan Avila, very close to the mission.

One night this advance patrol of Dieguinos came to San Juan Capistrano. I asked Don Jose Antonio Carrillo what he had seen of Alvarado's forces during the day, and he told me that he had not seen any people or even heard that there would have been any where he had passed. He asked me for food for his people. I gave him meat, wine and aguardiente. Then he said that he wanted to sleep there overnight, because it seemed there was nothing to be worried about, but an old soldier named Marron told him it would not be wise to sleep there. So they decided to sleep near the arroyo. It was very foggy. The soldiers were half drunk. All the Dieguinos were heavy drinkers, and Don Jose Antonio Carrillo was the captain of them all, a man who could knock down 20 men. They asked me for liquor to take along and I gave them a demijohn of wine and another of aguardiente. This was about 9pm. I lay down to sleep without worry. Around 12 o'clock the same night there was a knock on the door of my room. I got up, opened the door and suddenly found myself with two rifles pointing at my chest, and was ordered to give myself up as prisoner. I only saw two shapes in front of me because the fog was very dense. I gave myself up without protest, and the fear I felt was not passing. The two men entered the room with me. They searched me, something that did not take long because I was in my underwear. Other people stood by the door. They made me light a candle, and then I recognized both men, a certain Camacho (Chilean), Governor Alvarado's assistant, and the short one, Estevan Espinosa. They told me to open the entire mission, and when I entered the plaza to open the main gate, I saw all the flat roofs full of people. Because a few of Don Francisco Arguello's mares were in the plaza, they imagined the advance patrol from the south was inside the mission.

A short while after opening all the gates, Governor Alvarado and Jose Castro appeared. They asked me if any southern forces had been there, how many, and where did they go. I told them what I knew, but without giving them the location where Carrillo and his people had gone to sleep. They asked me about weapons and supplies. I told there were supplies but no weapons, that there was only one old cannon buried under the straw in a room that also had liquor.

Alvarado and Castro ordered Lazaro Piña to fetch the cannon, which they mounted on a carriage and loaded with a cannonball and pointed towards the port. This might have been around 2 or 3 in the morning. They fired the cannon, and the men from the south, who were sleeping near the arroyo in the direction of the shot, jumped up like deer, and almost all of them started running, mounted their horses bareback, leaving behind a lot of possessions.

Alvarado and Castro called me back to the room and ordered me to bring them a big bottle of wine and another one of aguardiente, and two cups. Castro asked me if there was any poison in the drinks to which I replied no, and he brought me a cup of wine and made me drink it. Immediately thereafter he poured aguardiente in the same cup, and when I told him that I was not used to drinking liquor, he forced me to drink it under threats. I drank it, and inevitably at that moment I felt quite drunk. I went to lie down after handing them the keys of the mission so they could search it as they pleased.

In the morning I woke up at 7. Lazaro Piña came to greet me. I had met him as corporal in the artillery picket in San Diego. Piña told me he had served as my guardian angel, because the boys had wanted to beat me up and he had dissuaded them by saying that I was his friend.

Alvarado and Castro remained there a day or two with their forces, exchanging correspondence with the opposite side that was in Las Flores. The correspondence did not have the desired effect, and the troops with their chiefs went on to Las Flores. I stayed at the mission. Afterwards I found out that they had signed a treaty and the campaign ended.

One day, I believe it was after these events, Padre Jose Maria Zalvidea, Minister of San Juan Capistrano, who was a supporter of Alvarado, told me that he had to marry Jose Antonio Yorba to Benigna Lopez, and to be able to do that he needed a dispensation from Padre Presidente Narciso Duran who was in Santa Barbara, and he wanted me to go there on this errand to the Presidente, and at the same time deliver a letter to Señor Castro who was in Los Angeles. There was another revolt in the country. The troops from the north were in San Gabriel and those from the south were coming from San Diego or, if I don't remember wrong, they had already arrived in San Juan Capistrano. Don Pablo de Portilla was commander of these forces. I departed with Yorba's document in full view, and the letter to Castro hidden in the underwear because all communiques were intercepted by the southerners. On the way four soldiers appeared and asked me where I was going. I replied to Santa Barbara with some marriage documents which I had to show them. They asked for a passport and I told them I did not have one. They grabbed me and took me back. I was extremely scared, but without letting them know. I returned again to the mission and they introduced me to Portilla. He asked me questions about the purpose of my trip. Padre Zalvidea saw me and came over to where we were. He talked to Portilla and told him that it was urgent that I deliver these documents to Santa Barbara, and obtained a safe-conduct for me. I departed again with the two soldiers escorting me to Los Alisos. Fearing that they might want to search me and to dispel any suspicions that they might have, I told them that I did not want to continue but to stop there and rest. Then they left in another direction. I stayed there about an hour and set out slowly so that I could see on the plains of Santa Ana that I was not being followed. I spurred my horse and arrived galloping to Tomas Yorba's ranch. I told him I was going on very interesting business and would he lend me a horse right away. He gave me a horse, and then I rode at full speed towards San Gabriel. Arriving in Los Coyotes, I could see Los Alisos about 3 or 4 leagues away. I hastened my pace to San Gabriel, and when I reached the hills near the mission, I met a little Indian and asked him where Castro and Alvarado were. He told me Castro was in Los Angeles, and Alvarado in San Fernando, Pachito Soto with a few soldiers in San Gabriel. Then I hurried even more to get to the mission. I dismounted by the guard-house and found out that Soto was in there sleeping. I ran to where he was and told him how careless they were when the enemy was already so close. He dispatched four men to see where the enemy was and dispatched me with a soldier to Los Angeles to talk to Castro. I reached the town at breakneck speed and found Castro in Don Jose Sepulveda's house together with Don Anastasio Carrillo. I handed him the letter from Padre Zalvidea, and to his questions about the enemy forces I told him what I knew.

We went recruiting people and then we withdrew to San Gabriel. When we arrived there, we found out that they had caught two lookouts from the south. From there we all (also the two prisoners) left for Los Angeles. Then I rode alone to Santa Barbara, and did not return any more to San Juan Capistrano.

I forgot to tell that when I was in San Juan Capistrano (I believe it was in December 1837), Castro was crossing the hills with twelve men in the middle of an enormous rainstorm in the direction of San Diego, and fell on the town at midnight, taking prisoner Don Carlos Antonio Carrillo, Pio Pico and others who were attending the fiesta at Los Pastores. I saw them in San Juan on their way back when Castro brought them to Santa Barbara.

I stayed in Santa Barbara for over a year and kept busy making hats that earned me enough profit.

In 1840, I came to San Luis Obispo where Don Juan Pablo Ayala was administrator. There I stayed in charge of the mission for a few months while Ayala went to visit his family in Santa Barbara.

When I was in San Luis Obispo, Francisco Soto and Rafael Pinto came back from Mexico where they and some others had gone as escorts with Captain Jose Castro, transporting Graham and other foreigners who were ordered to attend a deposition before the Governor General. These individuals brought mail overland from the Governor of Mexico.

Together with Soto and Pinto I rode to Monterey via San Antonio where Jose de Jesus Pico was administrator. In Monterey I stayed in the home of Rafael Pinto, and spent a month or so without a job. I set up a hatter's workshop near Governor Alvarado's house. Then the Governor told me to go to work at his ranch El Alisal, giving me a place and Indians so I accepted and went there. In the beginning of 1841, I went down south to Mission San Luis Rey. Don Agustin Janssens was administrator in San Juan Capistrano, and Don Jose Antonio Estudillo in San Luis Rey. I brought materials and Indians for my business.

Padre Thomas Estenaga was in charge in San Gabriel with Bernardino Guirado (brother of Governor Downey's wife). Jose Maria Villavicencio was administrator in San Fernando; if I remember right, Don Rafael Gonzalez in San Buenaventura; Don Francisco Cota in Santa Ines.

In a few months I went down to Santa Barbara again, and then I married Josefa Pico, daughter of Rafael Pico. I returned to El Alisal. I was there until the beginning of 1842 when the job ended in El Alisal, where I just broke even living "from hand to mouth". I went to Monterey and put up a cantina which I ran until 1845 at what time I transferred it over to Don Jose Maria Castañares, and moving into the house that belonged to Don Joaquin Gomez, which had a general store with a billiard room.

In 1842, about the end of the year, American Commodore Jones seized Monterey, and many families, including the ones of Alvarado and Castro, fled to El Alisal. They feared a bombardment because Señor Alvarado did not want to give up the Plaza. He was still in charge of the government although his successor General Manuel Micheltorena was already in Los Angeles. They went looking for the most recent newspapers from Mexico to prove that there was not war between United States and Mexico which convinced the Commodore, and he then returned the Plaza, and came back to raise the Mexican flag with a salute. I was then in El Alisal.

Towards the end of 1843, General Micheltorena came to Monterey, and took up residence there. He brought along most of the Fixed Battalion of California that consisted mainly of inmates from the prisons in Guadalajara and convicts, people who caused so much trouble in Monterey and everywhere they showed up because of their thievery and brawls. At one occasion they had a quarrel with the sailors of a whaling ship who killed one of the soldiers. The sailors took a boat and went on board and that was the end.

Nothing special happened until December 1844, when certain Californios like Manuel Castro, Francisco Rico, Jose de Jesus Pico, the Soberanos, Joaquin de la Torre and some others in the lead declared themselves against the General by the Salinas River, after capturing all government horses. Major Lieutenant General Tellez went after them, but could not reach them, and returned to Monterey finding a large number of cattle that he gathered on the way. A few days later, the same General [Micheltorena] marched with nearly 400 men and reached the rebels who were already in Santa Clara under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Jose Castro. They camped in Laguna Seca, the rancho of Juan Alvires, close to San Jose. There was no act of war, but an agreement between the two chiefs, the content of which I did not know. I was in Monterey.

It should be pointed out that Señor Castro, at the outbreak of the revolt, was performing an important commission entrusted to him by General Micheltorena, to establish a kind of military colony in the San Joaquin Valley. The General had helped Castro in Mexico, defending him with success when he was tried by court-martial for his conduct in the matter of transporting foreign prisoners from California to Tepic in 1840. Castro was in trouble, and Micheltorena's defense saved him. The General also assisted by providing him with funds, and after his return awarded him the rank of Lieutenant Colonel of the Cavalry, and it was said that he even put on the insignia of that rank with his own hands.

General Micheltorena returned to Monterey with his forces, and Castro stayed for some time with his forces at Mission San Jose. Most Californios had gone their homes when Castro found out, in the beginning of 1845, that General Micheltorena was going to attack him with a formidable force from Monterey, and from Sacramento came another force to join the General, consisting of a company of foreign riflemen and a company of more or less disciplined Indians, all supplied by Captain Juan Augusto Sutter. Castro and the few men that were with him retreated in a hurry to the south. The General and Sutter with their troops followed in pursuit, but the outcome of the campaign was an arrangement in Cahuenga, by which the General agreed to leave the country with his officers and battalion. He boarded a ship in San Pedro. From there they set sail to Monterey, and picked up his spouse, other officers and troops, his luggage, and returned on board with all the honors of his rank. This is how Micheltorena retired to Mexico.

Don Andres Pico became Commissioner to receive the Plaza of Monterey.

In the middle of that revolt, Governor Don Pio Pico stayed on as Leader of the California Assembly, Don Jose Castro as Comandante General, and Don Juan Bautista Alvarado as Administrador de la Aduana (Administrator of Customs) instead of Don Manuel Castañares who was in Mexico as Diputado of California, but who was Administrador propietario de la Aduana.

The relationship between the Comandante General and the Governor was not very cordial for several reasons and would eventually have resulted in battle, and the country probably would have been embroiled in a civil war, had the invasion and capture of Sonoma by a party that raised a flag with a painted bear not intervened in the beginning of 1846 .

Before this, in the end of 1845 or the beginning of 1846, United States Army Captain John C. Fremont was in Monterey, whom I saw in the home of American Consul Thomas Larkin. This gentleman told me that Fremont had come on a scientific expedition. Fremont asked for permission to explore this country with his armed men, and the permission was denied by the Comandante General Don Jose Castro and by Prefecto Don Manuel Castro who represented Governor Pico in Monterey. Fremont marched off in disgust in the direction of San Juan Bautista where he was reunited with his party and barricaded himself at Gavilan Peak where he flew the flag of his country. When they found out about it in Monterey, it caused a big shock, and it was decided to raise an army to evict Fremont from that hill. We are already in the beginning of 1846. Since the first of January that year, Don Manuel Diaz was Alcalde Primero and Juez de Primera Instancia, Joaquin Escamilla Alcalde Segundo, and Ignacio Ezquer Regidor Decano.

When Señor Diaz was ill, I was in charge of the Juzgado de Primera Instancia (Court of 1st Instance). That is when it was decided to raise an army against Fremont. I was giving possession of Rancho Los Pilarcitos, Ambrosio Gomez being my secretary, when some people in the county tried to hinder me. Because of this I had to return to Monterey. As soon as I arrived, I had them brought in one by one, and I threw them in the dungeon, including Don Santiago Estrada. Then I fined them, and when they paid the fines, I released them. Then I returned to Pilarcitos, and put Felipe Vasquez in possession. When this was finished, I returned to Monterey, and immediately I received an order to go and give possession of Rancho Los Corralitos in the Pajaro Valley to Don Jose Amesti. There Don Guadalupe Castro tried to hinder the process, and I sent for ten soldiers from Monterey. They arrived and I continued giving possession.

The last line that touched Don Manuel Jimeno's ranch (all the neighbors were there) caused a dispute between Amesti and Jimeno. Amesti wanted to hit Jimeno. In the middle of a little flat of sand was an elm. Then Jimeno insulted Amesti verbally. Amesti attacked Jimeno, and he immediately climbed up to the top of the tree, insulting old Amesti from up there. (It is necessary to mention that Amesti was a very tall portly man who was not able to run or climb a tree; Jimeno was very skinny and light.) There were no rocks or sticks around, and Amesti irritated by the insults that Jimeno directed at him, grabbed sand with his hands and threw it up at his adversary since there was nothing else he could do. I had retreated, and when I heard the shouts, I came with the soldiers to put an end to the conflict and ordered Jimeno to climb down from the tree, that they should settle their difficulties by splitting the difference. And then I made them hug each other; doing that Jimeno stuck a pin in Amesti's buttock, and then he hit him in the jaw, and he knocked him down. Seeing this, I reprimanded them severely, but finally they made friends. Jimeno was funny and entertaining, and he liked to pick on Amesti, who was a Basque and had a bad temper, just to hear him grumble and talk nonsense. From there we went to Amesti's house to finish the business.

That same day I received an order from Prefecto Manuel Castro. With the soldiers I had, I was to gather all the ranchers I could and march with them to Santa Clara via Santa Cruz, gathering people along the way. In Laguna De Las Calabazas I met a certain Felipe Armas who refused to serve claiming that he was an American citizen not really being one because he had only been to the Sandwich Islands. I took him as prisoner to Santa Cruz.

From there I crossed the mountains with some seventy men. When I came down to the Hernandez ranch, going downhill to Santa Clara Valley, I waited to join the people who came behind, and while there I found myself with only some forty men, twenty others had deserted to the mountains. I arrived to Santa Clara and handed the forces over to Don Jose Castro who seemed grateful. I also handed over the citizen who had been to the Sandwich Islands and Castro locked him in leg irons. The following day General Castro appointed me to his assistant, and we marched to Rancho San Lorenzo of Don Carlos Castro. This was in June, a few days after the Bears had captured Sonoma. The day after our arrival to San Lorenzo, Captain Joaquin de la Torre passed by with his people. They came pursued by the Bear Party that had already beaten them. They were lucky to find boats to cross the bay. Among these people were Ramon Carrillo and Juan Nepomuceno Padilla.

From there we returned to Mission Santa Clara where we received the news of the declaration of war by Mexico on the United States. Then Castro commissioned me and Benito Diaz to ride as fast as we could to Monterey with a letter to Treasurer and Comisario Don Jose Abrego to deliver to us all the supplies they had in their treasury and in their warehouses. All of which we were to deliver to El Alisal where Jose Castro and his forces were going to be.

Señor Abrego delivered additional pieces of blanket and others of grogram that I put in the loft of my house. There we learned that Señor Fremont was chasing Castro under the American flag. So he already knew about the declaration of war. The following day in the morning the American warships, that had entered Monterey Bay the previous day, disembarked troops and seamen and took possession of the Plaza. Captain Mariano Silva was Comandante of the Plaza.

Commodore Sloat came to my house with some officers and an interpreter and asked me if I was the judge. I replied yes, and he ordered me to hand over all the files that were in my charge. I told him that I did not have the key to the office. Then the soldiers went up and broke down the door with bars. They pulled up a cart, and from the balcony above they threw down the papers into the cart. Some papers flew away. Then the Commodore placed me under house arrest on my word of honor.

The Commodore appointed two of his officers to function as judges. Very soon thereafter Commodore Stockton came and replaced Sloat.

In the beginning of 1847, Reverend Walter Colton, the Chaplain of the Navy, was appointed Magistrate of Monterey. In the year 1847 nothing of note occurred in Monterey that I would have noticed.

In 1848 Florencio Serrano was Alcalde and Juez de la Primera Instancia (Judge of 1st Instance). During his term occurred the case of Domingo Hernandez who was sentenced to death by hanging for robbery and murder by the jury and the judge. When carrying out the sentence, the rope broke and Hernandez fell down. A report of this incident was sent to the military governor who then pardoned Hernandez. Serrano had him brought to the jail to recuperate. Everywhere they began donating him money and he collected a considerable sum. The very same night there was a celebration at the house of Maria Antonia Armenta and Hernandez showed up. They were gambling and getting drunk and Hernandez punched someone leaving him almost dead. From there he went on to pursue a criminal career that eventually led to his death by hanging in the town of Santa Cruz together with another even worse bandit named Capistrano Lopez.

Serrano continued as Alcalde Primero until July 19, 1849 when I took over this position elected by the people. The following month Governor Riley appointed me to Juez de la Primera Instancia. During my term, an Indian named Camilo killed another and threw the corpse into a well. The crime was discovered and the Indian was judged and sentenced by me to punishment by hanging which was carried out. An hour or two after they lowered the body, it was placed in a box and delivered to Jacinta Zurita and some other women who carried it to their house. A little later they came and notified me that Camilo was alive. I went to examine the corpse and noticed that the heart was still beating. I asked them to go and find a doctor, and since they were not able to find one, they sent for a Mexican who was a medium curandero and he bled the throat of the patient by slitting it open. Of course the Indian died.

One night when I was in the fort with a military patrol, I was notified that a certain Zenon, who had been one of Micheltorena's soldiers, had been stabbed to death. I rushed to the location and found him already dead. The killer was Zenon's brother-in-law by the name of Garcia. He was already secured in prison. He pleaded his case and was sentenced to only six months of public work, because it seemed that Zenon had wounded him first and even destroyed his eye. Garcia was freed before he had fulfilled his sentence of six months.

There was another attack. One of the soldiers that Micheltorena had brought named Chavez had stabbed Bonifacio Olivares with a knife spilling his intestines. When they came to notify me, I went to the location and found Olivares holding his intestines in his hands. The doctor was called immediately. He performed the operation, and the wounded man survived. The criminal had fled and could not be found.

The Judge of San Juan Bautista sent me a thief, who had stolen a horse, to be sentenced. The name of the thief was Juan Lisalda. I went to talk to the Governor, and since the town was teeming with petty thieves, he authorized me to set up a pillory in the square where all these petty thieves were to be flogged. Lisalda was the first one in the pillory receiving 50 lashes on his bare back applied by the bailiff. Right after Lisalda had been given his lashes, I ordered him to be released advising him not to relapse or he would fare a lot worse. He replied thanking me for carrying out the sentence promptly and not doing like the judges in San Juan who had kept him prisoner for several months. He finished by asking me for a dollar to be able to go home which I gave him.

James McKinley filed a lawsuit against Paty for $4,000. I served him the summons to appear in court to answer the complaint. The summons was delivered to him on board his ship. He did not obey. He was weighing anchor to leave port, setting sail for the Sandwich Islands. I asked Governor Reilly for help, and he had the cannons of the fort loaded and pointed towards the ship. He gave me his officer who escorted me on board. The officer was carrying a signal rocket to be fired in case Paty did not obey, so that the fort could fire a warning cannon shot over the bows after we were a good distance away. When we arrived alongside the ship, Paty pulled up the ladder, but the officer climbed up one of the ropes, and I stayed in the boat. The officer brought Paty down and made him come ashore with us. Paty appeared in court. After I heard the lawsuit, I sentenced him to pay McKinley the $4,000 that he asked for, and additionally, a $500 fine for disobedience. Paty paid both the debt and the fine.

When the voter certificates came from the whole territory for delegates to the convention, who were to meet in Monterey to write the Constitution, Captain Halleck, Secretary of State, David Spence and I counted the votes. The Convention met in 1849, the same year, in Colton Hall and proceeded to work of which I will not be talking because this information can be found in the archives.

When my term as judge ended, I continued living in Monterey until the middle of 1850 when I settled in El Alisal. I was living there for three years and months. In 1854 I returned to Monterey, and the same year I moved to San Luis Obispo where I have lived ever since. I was Justice of the Peace for a few years. I was in that position when the terrible events, the hangings of bandits by the Committee of Vigilance, took place in 1858 (I think). I did not get involved in these matters, but I did see several executions. The effect of the hangings was very healthy for this county, for it had been infested with thieves and murderers, and nobody dared speak up against their crimes, until the Committee was formed. It freed us from all those scoundrels, ensuring security of life and property. The Executive Council of the Committee consisted of John M. Price, Walter Murray, William Beebee, Agustin Albarella and Captain Mallagh.

I forgot to mention something that happened in Monterey when I was Juez de Primera Instancia and Alcalde Primero with civil and criminal jurisdictions. Realizing that I had much more work than I could handle, I went to talk to General Riley to find out if he would exempt me from one of the two branches. He asked me which branch I would like to keep and I answered him the criminal. Then he asked me who might be a suitable man to be in charge of the civil branch. I suggested Mariano Malarin and he was appointed Civil Judge and practiced in this function until the same date that I left office.