The First Recorded Ascent of "Old Saddleback" - Horse Thief Raids on Orange County Ranchos, 1830-1855
“After an infinite amount of scrambling, danger, and hard
labor,” wrote Major Horace Bell, “we stood on the very summit of the Temescal mountain,
now by some called Santiago mountain.” So begins the story of the first
recorded ascent of Santiago Peak, the highest point in Orange County and the
eastern of the two peaks that comprise of “Old Saddleback.” Bell was thoroughly
impressed with the view from the top, writing that “with my face towards the
sea, I behold the great Pacific ocean and its numerous islands spread out
before me” and that there was “a sublime view, more than worth the journey and
ascent.” Bell’s climb was part of a larger journey that he and his fellow Los
Angeles Rangers took in pursuit of thieves in the fall of 1853. It was
fortunate that they were able to enjoy the view from the top because they were
ultimately unable to catch any of their prey.
This bit of Orange County history (some 35 years prior to
the official establishment of the county in 1889) was brought to the public’s
attention by historian Terry Stephenson in his seminal work, Shadows of Old Saddleback. Stephenson
helped draw historians to Bell’s book, Reminiscences
of a Ranger, which was published in Los Angeles in 1881. Many historians
quickly realized, however, that Bell wasn’t always a reliable authority on what
actually occurred, causing historian
Jim Sleeper to remark that the “Major’s stories were rarely overburdened by
reality, but never undernourished from restraint.” Given the “Major’s”
unreliable reputation, other sources are needed to contextualize and verify his
exciting account of pursuing thieves to the top of Santiago Peak. To fully
understand this story, it’s necessary to examine the antecedents to the
establishment of the Los Angeles Rangers, which go all the way back into the earliest
organized horse thief raids during the Mexican Era in California, including the
infamous “Black Star Canyon Massacre.” Perhaps surprisingly, the story that
emerges directly ties Orange County to the broad story of the American West and
may have even helped kickoff the momentum that led to the county’s founding.
While it may be difficult to believe while driving
through Orange County’s urban sprawl today, in 1853 the area was mostly
occupied by Mexican ranchos. Instead of housing tracts, small groups of adobe
settlements owned by different Mexican families, called Californios, living in adobe houses, were sparsely scattered across
the county. Between the settlements were vast plains and hills populated by
thousands of roaming cattle. The Yorba and Peralta families occupied the area
east of the upper Santa Ana River and the Sepúlvedas east of the lower river.
Further south, the Serrano family settled in Aliso Canyon, the Avilas inhabited
San Juan Capistrano and today’s Laguna Niguel, and the Forsters lived in
the former Mission San Juan Capistrano and owned nearby ranchos.
By 1853, the
year of Bell’s ascent, the ranchos were connected to a network of overland
trade routes. These routes, however, were relatively new to the rancheros and
settlers living in the coastal regions of California. The Mexican ranchos included
lands formerly controlled by Spanish colonial era missions. Despite great
efforts by the Spanish to establish an overland route from Mexico to
California, they were prevented from doing so by indigenous peoples living along
the Colorado River. By the time Mexico won independence from Spain in 1821, the
coast of California was still largely cut off from overland access.
California’s
isolation by land was forever changed in 1829 when New Mexican merchant Antonio
Mariano Armijo led a caravan overland from New Mexico to Mission San Gabriel.
The route (and later variations) generally followed well-traveled overland trails
utilized by native peoples across the southwest. The profitability of trade
between California and New Mexico was quickly realized, resulting in several
similar trading caravans following similar routes that are today erroneously referred
to as the “Old Spanish Trail,” despite not being an old Spanish “trail” into
California. One of the routes’ early travelers was William Wolfskill, an American
fur trapper with Mexican citizenship who left Santa Fe with a small party of fellow
trappers and followed a similar route to Armijo’s up the Mojave River and over
the Cajon Pass before arriving at Mission San Gabriel in February of 1831.
Just a month
after Wolfskill’s arrival the governor of the Mexican department of Alta
California, Manuel Victoria, informed the military outposts in Santa Barbara
and San Diego under his command that Indians from New Mexico were working
together with “the wild Indians, Christian fugitives, and even some of the
mission neophytes” to rob the missions of their horses and “take the animals to
their own country by various routes.” Undoubtedly the increased traffic of
merchants and trappers like Armijo and Wolfskill also attracted the attention of
others throughout the southwest who sought the profitability of stealing horses
from California to trade to the growing number of settlers and transients
throughout the region. Raiding parties were soon organized and made their way
to California. While often described as Utes or Paiutes, the raiders were
likely a diverse group that also included some Americans and New Mexicans.
Wolfskill himself was possibly approached to help the rancheros defend their livestock against the burgeoning organization of partnerships among horse thieves making their way to Southern California. He told one of his later employees, Joseph Pleasants, that within a year or two of arriving in Southern California a “band of horses had recently disappeared and there was every reason to believe that Indians had driven the animals away.” While the core details of the story are difficult to verify from Pleasants’ retelling of Wolfskill’s story seventy years after he heard it, it seems that the Mexican rancheros hired Wolfskill and some men in his trapping party to retrieve the stolen stock. The story alleges that the horse thieves were “followed eastward across the Santa Ana river, up the Santiago canyon, over the crest of the ‘old road’ to the County park [Irvine Park], and on up the canyon to Black Star.” Wolfskill and his party apparently surprised the thieves at the village of Puhú, which was located upon a flat high in Black Star Canyon later known as Hidden Ranch. A battle apparently took place, with several Indians being killed by Wolfskill and his men’s muskets before the rest of the villagers fled down to the canyon bottom and then into the mountain brush on the ridge to the east, beyond the reach of the trappers. The stolen horses were apparently retrieved and driven down Santiago Canyon and returned to their owners. Allegedly none of Wolfskill’s party were injured.
Pleasants is the
sole source of Wolfskill’s story, making it rather uncertain as a historical
event and can’t be corroborated. Nevertheless, Pleasants was considered a
reliable storyteller, and knew Wolfskill well, so it isn’t a stretch to assume
that the story’s core details may have indeed taken place. The circumstantial
evidence also supports the veracity of some of its core elements.
More recent
archaeological evidence suggests that Puhú was especially diverse, with a
complex material culture indicating that the village was inhabited and/or frequented by people
from throughout Southern California and as far as the Colorado River. After Mexican
independence, progressive-minded government officials sought to secularize the
missions, which still had dominion over tens of thousands of baptized Indians
and controlled much of the most desirable farming and grazing land along the
coastal regions of California. While Mexican government officials publicly
declared their support for making mission Indians free citizens, they and their
friends also waited impatiently to establish private ranchos for themselves on
these mission lands. In an early step towards secularization, many of the
mission Indians were given the choice to leave the system, helping contribute
to about a 10-20% decline in the local missions’ populations between 1826 and
1832, the latter being the approximate year of the supposed raid on Black Star
Canyon. As a result, Indian communities just outside of the colonized areas
likely grew and diversified (for more information on this phenomenon, check out my article "Guaromo - the Story of a Tongva Village Territory and the Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana").
Borderland villages between Spanish settlements and the hinterlands were in regular contact with traders coming through the Cajon Pass. Trade between coastal areas and the interior deserts, which had been established long before the arrival of the Spanish, continued uninterrupted throughout the mission era. Horse thieves likely corresponded with individuals from these borderland villages, especially since the inhabitants had the most intimate knowledge of the surrounding region. The borderland villagers knew which local ranchos were most vulnerable to theft as well as the most secluded but passable routes to drive stolen stock back to Cajon Pass. It’s possible that some of the residents also participated in the opportunity to profit from helping horse thieves coming over the pass. Whatever level of their involvement in the raids on the ranchos should be considered in light of all that had been foisted upon them by the mechanisms of colonization.
Puhú in Black
Star Canyon was thus perfectly situated to assist raiders in accessing and
transporting horses. Just down Santiago Canyon from its confluence with Black
Star Canyon was the Yorba and Peralta families’ Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana,
which had its primary buildings occupied by the Yorba family on a hill near the
intersection of today’s 91 and 55 Freeways in Olive. From the rancho’s houses
atop the hill there was a commanding view to the north over the Santa Ana River
towards the Chino Hills and to the south across the plain between the Santa Ana
River and Santiago Creek. The Nieto family’s rancho was located on the opposite
side of the river, stretching out all the way to the San Gabriel River. Puhú
was located on one of the primary paths utilized by indigenous people over the
northern Santa Ana Mountains, connecting the coastal areas over the “pass” between today's Sierra and Hagador Peaks, to the
modern Corona area, and thence to the northeast to San Bernardino and the Cajon
Pass, east to San Gorgonio Pass, and southeast through the Temescal Valley.
In this context
the Wolfskill story can be analyzed. He arrived in California with little money
to repay his accommodating Californio hosts at Mission San Gabriel and Los
Angeles. After learning that there were no beavers in Southern California, he
shifted his focus to hunting otter. He assisted in the construction of a boat
for hunts, and even spent time cutting timber for it in the San Bernardino
Mountains. When the vessel was finished in late 1831, he embarked on an
unsuccessful hunting operation that went as far south as Cedros Island in Baja
California and as far north as Santa Barbara. Prior to his departure, and after
his return, it would not be surprising if Wolfskill took on whatever jobs came
his way, including an attempt to retrieve stolen horses from thieves who made
their way up Santiago Canyon.
While the story
alleges that the horses were stolen from near Los Angeles, it also seems
possible, if not probable, that they were taken from the Yorba’s side of the
Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana, which was just down Santiago Creek from Black
Star Canyon, or the Nieto family’s Rancho Los Nieto’s on the west side of the
Santa Ana River. It’s also possible that raiders were reluctant to drive stock
from ranchos in the Los Angeles area up the Santa Ana River valley through
today’s Yorba Linda because the Yorba and Peralta families, whose houses overlooked
the river, could have confronted them in the narrowing river valley boxed in
between the Chino Hills to the north and the Santa Ana Mountains to the south (traversed
today by the 91 Freeway). Another possible impediment for the raiders is the abundant
sand deposited at the river’s bend in the vicinity of what are now the Santa
Ana River Lakes which would have made it difficult for herds of stolen horses
to pass. In any case, the Santiago and Black Star canyons served as an
alternate to the more frequently used route along the Santa Ana River through
the “pass” between the Santa Ana Mountains and Chino Hills to access the
interior valleys and passes. Wolfskill apparently alluded to as much when he said
that it was “supposed that within a day or two the horses [at the village in
Black Star Canyon] would have been driven over the ridge into the Temescal
country.”
The so-called “massacre” that took place between Wolfskill’s party and the horse thieves at Puhú was perhaps more of a skirmish than a massacre. There is no known corroborating evidence at the time of the supposed event in the form of correspondence between rancheros and/or missionaries. While it’s unclear if the village itself participated in the raid, or if the raiders were passing through after making some kind of arrangement with the villagers living there, archaeological evidence indicates that Puhú continued to be inhabited for decades after the incident took place, suggesting that whatever occurred was not significant enough to drive the village’s inhabitants away permanently. It should also be considered that the “trail” that existed at the time up to Puhú was likely very steep, heading directly up the brushy mountainside that is today traversed by a truck road with several switchbacks. It seems unlikely that the villagers would have been unaware that Wolfskill’s party was approaching considering that they had the high ground, which ostensibly would have given them time to flee. In any case, it would not be surprising if some, if not all, of the horses were retrieved and returned to the rancheros without significant loss of life. This is not to say that whatever occurred wasn’t tragic, and indigenous historical trauma related to the incident continues to exist to this day.
Wolfskill’s
story is only one of many concerning horse thief raids during this time period.
As the missions were secularized in the years 1833-1834, more privately-owned
ranchos were established, creating new targets for horse thieves. What’s more,
whereas defense of the missions depended on military support from the soldiers
stationed at each mission and under the command of the local presidios (located
in San Diego and Santa Barbara), the rancheros needed to rely on their own
defense. The situation quickly became difficult for them to manage. In November
of 1834, just after secularization, Tomás Yorba of the Rancho Santiago de
Santa Ana was unable to make a routine visit to Los Angeles due to the presence
of thieves descending on the local ranchos. While detained, he complained that
“I am disgusted to see my country so much under the influence of these devils…[the
country] is so ruined by banditry that one doesn’t know what to do.” The
situation was so dire that a week later he was still unable to leave for Los
Angeles, causing him to write that for “several days I have not left for the Pueblo because of Indian scares” and
that “this situation will be lost entirely unless something providential
happens.” One can imagine the terror experienced by the rancheros as they
waited day and night for indications that things had settled down.
Meanwhile, the demand for horses
and cattle was peaking in California during the mid-1830s. Foreign ships
continually sailed up and down the coast anchoring at every port to take on
hides, many of which were supplied from the former mission cattle.
Simultaneously, thieves from the interior, who were continuing to work more
closely with their local counterparts, were making raids on the ranchos. The
rancheros were thus operating on two fronts; one in taking advantage of the
lucrative hide trade along the coast and on the other defending themselves
against thieves organizing in the interior. Just two months after Richard Henry
Dana famously threw hides off the cliffs of what became Dana Point, as
described in his memoir Two Years Before
the Mast, Tomás Yorba wrote that “every day it is getting worse here with
so many Sonoran thieves as well as local ones…José
Peralta went to New Mexico after Sonoran thieves; several [other rancheros]
have left [in pursuit].” Yorba’s mention of thieves from New Mexico and “local
ones” in the same sentence suggests collaboration between the two. Whatever
their arrangement, the livestock was being sent through the Cajon Pass,
prompting the local rancheros to go after them. Pursuing the thieves towards
New Mexico was extremely dangerous and seemingly required multiple ranchero
families to work together to provide men and provisions. Peralta, who was
probably living on the south side of the Santa Ana River in today’s Anaheim
Hills, was likely one of many local Orange County rancheros to be sent on such
dangerous pursuits.
Even after California became part
of the United States in the late 1840s, the raids continued and became more
severe. The thieves improved their local networks and fine-tuned their approach,
possibly organizing under the command of the great Shoshonean leader of the
Utah Indians, Walkara. The raids were now themselves more organized, with
multiple groups working in concert stealing horses from across the greater Los
Angeles region as far east as San Bernardino and as far south as the ranchos in
the San Diego area. After acquiring the animals, the groups of thieves would
then rendezvous on the desert side of the Cajon Pass before driving the stolen
stock back along the routes of the “Old Spanish Trail” to points east. One of
their techniques was to steal livestock in the middle of the night when the
moon was full. Being more familiarized with the local terrain, they could then
drive the stolen stock by the light of the moon along routes off the main
thoroughfares. They could now reach all of the ranchos in Southern California,
even those along the coast.
During one such full moon in April, 1848, the thieves robbed one hundred horses from José Sepúlveda of the Rancho San Joaquin, the headquarters of which were located in today’s Irvine. Ramon Carrillo, who had recently married Tomás Yorba’s widow, Vicenta Sepúlveda, went in pursuit with a posse of fifteen men. During the chase, the thieves killed some of the stolen stock, possibly to send a message to their pursuers to halt their pursuit. But Carrillo and his men persevered and caught up to them, leading to a skirmish between the parties. While most of the stolen animals were recovered, the result was deadly. One of Carrillo’s men, a servant, was killed and one of José Sepúlveda’s sons was wounded. The incident may have taken place within today’s Orange County somewhere between Irvine and the Santa Ana Mountains where the robbers likely attempted to abscond.
Soon thereafter the California Gold Rush started. While approximately
a quarter million miners and others rushed into San Francisco and to the gold
fields, Southern California retained its rancho culture and way of life. In
fact, the early 1850s were the most lucrative time for the rancheros. The hordes
of people from all over the world who arrived in California needed food, causing
the demand for beef to skyrocket. The rancheros seized the opportunity to
exploit the new market and started driving cattle northward each year, selling
them at far higher prices than they were able to yield from the hide-and-tallow
trade. Their profits were extraordinary.
Their prosperity, however, came at a cost. As the American legal system was organized in California, the rancheros had to adapt to new government policies that were very different from those of the Mexican government. Under a land claims act passed by Congress in 1851, grantees had to prove title and conduct precise surveys to formally define each rancho’s borders, often leading to disagreements that took years, and sometimes decades, to resolve in the courts. In addition to the ensuing legal costs, the rancheros also had to pay property taxes. The revenues collected principally funded law enforcement and the court system. In 1852, for example, José Sepúlveda of the Rancho San Joaquin paid $723 and Bernardo Yorba of the Rancho Cañon de Santa Ana paid $415 in property taxes.
Despite the new revenue from these taxes, most of which went to the criminal justice system, local law enforcement had a difficult time keeping up with the high levels of thievery and violence. This was particularly true of Los Angeles, which experienced incredibly rapid changes in demographics following the Gold Rush. Starting in 1848 and extending through the 1850s, a diverse group of opportunists from throughout the southwest, Mexico, and the United States came to California along the Southern Emigrant Trail. Many of them continued no further than Los Angeles, which already had an existing complex social composition of indigenous groups from throughout Southern California, including many who were formerly attached to the missions (emancipados), Californio families that came during the Spanish and Mexican eras, and a small but generally thriving group of immigrants from the United States and Europe who arrived during the hide trade. This diverse mix of peoples were part of a highly unstable and rapidly changing social order that was further disrupted by the daily arrival and departure of transients. The complicated and fluid dynamics contributed to the violence that became commonplace during the era. While Bell and Los Angeles Merchant Harris Newmark suggested there was as much as a murder a day in Los Angeles in the early 1850s, a team working with the late Eric Monkonnen documented that as many as three dozen murders took place each year in Los Angeles at the height of the Gold Rush, which was an astronomical number given that the city’s population was only about two thousand people. With such great need for law enforcement in the city and only a couple constables in each township in Los Angeles County, the rancheros in the surrounding countryside were generally left to fend for themselves against thieves. Not surprisingly, many of the rancheros harbored a growing resentment seeing so little provided for their protection after paying new taxes for that purpose.
In the midst of so much
instability, a highly organized and extensive horse thief raid took place in
early 1853 that targeted numerous ranchos including most, if not all, located
within today’s Orange County. The raid started on about March 13, when the
thieves made their way through the Cajon Pass and thence down the Santa Ana
River to Isaac Williams’ Rancho Santa Ana del Chino in today’s Chino and Chino
Hills. Despite the establishment of nearby Fort Jurupa by the United States Army
on the Santa Ana River near Riverside the year before, with the explicit
purpose to defend against raiders, the thieves easily concealed themselves from
its detection. At Chino they stole seventy-five tamed horses and mules along
with twenty that belonged to citizens of Los Angeles. The thieves then headed
west along the north of the Chino Hills to Don Ignacio Palomares’ Rancho San
José in today’s Pomona where they stole more animals and killed a number with
arrows, possibly because Williams had gone out in pursuit of his stolen stock
and the robbers needed to try to stay ahead of their pursuers.
From
Pomona the thieves seem to have crossed over the hills above today’s Brea and made
their way to somewhere near the Yorba and Peralta families’ Rancho Santiago de
Santa Ana where, on March 15, they stole horses that were “picketed down” and
killed one and wounded another with arrows. They then headed south to José Sepúlveda’s Rancho San Joaquin. At the time, Don Juan Avila, a prominent resident of
San Juan Capistrano and owner of the Rancho Niguel, was visiting the Sepúlveda rancho. The thieves took
eight of Avila’s horses that were tied together and about one hundred fifty animals
from Sepúlveda.
Sepúlveda and Avila organized a posse of around a couple dozen men to go after the robbers, leaving on about March 18. They made their way north, possibly over the Santa Ana Mountains, and up the Santa Ana River. Not surprisingly, the tracks led to the Cajon Pass. On March 19, as the posse neared the pass, clouds closed in and a cold mist turned into a heavy downpour, turning all traces of the thieves’ trail into pools of water and mud. Undeterred, Sepúlveda and Avila’s posse continued to look for evidence of movement near the pass.
By this time, however, the thieves had a commanding understanding of the terrain and avoided their pursuers. In fact, after likely dropping off the stolen horses somewhere on the desert side of the Cajon Pass, they returned to steal more horses from the ranchos south of the Ranchos Santiago de Santa Ana and San Joaquin. To avoid the main route via the Santa Ana River west of Corona, they probably came over the Santa Ana Mountains, possibly over Black Star Canyon, where the village of Puhú was still inhabited, or over a different route near “Old Saddleback” that likely dropped into upper Trabuco Canyon. In any case, under the light of a full moon on March 25 they made their way to Don José Serrano’s Rancho Cañada de los Alisos in today’s Lake Forest and stole more than a hundred horses.
Word
that the robbers had returned quickly reached the small village of San Juan
Capistrano. The former mission was in the possession of John (or Juan) Forster,
an English trader and ranchero who had married into the prominent Pico family. Forster organized
about thirty men from the local ranchos to go in pursuit of the robbers. While preparing
to depart the next day, word reached town that the thieves had made their way
south along Aliso Creek and robbed fifty horses from Juan Avila’s Rancho Niguel
in Laguna Hills. Avila himself was not present at his rancho because he was
still with Sepúlveda and their posse near Cajon Pass.
Forster’s
party headed for the mountains and discovered the rustlers’ trail, following close behind using the “clues left in the form of dead horses that the
Indians were shooting with arrows.” They soon entered the “sierra de Santiago,”
or Santa Ana Mountains. The day was getting late and the canyon’s shadows grew
long. Forster determined that the trail headed over the mountains, probably
into the Temescal Valley on the other side. Thinking that the mountains would
be too difficult to navigate at night, and perhaps considering the possibility
of an ambush, Forster and the posse headed to the Santa Ana River and took
the normal route of travel inland where they could cut the thieves off as they
moved north towards the Cajon Pass. This decision indicates that the rancheros
were fully aware that they were pursuing the same rustlers who had been coming that
way for many years. In order to move more quickly, they may have taken the
route through Santiago Canyon and over the “shortcut” through Weir Canyon to
the river and thence inland.
The
posse must have moved quickly because the next day, March 27, they arrived in today’s
Corona area where they found an exhausted Avila and Sepúlveda posse that had
been in pursuit of the thieves for over a week. All were mystified how the rustlers
were able to avoid detection and considered that they must be hiding nearby. Together, they formed a force of about fifty
men, which included some of the most famous Orange County rancheros, and spent
another six days looking for clues of the thieves’ trail. All of their effort,
however, came up empty. Ultimately, it was concluded that “the Indians discovered a new route of
travel that was unknown to their pursuers.”
After up to two weeks away from
their homes, the rancheros returned on about April 2. They now had to comfort
their concerned families who had been living in fear for their lives and the
threat of further raids. It seems José Sepúlveda had finally had enough and
wrote a passionate letter to the Los
Angeles Star that was, in part, printed in the paper’s Spanish section. The
letter was written in a combination of first and third person, probably because
it had arrived just before press time on April 2, preventing it from being
fully edited for print. He wrote,
After the fatigue brought about by so much wasted time
[in pursuit], the loss of their [the rancheros’] property, the abandonment of
their families, who were exposed to the risk of the wild Indians, and with no
hope of a remedy, they have retired to their homes to wait for the [wild]
Indians to return in the next few days to rob their few remaining horses and
perhaps to take their lives or the lives of their families.
The dramatic
elements of the letter were used to set up Sepúlveda’s main plea that reads,
We call the attention of our representatives so that in
the manner and with the means that they deem convenient they acknowledge: that
the Indians who harm this County are distant tribes, not the peaceful ones
close to us, because it is very painful that despite paying high [enormes] taxes their lives and their
property are not insured.
His call is interesting for a couple
reasons. First, he clearly made a distinction between the local Indians and
those conducting the raids. As previously mentioned, it’s likely that local
Indians in the hinterlands had previously helped the thieves coming through the
Cajon Pass. It’s possible that the more organized raid that prompted the
writing of this letter no longer required the assistance of local peoples because the rustlers were now thoroughly familiar with geography of Southern
California. Sepúlveda’s description of the local “tribes” being “peaceful”
seems to add further support to his claim. Second, Sepúlveda is clear in
asserting that the raids are harmful to the whole county, not just the ranchos, since tax revenues for the city of
Los Angeles depended in part on the rancheros. Sepúlveda specifically addressed
the inconsistency in paying high taxes, that were supposed to contribute to law
enforcement in the county, and yet having to defend themselves against the menace of
thieves without help from law enforcement or the Army.
To further assert the importance
of the protection of his property, Sepúlveda also had a notice published
immediately adjacent to his letter in the Star
warning anyone that he would seek legal recourse if they purchased stolen
animals branded with his mark.
Let everyone know by this notice, that in no way will I
go through the loss (in any form without exception of who it may be) of cattle,
or unbroken horses, with my brand mark that do not have the corresponding proof
of sale or are known to me; I reserve my right to retrieve them in the field
wherever I find them; consequently, I will hold anyone who purchases them without
the specified requirements liable to whatever legal charges that may apply.
This notice directly addressed anyone in Southern California who might deal with those who stole the animals. This suggests some level of distrust of the locals who might be willing to profit from the acquisition of relatively cheap livestock. Sepúlveda may have also simply had the notice printed out of great frustration with the loss of his property.
Orange County’s great horse thief raid of 1853 was one of only numerous examples of lawlessness plaguing Southern California at the time. In particular, the widely publicized exploits of the Joaquin Murrieta gang struck fear into the hearts of everyone throughout early 1853. Public fear fueled a growing demand for new approaches to deal with the continued violence and raids. The murder of American David Porter by a Mexican vaquero, Manuel Vergara, that summer was the final straw. In early August, the Star reported the organization of the Los Angeles Rangers, a militia of volunteers committed to addressing the lawlessness in the city and the surrounding region. The newspaper reported,
“The people of this county have long
felt the necessity of having among them an efficient military force, which
could be brought out promptly in aid of the laws and for the protection of life
and property. We are not only exposed to regular predatory visits from indians
from the neighboring mountains, who come here to feed on cattle and carry off
horses . . . we have seen an organized band of robbers, well mounted and well
armed [sic], traversing the country unmolested, sometimes making no concealment
of their movements, supplying themselves with the best horses with impunity, until
it is universally admitted that the roads are unsafe to travel, and a sense of
utter insecurity prevails in house and field.”
The Rangers consisted of about one hundred men, with about twenty-five making up the “active force” with “horses to be furnished gratuitously [free] by the rancheros, as a loan to the company.” The Board of Supervisors was responsible for appropriating funds, which came from both private sources as well as from the county. At the head of the outfit was Alexander W. Hope, a doctor, city council member, state senator, and even briefly the chief of a volunteer police department organized in the city in 1851. Other noteworthy members included W.T.B. Sanford, his brother-in-law Phineas Banning, David W. Alexander, and, of course, Horace Bell. Shortly thereafter, a steamer delivered the Rangers forty “Mississippi rifles, together with equipment for the same” and the “officers of the corps also received their commissions as such, and are thus constituted a part of the volunteer military force of the State.” The Rangers were ready to seek opportunities to prove their utility to the county.
The story of Los Angeles Rangers’
journey to the top of Santiago Peak started just a few months later with an
attempted robbery at the home of John R. Evertsen,
who had come to Los Angeles with his family not long before he was hired to
conduct the census for Los Angeles County in early 1851. Just before midnight
on Wednesday, November 2, about a half dozen “Mexicans” entered the household
with the apparent intention to rob it. Evertsen’s fourteen-year-old son, Evert,
confronted the robbers, shooting at one who was keeping watch outside before
fighting against another of the robbers wielding a knife. Despite receiving a
knife gash on his cheek, and his mother sustaining a neck injury, Evert was
able to drive them away.
Bell
told the story from there. He claimed that the alleged robbers also “made a raid on the
Mission San Gabriel” the same night. They apparently made their way east to the
upper Santa Ana River and their movements were detected by Isaac Williams of
the Rancho Santa Ana del Chino. He sent a “trustworthy Indian” to Los Angeles
to inform Captain Hope of the Rangers. Despite the incident not being a typical
organized horse thief raid, the Rangers made little, if any, distinction
between all alleged robbers and bandits. Hope therefore organized the Rangers and
headed to Fort Jurupa, purposely reaching it at nighttime on November 3 or 4 in
order to avoid detection from the suspects. Hope had requested the help of both
Captain Lovell of Fort Jurupa as well as the Mormon authorities at San
Bernardino, who sent mounted men under their sheriff, Robert Clift Jr., for
assistance. At Jurupa, the Rangers, soldiers from the fort, Mormons under
Clift, and Indian informants from Rancho Santa Ana del Chino came up with a
plan. With intelligence that the suspects made camp in the Temescal Valley
and with the night being clear with a crescent moon, the united parties decided
to surprise them in their camp and take them into custody.
They
marched through the night and located the camp just above the Temescal hot
springs (today’s Glen Ivy Hot Springs). As an advance of the Rangers’ party
came within sight of the suspects’ camp fires, they saw that they had
already escaped. After the Rangers’ horses stopped near the camp and silence
was restored, they could “hear their [the robbers] retreating clatter as they
went up Coldwater cañon [Coldwater Canyon],” which today has the same name and
leads directly up to the saddle in the middle of “Old Saddleback.”
After the balance of the Rangers’
party arrived, they decided to wait until daylight to follow the robbers’ trail
because it was too dangerous to do so at night. In the meantime, they made
coffee, ate a breakfast of “Mexican cheese and Jurupa hard tack,” and tended to
their horses. They were already exhausted after a sixty-mile ride, but, as soon
as the sun started to rise they saddled up and followed the trail up the
canyon. The going was extraordinarily difficult. Their path alternated between
following the streambed and climbing up to steep precipices along the ridge
bordering the canyon. The going was so rough that the infantry from Fort Jurupa
was sent back to it, although the colorful and hard-drinking soldier referred
to only as “Smith” remained with the Rangers.
It was at this point, on either November 4 or 5, after an “infinite amount of scrambling, danger, and hard labor,” that they reached the summit of Santiago Peak and enjoyed the “sublime view, more than worth the journey and ascent.” Interestingly, Bell indicated that they then “followed the trail along the ridge, bearing to the east, for several miles” before they “descended to the plains.” This indicates that they followed the north ridge of Trabuco Canyon towards Trabuco Peak, and perhaps beyond, before they descended into Trabuco Creek. Today’s well-known “West Horsethief Trail” in Trabuco Canyon may very well have been approximately where the Rangers descended into the canyon, if not along a path closer to Holy Jim Canyon. In any case, it seems that they followed an established trail without any sign of the men they were pursuing. This suggests that the suspects knew the mountains well and were able to easily outmaneuver their pursuers. The trails they utilized may very well have been the same that the horse thieves who came over the Cajon Pass earlier in the year had used in their raid. The suspects’ knowledge of the terrain may even suggest the possibility of having assisted the latter in their raid.
The Rangers then apparently followed a trail down Trabuco Canyon out of the mountains. The sun set and the moon shone brightly as they passed through today’s O’Neill Park. Finally, feeling “worn out, hungry and sleepy,” the Rangers reached Mission San Juan Capistrano late into the night.
John Forster and his family lived in what Bell claimed was the “only inhabitable part of the old, dilapidated, vermin-infested, tumbling-down Mission buildings.” Forster was awakened by the Rangers with the expectation that he would offer room, board, and whatever else he could in conformity with the famous hospitality of the rancheros. The Rangers reported to Forster that they had been in pursuit of the thieves over the mountains without success. Forster responded that he had “no knowledge or information as to thieves” and, according to the Rangers, seemed dismissive. Bell wrote that he “guided us into an old open courtyard, with old, broken-down corridors, dusty, dirty, brick floors, that had been inhabited by hungry hogs and many curs [curses] since Don Pio [Pico] had laid his despoiling hand on the doomed Mission.” Forster left the Rangers in the middle of the mission quadrangle to set up their own camp and they were incensed. They ate what little barley they had left, “tied and fed our worn-out mustangs, spread our blankets, and were soon sound asleep, regardless of the fleas, tarantulas, lizards, or any other kind of vermin…[and] we slept, with what degree of comfort I will not pretend to say.”
At four o’clock in the morning of the 6th, “a cold, deluging, driving November rain” roused the Rangers to their feet “shivering with cold and drenched with water.” Captain Hope assured the party that “Don Juan [Forster] will be out presently, and will furnish us with better quarters, and whatever there may be of good cheer in the Mission, Don Juan will supply.” But Forster never came. The Rangers’ tried to saddle their horses to move on, but their fingers “were so benumbed that we could scarcely use them.” The horses were now forced to “huddle under the lee side of the [mission] wall for protection against the driving blast [of rain].” The Rangers scavenged the mission for any food they could find to eat and somehow were able to start a small fire that they used to make the rest of their coffee.
Now being midday, two of the
Rangers’ party had enough. Smith, of Fort Jurupa, and Sheriff Clift of the
Mormons from San Bernardino, found brandy which they drank as they gathered
together and “held a council of war.” Some suggested they demand shelter from
Forster while others recommended that they leave. It was finally decided to
move on to Juan Avila’s Rancho Niguel where they hoped for better treatment.
Before leaving, however, Smith “imbibed freely from his canteen” and “took
position” in front of the “large, unglazed, open, iron-barred window” where
they could see Forster sitting within, probably one of the same openings along
the mission’s south wing facing the quadrangle today, and started yelling “Damn
Juan Forster! Goddamn Juan Forster!” Smith kept up his aggressive yelling for
“a full hour.” Finally, the Rangers “emerged from the miserable old corral, in
the most dilapidated and wretched plight that it is possible to imagine, and in
doleful procession filed out of the Mission square, passing Juan’s open window,
and joining in a chorus with Smith’s doleful refrain, ‘Damn Juan Forster.’”
Forster’s treatment of the Rangers
was indeed atypical. Other visitors to his mission residence at the time
enjoyed the usual ranchero hospitality. In 1849, a visitor named Charles
Christopher Parry was even served salmon from the upper Sacramento River that was
recently shipped to the mission. Judge Benjamin Hayes also reported good
treatment at the hands of Forster in the 1850s. Forster’s actions towards the
Los Angeles Rangers were so extraordinary that the Los Angeles Star even printed a condemnation of his actions,
although his name was not used as a courtesy to the general respect he commdanded
throughout the country. The Star
reported,
“The
Rangers, on several recent occasions, have made long and toilsome excursions in
search of suspicious characters and stolen property. Upon some of these
excursions they have made important discoveries; upon others, they have
returned weary and unsuccessful. Generally they have received most cheerful
hospitality from Rancheros. On one occasion, however, they were repulsed,
during a rain storm, after being in the mountains for a week, exposed to many
privations. We have some items concerning the operations of this corps, which
will form an interesting chapter for our readers.”
Not surprisingly, the Rangers’ failed pursuits got a lot less attention in the press than their successes, and no further mention of their famous ascent of Santiago Peak could be located in the papers by the author. That said, the furor over the Rangers’ treatment by Forster was long lasting, being printed in the newspaper more than two months after it occurred. The event had such a significant effect on Bell that he made sure to include all of the sordid details at the time of writing Reminiscences of a Ranger when Forster was still alive!
While it’s possible Forster was simply in a bad mood and/or tired when the Rangers showed up late into the night at his residence, it’s also possible he was harboring a different kind of resentment. It must be considered that the Rangers’ failed pursuit occurred about six months or so after the great horse thief raid throughout Orange County. The negative feelings about the lack of effective intervention on the part of the authorities in Los Angeles to protect the rancheros, that was so persuasively expressed by Sepúlveda in the Los Angeles Star, was likely shared by Forster. From his perspective, perhaps, the pleas of the rancheros in the extreme southern part of Los Angeles County for protection resulted in a party of Rangers who were unsuccessfully pursuing thieves, who had no apparent connection to raids on local ranchos, and showed up to his door in the middle of the night expecting room and board. If this was Los Angeles’ answer to the very real threat of horse thief raids, one can perhaps understand why Forster may have been less than accommodating.
That said, Don Juan Avila of the Rancho Niguel did provide the Rangers with the famous ranchero hospitality. Bell described a “hearty, christian [sic] welcome” from Avila and “although our party was large the generosity of our noble host was yet larger.” As a bitter use of humor, Bell ironically included the phrase “bless his soul” each time he mentioned John Forster’s name. To complete the punchline of this joke, Bell wrote that “the household and Don Juan Avila, ‘bless his soul,’ went to work in good earnest to ameliorate our wretched condition, and when the sun burst forth in all its glory on the following morning, with well-fed mustangs, dry clothes and full stomachs, we saddled and took up our line of march.” While Avila’s treatment of the Rangers was clearly better than Forster’s, there is no known historical evidence to give greater context or corroboration to the feelings and attitudes of everyone involved; Avila may or may not have been happy to oblige the needs of his guests.
For a variety of reasons, the great horse thief raids in Southern California dissipated in the mid-1850s. Just before the Rangers left Los Angeles on their journey that would take them to the top of Santiago Peak, an official survey of Cajon Pass was conducted by Colonel R.W. Norris for the United States Government. The increasing presence of settlers throughout the pass reduced its convenience for thieves attempting to conceal the transportation of stolen horse herds into the desert country. In January 1855, too, the great Shoshonean leader Walkara died. His involvement in the great horse thief raids throughout Southern California, which was always rumored, was all but confirmed when the frequency of large-scale organized raids diminished following his death. By October, too, the Los Angeles Star suggested that the great raids were already an episode of the past:
“Who that has lived in this county,
for the past five years, does not recollect the magnificent droves of horses
stolen from San Bernardino, San José, El Chino, El Rincon, Santa Anna [sic], El
Neguil [Niguel], the Verdugos Tajunga, San Fernando, Cahuenga, and every other
exposed Rancho in this county...[but] in the fall of 1853 the Sebastian Reservation
[Tejon Indian Reservation] was established, and in three months thereafter
Indians [sic] robberies had ceased. Since that time we do not believe that the
wild Indians tribes have robbed a single hoof of stock of any kind.”
According to the Star, the establishment of Indian
reservations was the key to stopping further raids. In a more general context,
the raids diminished with the increase of political and social organization
throughout Southern California in the 1850s.
The period between about 1830 and the 1850s in what would later become Orange County has generally been characterized as a transition period between the rancho and the American eras. Historians have organized horse thief raids and local crime and violence as two sides of the same coin. While connections between the two almost certainly existed, the former were part of a much larger historical phenomenon stemming particularly from the maltreatment and subsequent disorganization of indigenous peoples throughout the American Southwest. The area within Orange County was part of this story both geographically and in terms of the indigenous people trying to endure the repeated social and political intrusions into their lives. From the rancheros’ perspective, the worsening situation demonstrated the need for a more local government response to protect their economic interests, especially in light of their paying taxes for such purposes.
Part 6: The Great Stone Church (A future post)
Part 10: Richard Henry Dana at Dana Point
My Story with Phil Brigandi (1959-2019)