[p.15] Junipero Serra. [1713-1784]
"The first Apostle of California," Father Junipero Serra, was a humble friar of the Franciscan order when, in 1767, he was appointed presidente general of the missions of the Californias, in charge of the missions of Lower California, and with orders to establish new missions in Upper California. Filled with zeal for the salvation of souls, he prepared with great rejoicing and with excellent good sense, as well, to enter new territory. For sixteen years he labored incessantaly, travelling up and down the coast and visiting the City of Mexico, although he was afflicted with an incurable disease and so lame that he could not move without suffering. He founded nine missions before his death, at which five thousand natives had been baptized.
Less than a year before he died, he made his last journey from San Diego to Monterey, visiting each of the missions, journeying on foot, sleeping on the ground, although he was so ill that no one believed he would live to complete the trip. He was most ascetic in his habits, never eating meat; sleeping on rough boards, and spending most of the night in prayer; Palou relates that four days before his death an old Indian woman came to visit the holy father and with his own hand he gave her a blanket. After his death they found that it was half of his own blanket that he had given.
Father Serra was born on the island of Majorca in 1713; he died at San Carlos Mission, August 29, 1784, and was buried in the church to which he had given so much of his love and thought.
To Junipero Serra and his noble band of assistants California owes the existence of her mission ruins; but she also owes to these simple, hard-working friars, the beginnings of her industries, the nomenclature of her geography, the distinctiveness of her architecture and the civilization of her savages.
[p. 15] San Diego de Alcala
The Mission San Diego de Alcala (Saint James of Alcala), was founded July 16, 1769, by Father Junipero Serra, on an eminence overlooking the Bay of San Diego. A temporary altar was erected beneath the branches of a tree from which bells were swung and loudly rung. Water was blessed, the cross raised, high mass was sung by Father Junipero. The services were attended by the officers and soldiers from the ships and the land forces; the royal standard was unfurled and the country was formally occupied in the name of Carlos III. [p. 16] Several huts were erected, one of which was used as a chapel. The Indians at no time very friendly, became hostile, and on August 15, 1769, made an attack upon the mission, but were repulsed, and a stockade was immediately erected aroud the camp.
[p. 16 San Diego de Alcala, 1908d]
In 1771 Fathers Luis Jayme and Francisco Dumetz came from Mexico and were placed in charge of the mission. In 1774 the location was changed to a point about seven miles up the Valley of the San Diego river. A wooden church was constructed, 18 x 57 feet in size, roofed with tules, three small adobe buildings used for a store, a blacksmith shop and a dwelling. In 1775 new buildings were erected and a well dug. A ferocious attack was made upon the settlement by the Indians on the night of November 4th, 1775, all the buildings being destroyed and Father Jayme murdered. His body was found naked with twenty arrow wounds in the breast. Jose Manual Arroyo, the blacksmith, and the carpenter Ursullino were also killed. All three were buried in the chapel at the Presidio. Fathers de la Peña and Fuster resumed the mission work, holding services at the Presidio. A new church, strengthened with heavy pine timbers and otherwise improved was completed in 1780. A report on the condition of San Diego Mission given by Father Lasuen in 1783, is as follows: "A church, 90 x 17 x 17; a granary, 75 x 16 1/2 feet; a store-house; a house for sick men; sheds for wood and oxen; two horses for the fathers; a larder; a guests' room and a kitchen." All were of adobe and with the soldiers' barracks these buildings formed three sides of a quadrangle of 165 feet. The fourth side consisted of an adobe wall fifteen feet high. There was a vat for use in tanning hides, two adobe corrals for sheep and one for cows. These were outside the regular mission enclosure. The cabins of the neophytes were of wood and grass. At this time there wer seven hundred and forty neophytes, under missionary care.
In 1793, a substantial granary of adobe, 96 x 24 feet, was built, and in 1795, the vineyard was surrounded with an adobe wall five hundred yards in length. This year saw also the commencement of an extensive system of irrigating ditches, remains of which can still be seen and constitute a valuable object lesson in ditch construction. About three miles of San Diego river was dammed back with a solid stone dam thirteen feet in thickness and coated with cement that [p. 17] became as solid as rock and remains so to this day. In the center of this dam was a gateway from which a stream of water, 12 x 24 inches, was carried through an aquaduct of tile and resting on a base of cobblestones and cement. This aquaduct for the major portion of the way was laid along the sides of a precipitous gorge and frequently crossed gulches from 15 to 20 feet wide, and as many feet deep.
On May 25th, 1803, an earthquake occurred which damaged the church. In 1804, a new church was begun. It was completed and dedicated November 12th, 1813. It is the ruins of this building that we see today. The remains of Fathers Jayme, Figuer and Mariner were transferred from their old resting place and buried in one grave, though in separate coffins, between the altars of the church, Father Jayme resting nearest the altar of the Blessed Virgin.
From the time of the establishment of San Diego in 1769 to 1834, the date of its secularization, there were 6638 persons baptized, 1879 marriages performed and 4428 burials. In 1831, the mission owned 8822 head of cattle, 1192 horses and 16,661 head of sheep. There were 1506 Indians on the roll of the mission January 6th, 1846, when an inventory of the mission property was taken. In June of the same year the mission lands were sold to Santiago Argüello for past services to the United States government. His title was not, however, sustained and in accordance with a decision of the United States Land Commissioners, in 1856, based on the old Spanish law, that divided church property into two classes, sacred and ecclesiastical, and whereby sacred property could not be sold, San Diego Mission was returned to the church. "Sacred property" is defined as that which has been formally consecrated to God, such as churches, church buildings, vessels and vestments. The priests' houses and their gardens were thus included. According to this decision all church property that had been sold by Governor Pio Pico reverted to the church while the ecclesiastic or mission lands were government property.
San Diego Mission has been in part restored by the Auxiliary to the Landmarks Club. The ruins of the old dam, the irrigating system and garden walls are to be seen. Many of the original trees of the olive orchard are still standing and productive. The old olive press is also there. Down at the old town of San Diego may be seen the ruins of the first Presidio buildings, relics of the century past. Two old mission bells hung suspended from a beam outside of one of the original buildings.
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