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Mexican Period
Mexican Period: 1821 - 1846
The Mexican Revolution
From 1810 to 1821, war in Mexico slowly displaced Spanish rule from North
America. In California, almost nothing was known of the fighting. What few
government supply ships that did come brought only news approved of by the
regime, hence Californians thought the revolution was a minor issue on the
verge of defeat at any moment. It was with surprise that the Californios
learned in 1822 that they had been, in fact, Mexicans for most of the
previous year.
The change to Mexican rule had little immediate impact since Californios
had been self sufficient for some time, but it left the power structure
uncertain. California was declared a territory, rather than a state, and
was low on the list of priorities for Mexico. Governors were declared and
sent out from Mexico City starting in 1825, but the Californios themselves
had little to fear from Mexican force and none of the respect they had
formerly held for Spanish Royalty. As a result, the Mexican government of
California was soon in confusion. Between 1831 and 1836, California had 11
different government administrations and ignored an additional three
governors sent from Mexico City.
The real power base in California transferred to a small number of
families descended from the Spanish soldiers who now became owners of
permanent and large ranchero grants. The number of "respectable" Spanish
still being very small, these families were of necessity interlinked by
marriage. Blood ties did not mean there weren't conflicts, especially
between the northern and southern half of the state, but it did mean the
conflicts were tempered. In fact, I would propose that the Indian model of
warfare had infused the Californio culture. Battles were fought with few
or no casualties, after which the contestants agreed upon a victor who
governed without ill will until the next dispute arose. Bean calls these
conflicts "the comic-opera 'revolution,' a political device characterized
by bombastic 'pronouncements,' chesslike marches and countermarches, and
noisy but bloodless artillery duels, just out of range, in which both
sides retrieved each other's cannonballs and fired them back." [Bean 45]
In one of these revolutions in 1836, led by Juan Bautista Alvarado,
California was declared a "free and sovereign State" for a year [Bean,
50], before Alvarado was declared legal governor by Mexico. Hence the Bear
Flag Revolt of 1846 may not have been recognized at the time as anything
more than the resident Yankees taking their turn at revolution. (This is
not to say that the resident Yankees weren't involved in earlier
revolutions -- Alvarado had 30 riflemen commanded by Isaac Graham of
Tennessee.)
Up north, the San Francisco presidio was visited in 1825 by the British
ship Blossom. The Captain described the fort as "little better than a heap
of rubbish and bones." He went on to say, "The neglect of the government
of its establishments could not be more thoroughly evinced than in the
dilapidated condition of the buildings in question; and such was the
dissatisfaction of the people that there was no inclination to improve
their condition, or even to remedy many of the evils which they appeared
to have the power to remove." [Lewis, 18] When Duflot de Mofras visited in
1841, he found the roofs and adobe walls fallen to ruin. At this time in
1841, the garrison consisted of only six soldiers and their families
[Lewis, 17].
The Welcoming of the Yankees
In 1821, the new Mexican nation viewed the United States as both an ally
in revolution and a model for success. The 1824 Mexican constitution was
modeled after the American one. Unfortunately, while the American
revolution was the culmination of many decades of free thought and
independent development, the Mexican revolution was the overthrow of an
authoritarian regime by a population with no experience at self
government. In fact, though the idealistic Mexican leaders promised
equality and freedom (even granting the right to vote to Indians), the
government rapidly became, in the political observation of the cartoon
character Krazy Kat, "a run down constitution." Nevertheless, the early
effects of this liberal beginning was to open the borders of Mexican
territories like Texas and California to any foreigner willing to be
naturalized and adopt Catholicism [Bean 44].
Yankees had long been involved in California trade, albeit illegally. Fur
trading had started with the Otter in 1796 and continued to about 1820,
when the seal population was greatly reduced. The other great products of
California were the hides and quantities of tallow collected from the vast
California cattle ranches (transportation of beef or other food products
was, of course, impractical due to cost and spoilage.) Hence the news of
Mexican independence was followed immediately in the spring of 1822 by the
establishment of the Boston firm of Bryant and Sturgis (agent William
Gale) at Monterey for the purpose of buying hides and tallow (Bean
incorrectly believes this is the origin of the Californio's tendency to
refer to all of the United States as "Boston;" Chapman shows that the term
pre-dates this time). [Bean 57]
As mentioned, the American Chapman was living at Monterey since 1818. Now
with Gale and a British hide trader, William Hartnell, the number of
foreigners began to rise. William Richardson deserted from the British
whaler Orion in 1822. He would later build a trading post that would grow
into the city of San Francisco. William Dana came in 1826 (uncle to the
famous author Richard Henry Dana), married a wealthy Californio daughter,
and had 21 children! Abel Stearn, a familiar hide and liquor smuggler,
also settled in California in 1829 and married a wealthy Californio's
daughter. Through land accumulation and cattle ranching, he became the
wealthiest man in southern California [Bean 62].
Yankees also found a new industry in California -- beaver fur. Jedediah
Strong Smith led a small party from the Great Salt Lake overland to
Mission San Gabriel in 1826. On his return to Utah in July, he became the
first documented person to cross the Sierra Nevadas. He brought both news
of the existence of a trail, and news of a virtual beaver trapper's
paradise. Another trapper, James Pattie, entered California in the Fall of
1826. A book of his experiences that Bean states is full of "tall tales",
The Personal Narrative of James O. Pattie, was published in 1831 was
contributed greatly to the young American fascination with adventure in
the far west. Trappers continued to come to California from the East after
this time, developing what would become the most important immigration
route some twenty years later. The Mexican government was much less
accepting of these transitory, non-oath taking Americans, and jailed them
when they could catch them. [Bean 60]
The Weakening of the Missions
The loss of Spanish nationality in 1821 (1822 in effect) meant the loss of
Royal support for the missions, and the jealousy of the starving soldiers
for the apparent wealth of the missions became more blatant. At the same
time, the worsening treatment of Indians lead to a condition where Costo's
quote about the preference of death to mission life was probably
true. Most of the oral tradition of Indian hatred of the missions
documented in Costo may date from this time. Certainly it is no longer
necessary to try to reconcile injustice to Indians with apparent Indian
docility, since the Indians could no longer be described as
docile. Instead, in 1824 the Chumash Indians revolted and temporarily
controlled three missions (Santa Barbara, Santa Ines, and La Purisima). In
1829, an Indian named Estanislao organized Miwok tribes into a band that
successfully fought off the Californios for the rest of the Mexican period
(the Stanislaus River is named for him) [Bean 46]. Other Indians led
similar successful guerrilla bands. It is interesting to ponder how much
of a contribution to this successful organization might have been due to
the existence for the first time of a common language, that is,
Spanish. Certainly a large factor was the Indian's mastery of horse riding
and fire arms.
The dependence of the missions on military protection and the change of
government led very quickly to calls for secularization. The primary
factor delaying secularization, and the primary political question in
California for some time, was how to divide up this prime land. Spanish
mission law declared that it belonged to the Indians, but in Mexico it was
uncertain if the law still applied. The result was a final decade of
mission rule to 1834, during which the continued existence of the missions
was constantly in question.
Governor Figueroa (summer 1833 to fall 1835) provided a brief period of
stability during which secularization was declared in August 1834. Half
the mission lands were to go to the Indians, the other half to Californios
(the threat of the lands going to unknown Mexican colonists being
successfully resisted). The result, though, was that very few Indians even
attempted to farm their land, and none retained it more than a few
years. All the land quickly went into the hands of the powerful Californio
families. The mission buildings continued in several cases to be occupied
by the Franciscans and a few of the Indians who had no other place to go
to. The majority of the Indian population dispersed, to be ranch hands for
the Californios, to seek out tribes that would accept them, or to become
laborers in the pueblos. The last head of the missions, Father Duran,
wrote that the Los Angeles pueblo Indians were "far more wretched and
oppressed than those in the missions." [Bean 49]
When Richard Henry Dana (described below) visited the San Diego Mission in
1835, he found "a number of irregular buildings, connected with one
another, and disposed in the form of a hollow square, with a church at one
end ... Just outside of the buildings, and under the walls, stood twenty
or thirty small huts, built of straw and of the branches of trees grouped
together, in which a few Indians lived....Entering a gateway, we drove
into the open square, in which the stillness of death reigned. We rode
twice round the square, in the hope of waking up someone." The Mission was
on the verge of abandonment, but still housed at least one monk. This man
provided Dana and his companion with "the most scrumptious meal we had
eaten since we left Boston," accepting ten or twelve reals as donation for
his charity. [Dana, 82]
When Duflot de Mofras of France visited the Mission Dolores in San
Francisco, 1841, he found less than fifty Indians still tending the
crops. There was no priest living there, but services were held from time
to time by a visiting priest from Santa Clara. [Lewis, 16]
The Ranchos
The 1830s and 1840s can quite properly be labeled the age of the ranchos
in California. The opening of the Mission lands resulted in many more land
grants and the construction of several (relatively) lavish ranch
houses. This was also the period that introduced California to Yankees,
hence the image of Spanish California in later years is really an image of
this period. These are the days of fiestas, rodeos, bull fights, and, for
the Californio families, freedom. This is the source of the great
Californio myth of indolence, wealth and ease.
The typical rancho mansion was a long, one story adobe with shaded
verandah, often with a surrounded courtyard. An excellent example remains
in San Diego's old town; another is the Vallejo "fort" in Sonoma. In
Orinda, an original 1840's adobe is still occupied as a private residence.
It was a requirement of many land grants that a structure be built onsite,
hence the rancho buildings were necessarily separated from their neighbors
by a large distance. Thus a neighborly visit was a marked occasion for
festivities. The great Californio families -- Matinez, Vallejo, Moraga,
Castro, and Peralta, for example -- excelled in providing entertainment
and comfort for visitors, who it turn, provided excitement in a normally
rather dull existence. "There was prodigal hospitality in the
entertainment of strangers, and singing and dancing were passions with
Californians." [Bean, 53]
Cattle was the primary, and almost sole, business. Meals were beef for
breakfast, beef for lunch, and beef for dinner. The cultivation performed
by the missions was lost, as well as the mission industries -- blanket
making, tanning, wine making, soap, candles, etc. Instead everything had
to be imported. This lack of industry was both a consequence of and
continuing cause for the low population density. With very few non-Indians
and an abundance of grazing land, there was no need for Californios to
seek new industry -- they made their comfortable living without unpleasant
labor (Indians did what physical work was required). With the land locked
up by the Californio families, new immigrants had little opportunity to
generate a living. The only empty economic niche was trading between the
ranchers and foreign ships, and this was where the Yankees would excel.
At the end of the Mexican period in 1845, Bean estimates that there were
about 7000 non- full blooded Indians. Of these, less than 1000 were adult
males, and of these, less than 100 could read and write. [Bean, 54] These
startlingly small numbers (a state-wide population growth of less than 100
per year for the over 70 years of Spanish/Mexican rule) were the real
reason that California did not remain a Mexican territory.
Snapshot of California in 1835
Just as Vancover and La Perouse provided useful descriptions of California
from an outsider's perspective, so too did Richard Henry Dana in his
popular book, Two Years Before the Mast. Dana wrote of a 1835 visit in the
Boston trading vessel, the Pilgrim (it was published in 1840). Dana's
primary subject was the life of a sailor, but he includes much useful
information on the sites he visited.
Dana's described Santa Barbara: "The mission stands a little back of the
town, and is a large building, or rather a collection of buildings, in the
center of which is a high tower with a belfry of five bells. The whole
being plastered, makes quite a show at a distance, and is the mark by
which vessels come to anchor. The town lies a little nearer to the beach -
about half a mile from it - and is composed of one-story houses built of
sun baked clay, or adobe, some of them whitewashed, with red tiles on the
roofs. I should judge that there was about a hundred of them; and in the
midst of them stands the presidio."
The Pilgrim next visited Monterey, a requirement of Mexican law since
Monterey had the only customs house and was the only place the government
could collect its tariffs. Less honest captains than Dana's were said to
disembark their goods at an uninhabited spot, visit Monterey, and then
reload. Dana describes a lively (and lucrative) trade, where thanks to his
instruction in French and Latin at Harvard, he picks up enough Spanish to
make himself the boat's primary translator.
Dana has both praise and disdain for the Californios. He says of Monterey
that it makes "a very pretty appearance, its houses being of whitewashed
adobe, which gives a much better effect than those of Santa Barbara, which
are mostly left of a mud color. The red tiles on the roofs contrasted well
with the white sides and with the extreme greenness of the lawn... The
Mexican flag was flying from the little square presidio, and the drums and
trumpets of the soldiers, who were out on parade, sounded over the
water." He also describes the residents as joyfully coming aboard to trade
-- men, women and children. "Everything must dress itself and come aboard
and see the new vessel, were it only to buy a paper of pins."
At the same time, the hardworking sailors are offended at the easy life of
the Californios. Dana writes, "The Californians are an idle, thriftless
people, and can make nothing for themselves. The country abounds in
grapes, yet they buy, at a great price, bad wine from Boston. [The Boston
shoes we sell them are] as like as not made of their own hides, which have
been carried twice round Cape Horn...The Indians do all the hard work, two
or three being attached to the better house, and the poorest persons are
able to keep one at least." This disdain is in large part due to the
Protestant work ethic of the Yankees. Dana earlier had commented that the
ship's mate job was to see to it that the sailors were continuously
occupied with working, and if no work was available, the crew was put to
almost useless tasks like scraping the anchor chain.
The comparison between cultural attitudes towards work made Yankees very
successful in Mexican California. Dana wrote "In Monterey, there are a
number of English and Americans ... Having more industry, frugality, and
enterprise than the natives, they soon get nearly all the trade into their
hands. They usually keep shops, in which they retail the goods purchased
in larger quantities from our vessels."
This is an interesting cultural difference of critical importance to 19th
century authorities, but discretely glossed over by polite modern
historians. I suspect it has its roots not only in economics -- the
Californios were making an economic facsimile of the landed aristocracy in
Spain -- but also in religion. Californios believed they need only obey
the church and prosper for eternity in heaven, whereas the Yankee beliefs
are well summed up by the sailor's observation that Dana quotes, "To work
hard, live hard, die hard, and go to hell after all, would be hard
indeed." In other words, the Yankees felt that hard work was good for the
soul and "would be passed to their credit in the books of the Great
Captain hereafter." [Dana, 31]
The dress of the Californios is described in detail, and is consistent
throughout Californio for both Mexican and Yankee residents. Men wore a
"broad brimmed hat, usually of a black or dark brown color, with a gilt or
figured band round the crown and lined under the rim with silk; a short
jacket of silk or figured calico; the shirt open in the neck; rich
waistcoat, if any; pantaloons, open at the sides below the knees, laced
with gilt, usually of velveteen or broadcloth; or else short breeches and
white stockings ... deerskin shoes ... made by Indians [and] usually a
good deal ornamented. They have no suspenders, but always wear a sash
round the waist, which is generally red, and varying in quality with the
means of the wearer. Add to this the never-failing poncho, or serape,
... with as much velvet and trimmings as may be ... and you have the dress
of the Californians."
"The women wore gowns of various texture -- silks, crepe, calicoes,
etc. -- made after the European style, except that the sleeves were short,
leaving the arm bare, and that they were loose about the waist, corsets
not being in use. They wore shoes of kid or satin, sashes or belts of
bright colors, and almost always a necklace and earrings. Bonnets they had
none ... they wear their hair long in their necks, sometimes loose and
sometimes in long braids; although the married women often do it up on a
high comb." Dana notes that the Califonio's appearance was all important
to him, such that even those "without a real in his pockets and absolutely
suffering for something to eat" might still find a way to be finely
dressed.
As mentioned, the Indians formed a servant class while Yankees made up the
merchant class. Within the Californios, the respectability of each family
was dependent "upon the amount of Spanish blood they can lay claim
to. Those who are of pure Spanish blood have clear brunette complexions,
There are but few of these families in California, being mostly those in
official stations ... and others who have been banished for state
offenses. These form the upper class, intermarrying and keeping up an
exclusive system in every respect. From this upper class they go down by
regular shades, growing more and more dark and muddy, until you come to
the pure Indian ... The least drop of Spanish blood, if it be only of
quadroon or octoroon, is sufficient to raise one from the position of a
serf, and entitle him to wear a suit of clothes ... and to call himself
Espanol, and to hold property, if he can get it."
(Incidentally, among the sailors there was a great respect for Hawaiians,
who manned many of the vessels in the California trade. Dana calls them
"well formed and active, with ... intelligent countenances ... very good
in boating ... ready and active in the rigging. ... In their dress they
are precisely like our sailors." The mutual respect of Yankee and Hawaiian
sailors, and their frequent interaction in whaling and the California
trade, may have had much to do with the eventual siding of Hawaii with the
United States, at a time when England and France also coveted a Hawaiian
alliance.)
Dana noted that the Californios enjoyed riding above all else, from age
four onwards, and were probably the finest horsemen in the world. Horses
(and cattle) were everywhere remarkably plentiful. They were let to graze
with lassos dragging from their necks, so that riders could grab one
whenever convenient, and let it go when at their destination (branding
marks being used to track ownership). The vast amounts of cattle, which
formed the almost sole economic enterprise of hide and tallow, made beef
"cheaper here than the salt." [Dana, 46] Other entertainment included
horse racing, bull-baiting, bull fighting, bull and bear fights (in which
the animals were tied together and left until one was killed),
cock-fighting, gambling of all sorts, and the fabled fandangos.
In San Diego's "ruinous presidio," Dana found only two guns, one spiked
and the other without a carriage, a garrison of "twelve half-clothed and
half-starved-looking fellows." Of the future San Diego, Dana wrote "the
small settlement lay directly before the fort, composed of about forty
dark brown-looking huts and three or four larger ones, whitewashed." Today
the restored old San Diego is a major tourist attraction.
Increasing Numbers of Yankees
Several Yankees important to the eventual statehood arrived in California
in the 1830s. Thomas Larkin came in 1832 to join his half-brother John
Cooper at Monterey, and became very successful as a go between for
ranchers and traders. His wife, nee Rachel Holmes, is said to be the first
Yankee woman in California.
William Richardson, as mentioned above, deserted from a British whaler in
1822. He is technically an Englishman rather than a Yankee, but Americans
at this time, and early American historians, tend to adopt all white
non-Californios into "Yankee" culture. Richardson adopted Catholicism and
married into one of the powerful Californio families (Martinez). Sometime
in the late 1820s, the Spanish bought two schooners from the Russians for
use on San Francisco Bay, but through neglect they both sank by their dock
at Santa Clara. Richardson received permission to refloat and repair the
vessels, and he began a brisk trading business, centered in Richardson's
Bay near Sausalito. He built a shanty at Yerba Buena cove in 1835. Richard
Henry Dana wrote while anchored here that year, "Over a region far beyond
our sight, there were no human habitations, except that an enterprising
Yankee [had] a shanty of rough boards, where he carried on a very small
retail trade between the hide ships and the Indians." [Lewis 22] Two years
later Richardson was appointed Captain of the Port by Governor Alvarado,
and he built an adobe named Casa Grande to house his family and trade
business.
Jacob P. Leese of Ohio lived for a time at Los Angeles. In 1836, hearing
of the trade opportunities at San Francisco, he moved to Yerba Buena and
became Richardson's first neighbor. Starting July 4th, 1836, he had a
grand, three-day house warming party for all nearby Californios. Leese
married the sister of Mariano Vallejo, the most important Californio in
the Bay Area, who lived at Sonoma. In 1837, Leese's daughter became the
first white child born in the new Pueblo of Yerba Buena. It is of note
that Leese applied for his land from the alcalde at Mission Dolores. The
texts I consulted weren't clear, but it appears that the alcaldes of the
small Indian population by the mission eventually became the alcaldes of
Yerba Buena, as Yerba Buena grew to eclipse the mission settlement.
John Marsh, fleeing arrest from the United States on the charge that he
sold guns to the Sioux, came overland to Los Angeles as a penniless emigre
in 1836. Marsh had a degree in arts from Harvard, and he had assisted an
army surgeon in Minnesota for a time, so he told the Angelos that his
degree was in medicine and he was a doctor. Few of the Angelos could read
Spanish, much less Latin, so they believed him and Marsh became the local
doctor. Charging his fee in cowhides, Marsh soon collected the equivalent
of $500 in goods and, in 1837, bought the first successful rancho in the
modern region of Martinez- Concord. He is recognized as the first Yankee
in the East San Francisco Bay Area.
John Sutter had an even more checkered past and brighter future. He was
born a German Swiss, but fled to America in 1834 when threatened with
debtors prison at home. In doing so, he abandoned his wife and five
children. By the time he arrived in California in 1839, he had tried
several trades (including trapping) in the states and Hawaii. In
California, he declared himself a captain of the Royal Swiss Guard of
France. He arrived at an opportune time. Governor Alvarado (the same one
who declared California a free state in 1836, and who was recognized by
Mexico in 1837) was concerned that his supporter Mariano Vallejo was
becoming too powerful in the north. Alvarado seized upon this "Swiss
captain," and gave him both a
The number and independence of Yankee Texans alarmed the Mexican
government. The famous assault on the Alamo occurred in 1836. Mexicans
killed every defender at the Alamo in an attempt to break the spirit of
the Yankees before they became too rebellious. The strategy backfired, and
the Yankee Texans waged a successful though violent revolt. In 1836, the
Lone Star Republic was declared. Mexico did not recognize its legality,
but neither did it attempt to reassert its authority. The United States
did not immediately absorb Texas because they did not want to provoke
Mexico, and perhaps more importantly, because they did not want to upset
the balance of slave and free states. For the next ten years the Texas
Republic was disputed land.
The Texas experience had less impression on the Californios than might be
expected. There was no immediate halt in authorizing foreigner
settlers. The Californios seemed to see their Yankees as more willing to
assimilate, at least the coastal, oath-taking Yankees like Dana and Stearn
who married into their families and became leading members of the
community, and "Doctor" Marsh and "Captain" Sutter who similarly raised
the standard of settlers. The Californios never did like the inland
trappers and considered their actions to be illegal. In fact, the purpose
of Sutter's fort in 1840 was "to prevent the robberies committed by
adventurers from the United States, to stop the invasion of savage Indians
and the hunting and trapping by companies from the
Columbia." [authorization quoted by Bean, 64]
This was not to say there wasn't friction. Alvarado, as noted, was
concerned about his supporter Mariano Vallejo. He was even more concerned
about his supporter Isaac Graham and his company of Tennessee riflemen. In
1840, Alvarado arrested Graham and 38 other Americans on charges of their
fomenting a Texas-style revolution. The Americans were sent to Mexico,
where the Mexican authorities simply let them go.
In point of fact the Yankee settlers were undermining Alvarado's
authority, consciously or unconsciously. Marsh wrote to friends in
Missouri, prompting a party of Missourrians to come out to his rancho in
fall of 1841. Sutter gained a reputation as a great friend of Americans
coming to California, even sending out rescue parties when emigrant groups
became stranded in the Sierras. Bean, ever the cynic, points out that the
American settlers provided "potential assets to [Sutter's] colonial
establishment ... and ultimate buyers of some of the vast lands he had
received for the asking." [65] In any event, the tide of Americans was
slowly picking up.
Back at Yerba Buena, Leese sold out his trading post in 1841 to the Hudson
Bay company, which installed William Glen Rae to run it. (Leese moved his
family to Sonoma where Vallejo, his brother-in-law, lived). By 1841,
Duflot de Mofras tells us there were about twenty structures here, all
belonging to foreigners and all associated with trading with ships. By
1844, the population included William Leidesdorff of the Dutch West Indies
(who was a descendant of African slaves), Yankees Spear and Hinckley who
had been partners with Leese, and a sea captain turned grocer named Jean
Jacques Vioget. There were enough homes and shops that the alcalde
(Francisco de Haro) commissioned Vioget to map out streets for the growing
town. The Vioget map remains in the Bancroft museum at UC Berkeley. It
starts the grid pattern north of Market by mapping out the streets bounded
by Montgomery, Sacramento, Grant and Pacific.[Lewis 26] The next year,
1845, a new map was required due to expansion beyond Vioget's borders. The
new map, called by the locals the Alcalde's map, was kept beneath Robert
Ridley's bar. As lots changed hands, the old owner's name was erased and a
new one added. [Lewis 28]
American Attempts to Buy California
As for the American Government during the Mexican period, it had growing
desires for California. The overriding impetus was first, to establish a
port on the Pacific (and San Francisco was recognized as the best harbor
available, especially after the publication of Dana's Two Years Before the
Mast in 1840), and second, to avoid the founding of a new English
colony. This second incentive seems far fetched in retrospect, but at the
time, the War of 1812 was still in the common memory. Americans recognized
the weakness of Mexican hold over the territory, and the possibilities
California offered to any power that should claim it.
As early as 1835, Andrew Jackson was attempting to purchase Mexican land,
but his foolish agent in Mexico City openly bragged about a plan to bribe
Mexican officials and killed the negotiations. In 1837, after the
declaration of the Lone Star Republic, Jackson offered to calm the
situation by purchasing Mexican rights to Texas and parts of Arizona, New
Mexico and California for $3.5 million. The Mexican government rejected
this offer. Perhaps a higher offer would have been made, but the US
suffered a periodic depression that year (just after Martin Van Buren's
inauguration) that lasted until Tyler's presidency started in 1841. At
that time, Daniel Webster as Secretary of State again moved the
U.S. towards purchasing California. That effort ended by an unusual
affair. Commodore Thomas Jones of the US Pacific Fleet, heard an incorrect
rumor at Peru that the US had gone to war with Mexico. Jones rushed up to
Monterey and "captured" California in a bloodless coup on October 20th,
1842. (Monterey had only "29 soldiers, 25 militia, with 11 cannon, nearly
all useless and lacking ammunition, and 150 muskets." [Lewis 30]) As soon
as Jones took command and examined the official communications from
Mexico, he realized his mistake and gave back the command on the
21st. This incident soured negotiations. Polk would make the last attempt
to buy California in 1846, this time offering $40 million, but this offer
came after America had insulted Mexico by offering Texas statehood (by a
vote of Congress in 1845).
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