by Paul R. Spitzzeri
Maturin Murray Ballou (1820-1895) was a native of Boston who, while still in his teens, began work as a journalist, while also working for the customs house and post office, including co-owning a weekly newspaper and writing novels published by Frederick Gleason. The two then established Gleason’s Pictorial Drawing-Room Companion, which produced its first issue on 3 May 1851. After three-and-a-half years, Ballou bought Gleason out and renamed the journal Ballou’s Pictorial Drawing-Room Companion and he operated other publications, though the Pictorial closed down in 1859.
The featured artifact from the Museum’s collection for this post is the 2 May 1857 edition of the journal, which featured, on its cover page, a short article, “Digger Indians Burning Their Dead,” accompanied by a dramatic drawing of a “striking scene” said to have been rendered from a sketch by a Mrs. L Taylor, who was present for the ceremony, which took place in the Gold Rush town of Placerville, northeast of Sacramento.
The piece continued that “the Digger Indians, so called because they dig roots for their principal food, burn with the deceased everything belonging to him—bows, arrows, ornaments, cooking utensils, etc.” and added that “they are a peaceable tribe, but very filthy in their habits,” while also observing that “in the scene before us an interested group of Americans and Chinese are watching the curious ceremony.”
Ballou’s then cited Elisha S. Capron’s History of California, published in 1854 by a Boston firm, in which it was paraphrased “that a marked difference of natural characteristics exists between the Indian residing on the eastern and those inhabiting the western side of the Rocky Mountains,” so that the former were “generally tall, powerful and bold,” while the latter were “short, comparatively feeble and cowardly” not to mention “uniformly lazy.”
Moreover, Capron was summarized as remarking that “the natives who live west of the Sierra Nevadas are, with some exceptions, remarkably filthy” as well as darker-skinned and divided into such small groups that collecting their names “would be as difficult as it would be useless.” They were smaller in population than tribes to the east and south and “this fact is attributed to the intercourse of the former with Europeans, and to their physical inferiority.”
They were also described as not as likely to engage in wars, though “the moral proclivities of the natives of this beautiful region are not so variant” as “all of them are thievish, brutal and deceitful.” Their marriage rites were said to include polygamy and men could dispose of wives on any pretense. As to the southern California natives, the males of which wore no garments, except a partial covering during wet weather, while the women had “a very scanty petticoat made of tule grass,” it was remarked,
The Alchones [Shoshone?] of the south are among the most intelligent and athletic of the tribes, and the Diggers of the north and east are probably the most filthy, stupid, and depraved. The Catholic missionary priests easily reduced large numbers of these people to submission, but they do not appear to have benefited much, spiritually, by the instructions of the fathers. In the more southern missions, these priests planted extensive vineyards and orchards, cultivated luxuriant gardens, raised large crops, and, by the help of the aborigines, made the wilderness “blossom like the rose.”
Perhaps the most successful of the 21 California missions, from the standpoint of those agricultural endeavors, if not the spiritual salvation of the indigenous, nearly all of which succumbed to alcohol, disease and violence, in a few generations—mirroring the experience of most native peoples around the world when colonized by Europeans—was our local San Gabriel, the so-called “Queen of the Missions.”
Looking at newspaper sources for 1857, we find some notable references to the native people, locally and statewide. The ambush in January by members of the so-called Flores-Daniel Gang of Sheriff James R. Barton and his woefully inadequate posse as they headed to San Juan Capistrano to investigate robberies and the murder of merchant George Pflugardt, brought forth revenge and retribution on a significant scale.
The 31 January edition of the Los Angeles Star included an initial report, before the killings of Barton and his men were known, of the Pflugardt murder and depredations at the mission town and it was mentioned that “in the meantime runners were sent to all the Indian Captains [chiefs], instructing them to raise their people through the [Santa Ana] mountains towards San Juan, and watch all the outlets to Lower [Baja] California [in México] and the river Colorado.”
Elsewhere in the issue, there was news from San Diego that “the Indian captains were instructed to arrest all armed or suspicious Mexicans they might find,” though how any Latino was to be deemed suspicious and why anyone who carried a weapon, as many persons did during that particularly violent era, was not explained. Moreover, it was stated that “arrangements [were] made to pay them so much for each prisoner brought in,” though there was, of course, no possibility that white bandits would have been subject to such conditions.
The next week’s issue of the paper recorded that a “California Company” of Latinos commanded by Andrés Pico, a hero of the Californio resistance a decade before during the American invasion of Mexican California as he led his lancers to victory at San Pasqual near San Diego, and comprising some fifty men were on the manhunt for the gang. Notably,
The first step taken was to send Indian spies into the mountains, to find the camp of the robbers. One of the runners returned before dark the same day and reported that the camp was situated at the head of the cañada de Santiago [Santiago Canyon]. A second spy came in during the night, and reported to Don Andres that he had conversed with one of the band, Antonio Ma[ria] Varelas, (Chino) who sent word to Don Andres, to place his men in a certain position, and he would be sure to catch the whole gang.
While Pico was long credited with his role in capturing members of the gang, two of which he lynched in the Santa Ana Mountains, and this may have been a key reason why he was soon elected to the state assembly (his proposal to divide California into two states, with the southern “Colorado” to be a slave-holding one, was forwarded to Congress after passage here but was left ignored with the outbreak of the Civil War), the role of the Indian guides and spies has not been fully appreciated.
While most media reports of bandits, which frequently infested greater Los Angeles during the period, focused on their theft of horses from Anglos and Latinos on ranchos and those living in the few towns in the region, it is interesting to see an account in the 11 July edition of the Star, in which Barton’s successor, William C. Getman (who died at the hands of a mentally ill man in January 1858) report that “the mountains of San Bernardino and vicinity are the rendevouz [sic] of a large band of robbers” and that “those fellows are committing great excesses upon the Indians of the locality” as well as travelers.
Meanwhile, there was a continuing military presence with respect to indigenous tribes from more interior regions whose conflicts with local authorities were also a major issue during the era, especially in the earlier Fifties. The 9 May issue of the Star featured an editorial on the “Location of a new Military Post,” in which the paper remarked,
From time to time, we have called attention to the importance of establishing an additional military post in the southern section of the State, to guard our frontier from the incursions of Indians for the protection of immigrants seeking our locality, and for the defense of tettlers [settlers] and the inhabitants generally.
Of course, the obvious question is which tribes were involved and to what degree were they defending their traditional territory from the “incursions of Anglos”? Fort Tejon was established in the mountains north of Los Angeles in 1854 and its commander, Army Lt. Col. Benjamin L. Beall, was ordered to search for a suitable site.
The paper opined that the best location was at or near San Gorgonio Pass because of its location for persons coming and going from this portion of California and it “is the centre of a dense Indian population, which can be thereby controled [sic] and held in check,” the largest tribal group in that area being the Cahuilla. Significantly, the Star also suggested “let there be added a Reservation—if that system is to be continued—and the thousands of Indians in this country will be made self-supporting” as, it asserted, “their wandering, predatory habits will be checked, and the young of the tribes raised to habits of thrift and industry.”
What is intriguing about this suggestion, inherently awful as such reservation proposals were for numerous reasons, is the intimation that those native people residing in and around Los Angeles could be sent there. Whatever damage and destruction, great as they were, was wrought upon the indigenous people during the mission era under Spain and México, the decade since the American takeover of California markedly worsened their condition.
When Army Major George A.H. Blake, commander of a San Diego post, went “on an excursion with his men among the mountains, visiting San Luis Rey [Mission, in Oceanside], the Cahuillas, and other Indians in his district,” the Star of 13 June remarked that, “he found the various tribes quiet and peacefully inclined,” perhaps in the face of seeing well-armed Army personnel, “although suffering from want of necessaries.”
Two weeks later, the Star reprinted a letter from the head of the Board of Examiners for War Claims in California that, pertaining to an April act passed by the state legislature that allowed counties to submit “claims of expenses incurred in the suppression of Indian hostilities,”
The sum of $20,000.00 has been appropriated for service rendered and supplies furnished in an expedition against the Indians in the county of Los Angeles, in the years 1852 to 1855. Parties having claims for such pay, by forwarding the same with proper vouchers to the President of the said board at Sacramento, will be duly notified of the action of the said Board thereon.
One wonders if William Workman, with his vast landholdings at Rancho La Puente, which was frequently the target of Indian horse raids, was one of these claimants, assuming he provided services and supplies.
At the beginning of August, the Star expressed alarm at rumors that Fort Tejon was to be shuttered and its personnel sent to Oregon, where the Army was engaged in battles with native peoples, and it observed that troops at Tejon helped prevent further bloodshed in the lower San Joaquin Valley between indigenous people and whites.
It added that, during the recent drama following the massacre of Barton and his posse, “the presence of the military at Fort Tejon proved to be the safeguard and mainstay of our community” in the face of the fact that “the southern counties were overrun by an armed and fierce banditti.” Besides, the editorial continued, “just now, we are again threatened with another outbreak” and it added,
With the Indians, hungry and discontented, and bad men anxious to excite them to outrage and revolt, we cannot but deprecate any movement which will deprive us of military protection.
A remonstrance . . . has been circulated, and signed by our entire community [and included in that document was the statement that]
So great have been the depredations committed on this county by the Indians, that at no time have your predecessors in command deemed it advisable to leave us for a long time without military protection. The military post at Chino and Jarupa [Jurupa] garrisoned by infantry, during the years 1850, 51, 52 and 53, were utterly unable to protect us, owing to the impossibility of their pursuing Indians with any rapidity. During these years, so immense were our losses, and so bold and extensive the robberies by the Indians, that the Governor of the State of California twice saw himself compelled to call into service volunteer companies, and maintain them in the field for a long time, incurring thereby an expenditure of over $300,000 . . .
In the latter part of 1850 , or early part of 1851, a settlement of whites, numbering about twelve, were attacked and butchered by the Indians; and subsequently two droves of cattle, respectively owned by Henry Dalton [of Rancho Azusa] and H[illiard] P. Dorsey, in attempting to seek a northern market . . . were attacked and captured by the Indians, in the neighborhood of where the Fort now stands. Examples like these, repeated instances of isolated murder and daring robbery, have operated to prevent the tide of settlement from flowing northward.
Tejon was, in fact, kept open for several more years and Edward F. Beale secured government support for the San Sebastian, or Tejon, Reservation for native peoples residing in that area, which remained part of Los Angeles County until the creation of Kern County in 1866, two years after the fort was shuttered.
Another important item is from the 20 June edition of the Star, which commented that “rumors of depredations by the Indians of San Bernardino, caused by starvation among the tribes” led the paper to review reports to Congress “to find what provision has been made for the California Indians, and to what extent that aid has been afforded to the Indians of the South.” Unsurprisingly, “we regret to say that the greatest indifference and ignorance seems to prevail among officials concerning the condition, location, and numbers of the swarming tribes of the South.”
A September 1856 report by an Army officer estimated the Golden State’s indigenous population at 61,000, probably close to 20% of that existing before the arrival of Europeans roughly 90 years prior. Of these, about 8,000 were said to be residing in San Bernardino and San Diego counties, though no numbers were provided for areas closer to Los Angeles. My review of the census of 1860 found just over 2,000 identified Indians, 20% in the Tejon township, and this was about half of the number enumerated in the sole state census, taken eight years earlier (in 1870, only 215 natives were counted in the county).
In response to a circular from June 1856, Cave Couts, whose ranch was near Mission San Luis Rey (the house there still stands as part of a public park), and John Rains, living in Temecula, but soon to move to the ranchos Chino and Cucamonga and who had a notable history in Los Angeles before he was found murdered in 1862, offered reports on native peoples in their respective areas. Couts wrote,
The inhabited portion of this county is infested by two tribes of Indians known as the San Luisenians and Dieguinos, and number about 2,500 each . . . [the latter] are far inferior to the [former]. They lack nothing of that laziness and indolence proverbial to all Indian tribes . . .
Rains was more positive in his assessment of the San Luis Rey Indians (Payómkawichum) in Temecula, stating the population was between 2,500 and 2,800 resident in 19 rancherias, though combined with the Diegueño (Kumeyaay) and Cahuilla, he estimated the total at 6,000 persons. He added “they are Christians, raised to work, all cultivate more or less, are good horsemen and make good servants.” A drought, however, ruined their crops and “these are some of them in a starving condition, and are obliged to steal to maintain themselves and families.”
The Cahuilla, comprising various bands, were said to extend from the base of the San Bernardino Mountains and then south for up to 100 miles, with “every nook and corner, every mountain valley, where a scanty subsistence can be procured” providing their habitat. While a figure was not given, the Star commented that they “are undoubtedly far more numerous than any other tribe of Indians in California,” and, taking the 8,000 estimate and subtracting those from Couts and Rains, that would leave from 2,700 to 3,000 Cahuillas.
The paper concluded that, “we have frequently adverted to the neglect under which the Indians of this district have suffered,” and urged the need for two superintendents of Indian affairs in California because one was simply not nearly enough. As for local Gabrieleños, they were essentially left out of official reports during this period, though not so earlier in the 1850s and prior when such figures as Benjamin D. Wilson and Hugo Reid wrote about them.
During 1857, however, there were occasional reports of violence or theft among and by the indigenous people of greater Los Angeles, but these are sparse in detail. The 4 April issue of the Star, for example, merely observed, “on Sunday night, an Indian was killed. Next day, the body was found, and after an examination [coroner’s inquest] was interred.” The vicious cycle of arrests of native people for drunkenness and the sentence, in lieu of paying a fine, of labor on public works or for private citizens, after which the next weekend would bring the same actions, constituted what some have called a perennial “slave mart” of the local indigenous population.
Lastly, Juan José [Jonathan Trumbull] Warner, resident of close to three decades in greater Los Angeles and an avid historian, penned, for the 28 February edition of the Star, a detailed description of “The Eagle Feast of the California Indians,” though he didn’t specify which tribes observed it. The autumn ceremonies, during a full moon, involved locating nesting sites and then taking fledgling birds to a village where the festivities follow, including a procession of young women and singing and dancing, while the young eagles were sedulously cared for. If two or more birds were found, they could be given to a friendly nearby village.
At the fall ceremony, a “priest” or “shaman” oversaw the sacred rites, including petitions to “the Great Spirit” for blessings to the people, the recitation of important events during the past year, the wants and wishes for the upcoming one, including abundant food and protection from enemies, and so on. The officiant, becoming increasingly more animated, then sacrificed the eagle, the spirit of which was to convey gratitude and wishes to The Great Spirit as “the messenger and advocate of man at the celestial courts” as the body was displayed to the hushed and awed community.
The feathers of the eagle were plucked and preserved for future ceremonies, while the body was placed in a fire. The remainder of the evening was devoted to chanting, dancing and singing, while the morning brought the distribution of “the proceeds of the summer and fall harvests” to visitors from other villages. Warner concluded that “none but the more industrious among the Indians, are able to enjoy the luxury of giving an eagle feast” and ended up giving all of the “produce of his fields” to guests, so that he was compelled to go to other eagle feasts to get some of the “bountiful share in the distribution.”
It is remarkable to look back nearly 170 years to these reports, whatever their accuracy, of the indigenous people of California, including the southern part of the state and greater Los Angeles, and this striking illustration from Ballou’s is a rare item from our collection pertaining to the native inhabitants of that era.
Although it is not always labeled as such, the rapid decline of Native American populations during the Spanish, Mexican, and early American periods in California constitutes a genocide.