El Real Ejercito de California (review)

Even to describe Spain's limited armed forces in Alta California—from the late-eighteenth-century settlement of the mission-presidios through Mexican independence—as "an army" tends to exaggerate the nature of available military capacity. Indeed, at the apogee of its numerical strength around 1810, the scattered companies stationed from San Francisco to San Diego totaled just over 400 soldiers. Taking into consideration illness, chronic disabilities, and age, this "army" could not have assembled one regiment of cavalry or a single depleted infantry battalion. Moreover, soldiers assigned to California carried additional burdens of duties that were not at all connected with defense or pacification. Their primary function was to guard the fortified presidios that protected the Franciscan missions established to convert and settle the native population. The presidial companies offered limited coastal defense at San Diego, Monterey, Santa Bárbara, San Francisco, and at other ports visited by foreign explorers and scientists, would-be settlers, maritime fur traders, contrabandists, and raiders. The California soldiers also looked after guard duties, escorted the royal mail, protected livestock, and tracked down runaway neophytes who sought to escape the rigors of Franciscan rule. Soldiers of the Compañia de Voluntarios de Cataluña and militiamen from San Blas served as marines during the Spanish voyages of exploration to the Northwest Coast.

Despite the close relationships between presidio and mission, the friars had little use for the army commanders, who advocated secular rather than religious goals, and especially for the common soldiers who abused native women and made proselytizing more difficult. Some soldiers married Indian women, but the shortage of eligible women produced numerous internecine disputes within the presidial garrisons, as well as the chronic sexual exploitation of Indian women. Unless accompanied by a friar, soldiers and corporals were forbidden access to native communities. Except for the warlike Yuma Indians who blocked the overland route from Sonora, the fragmented California tribes failed to organize a common defense, and most tribes surrendered piecemeal to a mere handful of troops. Nevertheless, sudden native assaults such as the November 1775 attack on San Diego illustrated the potential vulnerabilities of the tiny presidial garrisons.

Parsimonious imperial authorities failed to recognize the value of Alta California, and neither the viceroys nor other senior bureaucrats of New Spain were able to authorize sufficient support. A shortage of ships and trained crews limited maritime communications from the isolated supply port of San Blas, and the regime failed to develop the overland route from Sonora. As a result, California soldiers lacked adequate basic clothing, weaponry, provisions, and accommodations. Even before the outbreak of the Hidalgo Revolt in 1810 that severed communications with Alta California and led to the rebel occupation of San Blas, foreign maritime fur traders and Russians from their settlement at Bodega Bay opened an active contraband traffic with the Spanish posts. The Russian intrusions so close to San Francisco, and a short but destructive Argentine privateering attack in 1818 on Monterey and Santa Bárbara, exposed Spain's defensive weaknesses. While Alta California remained staunchly royalist until Mexican independence, the decade of wartime isolation, supply and weapon shortages, and the lack of replacements and pay for the soldiers further eroded the effectiveness of the presidial garrisons.

In many respects, the present study follows a well-worn path established by generations of previous historians of Alta California. At his best, Carlos López Urrutia draws together themes connected with the Spanish military presence. Unfortunately, however, by undertaking very broad coverage on topics that have been researched thoroughly, the chapters on the northern explorations and the settlement of California are at times quite general and contain minor errors of fact and interpretation. The author neglected to include some key published works by California historians such as Janet Fireman and Iris Engstrand. Although the...