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1 1. “I DO NOT LIKE THE WHITE MAN . . . HE IS A LIAR AND A THIEF” Testimonios and the Politics of Resistance linda heidenreich In 1874 in Monterey, California, Rosalía Vallejo de Leese spoke with Henry Cerruti, a research assistant for Hubert H. Bancroft, the author and bookseller who was producing a multivolume history of California. Her purpose was to recount her memory of the so-called Bear Flag Revolt in the spring and summer of 1846, when a group of European American men came to the Napa-Sonoma region, stole goods from Californio ranches (that is, the homes of men and women of Spanish-Mexican descent whose families lived in California before the arrival of the Americans), subjected the indigenous people of the region to unbridled violence, and on June 14 proclaimed a California republic, complete with a flag depicting a grizzly bear. Soon after, John C. Frémont, an officer in the U.S. Army, arrived with troops; in the area on a surveying mission, Frémont took command. In mid-July, Frémont and the Bear Flaggers learned that the United States had declared war on Mexico in mid-May. At the end of the war, in 1848, Mexico ceded California and other territories to the United States. By 1874 the account of those events prevalent among the then dominant European American population of the region painted the Osos (Spanish for “bears,” a term used both by the filibusters of 1846 to describe themselves and by the Californios to describe the filibusters) as heroes—men who challenged Mexican rule in California and brought liberty and republican institutions to the region.1 Vallejo de Leese, however, described the Osos as thieves, rapists, and “rough looking desperados.”2 She narrated her account in Spanish, the language of her community before the Americans seized California. Her narrative presents a counternarrative of the events of 1846 and, in the process , it seeks to preserve and protect her culture. Her decision to present her version of those events, and to do so in Spanish was deliberate. From the time of the American conquest onward, she had refused to speak with the newcomers who had taken control of California, and she had forbidden linda heidenreich 2 her children from speaking English in her presence.3 In her own words, as translated by Cerruti: “Those hated men inspired me with such a large dose of hate against their race, that though 28 years have elapsed since that time, I have not yet forgotten the insults they heaped upon me, and not being desirous of coming in contact with them I have abstained from learning their language.”4 Yet on June 27, 1874, she spoke with Cerruti and, “through clenched teeth,” dictated a narrative that directly challenged the European American version of the Bear Flag Revolt.5 Her statement may not seem political on its face but, in fact, it represents an effort to challenge existing configurations of power, to preserve Californio values that were then under attack—including attacks using the more usual forms of politics—and to pose an alternative to the histories constructed by the “rough looking desperados” who came to power between 1846 and 1848.6 Vallejo de Leese’s statement may be considered a testimonio, or testimony. The term testimonio can be traced to the time of the Spanish conquest of the Americas. Yet its modern definition—describing testimonies that are political critiques of specific historical events and that are voiced by the people under attack—was not established until 1959 during the Cuban revolution.7 Perhaps the best-known testimonio is that of Rigoberta Menchú, whose graphic testimony of the Guatemalan civil war brought international attention to both Menchú and her people. Scholars now use the term to apply to a narrative by an eyewitness whose purpose in testifying is to draw attention to a desperate situation (e.g., oppression or poverty), or to correct a widespread perception that differs from the author’s personal experience. Recent scholars have begun to treat as testimonios many of the late-nineteenth-century dictations by Californios, Californianas,andindigenous(CaliforniaIndian)women.Bytreatingthese sources as testimonios, the political nature of those narratives becomes apparent.8 Genaro Padilla’s groundbreaking study, My History, Not Yours, examined many Californiana/o testimonios, drawing attention to women’s testimonios as a form of resistance, and placing the testimonios in the larger political context of their time. Rosaura Sánchez, Beatrice Pita, and Bárbara Reyes have published...

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