His Force Consisted Of Sergeant Ortega,
With Twenty-Seven Soldados De Cuera Under Rivera, Fages With Six Catalan
Volunteers - All That Could Travel, Ensign Costanso, The Priests, Crespi
And Gomez, Seven Muleteers, Fifteen Christian Indians From The Missions
Of Lower California, And Two Servants - Sixty-Four In All.
Both Fages
and Costanso were sick with scurvy, but joined the command
notwithstanding.
The personnel of this expedition contains some of the
best known names in California. Portola, the first governor; Rivera,
comandante of California from 1773 to 1777, killed in the Yuma revolt on
the Colorado in 1781; Fages, first comandante of California, 1769-1773,
governor, 1782-1790; Ortega, pathfinder, explorer, discoverer of the
Golden Gate and of Carquines Strait[14]; lieutenant and brevet captain,
comandante of the presidio of San Diego, of Santa Barbara, and of
Monterey; founder of the presidio of Santa Barbara and of the missions
of San Juan Capistrano and San Buenaventura. Among the rank and file
were men whose names are not less known: Pedro Amador, who gave his name
to Amador county; Juan Bautista Alvarado, grandfather of Governor
Alvarado; Jose Raimundo Carrillo, later alferez, lieutenant, and
captain, comandante of the presidio of Monterey, of Santa Barbara, and
of San Diego, and founder of the great Carrillo family; Jose Antonio
Yorba, sergeant of Catalonia volunteers, founder of the family of that
name and grantee of the Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana; Pablo de Cota,
Jose Ignacio Oliveras, Jose Maria Soberanes, and others.
At San Diego, Portola left the sick under the care of the faithful
surgeon, Prat, and a guard of ten cuera soldiers; Captain Vila of the
San Carlos, with a few seamen; Frays Junipero Serra, Juan Vizcaino, and
Fernando Parron, a carpenter, a blacksmith, and a few Lower California
Indians, some forty persons in all. The governor also left with them a
sufficient number of horses and mules and about sixty loads[15] of
provisions. On July 16th, two days after the Portola expedition started,
Junipero founded, with appropriate ceremonies, the mission of San Diego
de Alcala, the first mission established in Alta California. The deaths
continued, and before Portola's return in January, eight soldiers, four
sailors, one servant, and eight Indians died, leaving but about twenty
persons at the camp.
We will now follow the governor. Relying somewhat on the supply ship,
San Jose, which was to meet him at Monterey, but which, as we have seen,
was lost at sea, and also on the supplies to be brought by the San
Antonio, the governor, knowing the uncertainties of a sea voyage, took
with him one hundred mules loaded with provisions, sufficient, he
concluded, to last him for six months.
On the march the following order was observed. Sergeant Ortega, with six
or eight soldiers, went in advance, laid out the route, selected the
camping place, and cleared the way of hostile Indians by whom he was
frequently surrounded. At the head of the column rode the comandante,
with Fages, Costanso, the two priests, and an escort of six Catalonia
volunteers; next came the sappers and miners, composed of Indians, with
spades, mattocks, crowbars, axes, and other implements used by pioneers;
these were followed by the main body divided into four bands of
pack-animals, each with its muleteers and a guard of presidial soldiers.
The last was the rear guard, commanded by Captain Rivera, convoying the
spare horses and mules (caballada y mulada).
The presidial soldiers were provided with two kinds of arms, offensive
and defensive.
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