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Anza's Wild Gosling

Dedication

To readers of all ages, but especially the young-at-heart, who want to share an adventure of discovery that really happened. Life as these people lived it was not dull and their history need not be dull or "ancient." My goal is to share significant events in the development of our continent, share the adventures of those who were there with the reader of today and tomorrow.

Acknowledgments

The author is pleased to acknowledge the patience and encouragement of his wife, Louise, and the understanding of his children, David and Laurel. This work of historical fiction is based upon an idea that history can be entertaining and interesting, and not just a recitation of dates and places. The events of the expedition to establish a land route from Mexico to the San Francisco Bay area are in the main, factual, and based upon the diaries of the people who participated in one of the most challenging of explorations ever carried out in North America.

The U. S. Congress in 1990 recognized their accomplishments by establishing the Juan Bautista de Anza National Historic Trail. Under the National Park Service's direction, volunteer groups are recreating the trail throughout its entire distance in the United States for the use of hikers, horsemen, and in some locations, motoring visitors.

It has been recognized as one of The Millennium Trails for the year 2,000. The Trail is being executed mainly by volunteers. Arizona's group is the "Anza Trail Coalition of Arizona", and in California the group is entitled "Amigos de Anza." Work is underway with the citizens and government of Mexico to create the "Anza Trail" as an international trail.

I have indeed been fortunate to have as a mentor, super resource and willing critic, Don Garate, Historian and Chief of Interpretation, and Ranger at the Tumacacori National Historic Park, located just north of Nogales, Arizona. He is undoubtedly the premier and undisputed extant historian on the lives of Juan Bautista De Anza and his father, the Senior Juan Bautista, and is finishing his trilogy of books on this unique family.

Through the efforts of the Center for Advanced Technology in Education, (CATE) at the University of Oregon's Center for Electronic Studying, a website, "Web de Anza", was opened in 1998. Dr. Lynne Anderson-Inman is Director. It displays for interested parties throughout the internet the text of several diaries of Colonel Anza, Father Pedro Font, and Lt. Don Josef Joachín Moraga, leaders of the trek.

The notes and diaries describe the journey from Cuiliacán, Mexico north through the presidios and missions in southern Arizona near Tucson, west through the pristine desert wilderness, the perilous crossing of the Colorado River, and bitter cold struggles the mountains and deserts of southern California, to the bay at the mouth of the San Francisco River. CATE provides maps, illustrations, biographies, and translations with the original text versions of diaries, including Herbert E. Bolton's English translations which for years were the most readily available for those interested. The website may be visited through its address, (http//anza.uoregon.edu). I have found their high quality staff of unique value in dispensing information in a most readable format.

What I have done in this and in previous manuscriptsa , is to inject a fictional youth character into the daily lives of the real people, to participate in some of the events that actually happened. While my initial audience profile was youthful, I have found adults enjoying this adventure and recognizing the significance of this expedition to establish the first European settlement in San Francisco.

I wish to thank Lynne Anderson-Inman of CATE, the Arizona Historic Society, Mark Santiago and Don Garate for their permission to use items from their materials in the construction of this tale of adventure. And I especially appreciate all of the members of the Anza Trail Coalition of Arizona for awakening my interest in the Anza Trail soon after we moved to Arizona.

Philip V. English

Green Valley, Arizona

PROLOGUE

British oppression of the Catholic population in Ireland continued into the eighteenth century. Since 1586, young Irishmen left their native soil to fight as mercenaries in the armies of European countries, especially Catholic Spain. At the beginning of the 1700's, 50 regiments of Irish officers and soldiers fought for Philip V, first Bourbon King of Spain. Some of these regiments served in Italy, fought the Dutch in the Low Country campaigns, manned garrisons throughout Spain, and even tried to return the Stuarts to the English throne.

These expatriates were collectively known as 'na Gaena Fiadhaine', or "the Wild Geese."b [Hence the title of our story]. Among them were the O'Conors, and for the purpose of this story, one Hugh O'Conor, born in Dublin in 1734. Thirty years later, Just thirty, after serving in Spanish, Austrian and French armies, (in the Seven Years' War) O'Conor was sent to Cuba.

He was employed in Spain's Hibernian Regiment. From Cuba he was sent on a mission to Texas, Spain's northern frontier in the Americas. Part of his mission was to organize the Spanish Army forces on the border. The goal was to conquer the Comanche and Apache tribes, with which Spain had been 'at war' since 1748. From his arrival in March of 1765 and for the next several years, Lt. Colonel O'Conor battled the Comanches in the area around San Antonio. His military prowess had earned him the familiar title of "The Red Captain."

The French and British governments were trying to wrest control of the continent from Spain, whose military officers had to become politicians to manage the affairs of the territory, and preserve Spain's control.

In 1770, O'Conor was relieved of the northern frontier duty and sent to Mexico City. There he was assigned command of the troops in the Guanajuato District, both infantry and cavalry. In December 1771, O'Conor became the Commandant Inspector of the Interior Provinces&emdash;the military governor of northwestern New Spain, including the state of Sonora, including what is now southern Arizona, and New Mexico.

His new office included territory in New Spain under continuous siege by the Apaches and Comanches, formerly run by ineffective officers, guarded by an untrained military, and populated by tiny frontier settlements. For the next several years, O'Conor, now a Colonel, waged a vigorous campaign against the Comanche and Apache all across what is now northern Mexico and along the Rio Grande valley northwest into the Gila River valley.

In July, 1775, he was traveling in the furthest northwest reaches of his assigned territory, and by the 8th had reached the Presidio at Terrenate. It was there that he first personally met Juan Bautista de Anza, now a Lt. Colonel, and Captain of the Presidio at Tubacc. They conferred on the frontier presidio and Indian control problems for several days. O'Conor soon moved the fort or presidio from Tubac to Tucson, near the mission, San Xavier del Bac, in late August of 1775.

O'Conor continued his leadership in the area, focusing on the rivers, from the Colorado, up the Gila, and east to the Rio Grande. His travels, campaigns, and missions and new presidios throughout New Spain are well documented in Mark Santiago's book, "THE RED CAPTAIN"d, subtitled 'The Life of Hugo O'Conor' from which this prologue was condensed. In 1998, the City of Tucson erected a statue of Hugo O'Conor in the center of the government complex in honor of the 228th anniversary of the founding of the Presidio de Tucson, previously called the village of St. Augustin.

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