Existing records for these fifty years are much more voluminous, and in several important respects more satisfactory, than for the preceding half-century. They include several general reports of secular and missionary authorities, with statistical information that is comparatively complete. They throw much light on the mission system, on the condition of the pueblo Indians, on the Franciscan friars and their controversy with governor and alcaldes mayores, on the commerce and other industries of the province; but these and other general topics will be detached from the chronologic narrative and presented in a later part of this chapter. As to the series of happenings from year to year—the succession of rulers, campaigns against the various gentile tribes, the neverending question of Moqui conversion, and occasional complaints of impending ruin, with corresponding projects by which it might be averted—both events and the record are as before somewhat fragmentary and meagre, though there is little reason to fear that any momentous occurrence has been buried in oblivion.

Governor Cachupin marched against the Comanches in 1751, setting fire to a tular into which he had driven 145 of the foe, killing 101 and capturing the rest. This elicited commendation from the viceroy and was reported to the king. It may be well, however, to bear in mind that according to the friars, who were particularly bitter against Cachupin, the governor’s reports of Indian campaigns had often no foundation in fact. At the end of his five years’ term in 1754, Don Tomás was succeeded by Don Francisco Antonio Marin del Valle, who perhaps served ad interim by the viceroy’s appointment, and who was also cordially hated by the padres. In 1755 Padre Rodríguez de la Torre, with a small party of neophytes, visited the Moqui towns, being well received and permitted to preach; but whenever the masses showed any sign of yielding to his persuasions a ‘cacique endemoniado’ would rise to talk on the other side. The padres were good men, he said, but his people were too sensible and strong to become slaves of the alcaldes.

The leading event of Valle’s rule was the visit of Bishop Tamaron of Durango, who at the different settlements confirmed 11,271 persons, besides 2,973 in the district of El Paso. The visita was from April to July of 1760, and met no opposition on the part of the missionaries. Later in the same year Mateo Antonio de Mendoza acted as governor for a few months, and in 1761-2 the position was held by Manuel Portillo Urrisola. Don Manuel distinguished himself, if we take his word for it, by killing 400 Comanches in a fight at Taos in December 1761. The governor had hoped that this victory would settle the Comanche question and strike terror to all gentile raiders; but was disappointed at finding his successor averse to energetic and warlike methods, and the country consequently not yet saved.

That successor, who took command on the 1st of February, 1762, was no other that Cachupin, who, despite the bitter opposition of the Franciscans, had been appointed by the king for a new term. During this second rule of five years Don Tomás sent a party to search for mines in the San Juan and Gunnison regions of what was later Colorado, attended to the routine duties of his position, and waged legal warfare on certain Indians accused of witchcraft at Abiquiú, the whole affair presenting a striking picture of silly superstition—on the part of the Spaniards. In 1766 the Marqués de Rubí visited New Mexico in his tour as inspector of frontier presidios.

Colonel Pedro Fermin de Mendinueta succeeded Cachupin as governor and captain-general—being the last to hold the latter title—in 1767. In that year there was a great flood at Santa Fé in October, the course of the river being turned into the Rio Chiquito and threatening the safety of the public buildings. Against this ruler and his successors I have found no complaints from the missionaries. In 1771 he announced the conclusion of a treaty with the Comanches on the 3d of February; and the viceroy, replying with thanks, called for a report on the condition and needs of the province, which was furnished in March 1772. Mendinueta declared that the force of 80 soldiers at Santa Fé was not sufficient to protect so broad a territory, raided by savage foes from every side. True, there were about 250 men capable of bearing arms among the settlers, besides the pueblo Indians; but these were poorly supplied with weapons, and could not leave their homes unprotected to engage in distant campaigns. The governor’s proposed remedy was a new presidio at Taos, and an enforced law requiring the Spaniards to live in compact pueblos like the Indians.

The subject of northern frontier defences received much attention in these years, and in 1772-3 the new reglamento de presidios was published. The only change ordered in New Mexico proper was the detachment of thirty soldiers from Santa Fé to join thirty citizen auxiliaries from El Paso, forming a garrison at Robledo, which was to protect the route up the river and serve as a base for reestablishing the ruined pueblos of Senecti, Socorro, Alamillo, and Sevilleta. For the protection of El Paso the militia was to be organized, the presidial company being transferred to Carrizal on the frontier of Nueva Vizcaya. Nothing of all this was carried into effect, except the transfer of the presidio—or of the main force, a detachment being always or generally stationed at El Paso—the governor very properly protesting against the division of the force at Santa Fé, and some convenient excuse being always ready for failure to organize the militia.

The conquest or conversion of the Moquis was a matter still kept in view, though for about twenty years no practical efforts in that direction are recorded, down to 1774-6, when the project was revived in connection with the California expeditions from Sonora. Captain Juan Bautista de Anzamade an experimental or exploring trip by way of the Gila to California in 1774; and it was desired that in connection with his second expedition the region between the Gila and Moqui towns should be explored. This region had not been traversed since the time of Coronado in 1540-3, except by Oñate, whose journey was practically forgotten. The country and its people were wrapped in mystery, and were the objects of much curiosity and theorizing. To find a way to Moqui was deemed important, especially as it was proposed, if possible, to occupy the Gila valley and some of its branches. The New Mexican friars were called upon for their views, and Padre Escalante developed much enthusiasm on the subject. In June 1775, or possibly 1774, he spent eight days in the Moqui towns, trying in vain to reach the Rio Grande de Cosninas beyond. In a report to the governor he gave a description of the pueblos—where he found 7,494 souls, two thirds of them at Oraibe, in seven pueblos on three separate mesas—and his ideas of what should be done. He earnestly recommended—subsequently writing to his superior a long argument in support of his position—that the Moquis should be reduced by force of arms and a presidio established there. The Moquinos, he said, were well disposed, but their chiefs had determined not to give up their power, not only keeping their own people from submission, but the Cosninas as well, who were eager to be Christians. As to the routes, Escalante thought from what he could learn by Indian reports that the way from Terrenate by the Gila and thence north to Zuñi would not be very difficult; that the central route from the Colorado to Moqui would probably be found impracticable; but that the best of all was one leading from Monterey eastward in a nearly direct line to Santa Fé.

Alas for the good padre’s geographic theories! In 1776, with a party of nine, including Padre Francisco Atanasio Dominguez, he attempted to reach Monterey from Santa Fé by the northern route. This tour belongs mainly to the annals of Utah and Colorado, as recorded in other volumes. The explorers reached Utah Lake and thus accomplished results that should make their names famous; but fortunately—else they could not have lived to tell the story—when on the approach of winter provisions became scarce and the natives showed no knowledge of Spaniards in the west, lots were cast, and fate decided that the journey to Monterey should be postponed. Accordingly, they returned south-eastward, forded the Colorado, came to the Moqui towns, and returned to Santa Fé. The Moquinos, though furnishing food and shelter, would not receive presents. A meeting was held to discuss submission, but while willing to be friends of the Spaniards, the people proudly refused to be subjects or Christians, preferring to ‘go with the majority’ and be gentiles, as the traditions of their fathers directed them. Not only did Escalante fail to demonstrate the merits of his favorite northern route, but earlier in the same year the central one was proved to be practicable; and this, so far as the Moqui question was concerned, was the only result of Anza’s California expedition. Padre Francisco Garcés, leaving Anza at the Gila junction, went up the Colorado to the Mojave region with a few Indian servants, and after making important explorations in California started eastward for Moqui, which he reached without any special difficulty in July. The Moquis, however, would not admit him to their houses or receive his gifts, cared not for his painting of heaven and hell, and refused to kiss the image of Christ. After passing two nights in the courtyard he wrote a letter for the padre at Zuñi, returned in sorrow to the Yamajabs, or Mojaves, and went down the Colorado, finding his way to Bac in September. His was a wonderful trip, though not very effective in respect of Moqui salvation.

It was in 1776 that Lieutenant-colonel Antonio Bonilla, of Coahuila, embodied in a formal report, not only a résumé of New Mexico’s past history, but his views as to what should be done to avert impending ruin. He believed that as a frontier outpost among gentile tribes who had now lost all the fear and respect inspired by the first conquerors, and who themselves used fire-arms and horses, the holding of the province had an importance far beyond its direct value as a Spanish possession, since if it were lost the savage hordes would direct their whole force against Nueva Vizcaya and Sonora. Therefore a vigorous warfare should be waged by veteran troops from New Mexico as a centre.

It was also in 1776-7 that the northern provinces of Mexico were organized as the Provincias Internas, under the Caballero de Croix as comandante general, independent of the viceroy. This change and the following complications of the military and civil status of the various districts have but slight direct bearing on New Mexico, simply depriving the governor of his title of captain-general, and making him subordinate at times to the comandante general instead of the viceroy, and they cannot be properly presented here in the space at my command; yet, as they are in a general sense an essential part of the history of all the northern regions, I refer the reader to the annals of Nueva Viz­caya and Sonora in the last quarter of the century, as compactly presented in another volume of this series.

Governor Mendiuneta retired in March 1778, leaving Francisco Trebol Navarro in command as acting governor, but before the end of the year a successor came, in the person of Lieutenant-colonel Juan Bautista de Anza, as political and military governor. Anza, whose Californian expeditions have been noticed, was a native of Sonora, a man of excellent ability and character, and of wide experience in Indian warfare. He seems to have proved in every way worthy of the Caballero de Croix’s high esteem; yet with all his energy he effected but slight change for the better in New Mexican affairs. His first recorded enterprise was a campaign against the Comanches with a force of 645 men, including 85 soldiers and 259 Indians. His course was north and north-east for some 95 leagues, and the result was the killing of Cuerno Verde, the famous Comanche chieftain, with four of his lead­ing sub-chiefs, his high-priest, his eldest son and heir, and 32 of his warriors.

Back from this campaign, Governor Anza gave his attention to the Moquis. A failure of crops had reduced that people to such straits that the time was deemed most favorable for their conversion, even Christianity being perhaps preferable to starvation. Many of them were said to have abandoned their towns to seek food in the mountains and among the Navajos, and these fugitives were reported as disposed to submit, though the others still preferred death. It was feared that if something were not done now all the Moquis might quit pueblo life and join the hostile gentiles. Anza wrote repeatedly to Croix on the prospects, enclosing letters from the padres, and advising that an effort should be made either to establish missionaries at the towns, which would require some additional force, or to induce the natives to migrate en masse and settle in new pueblos nearer the Spanish centres. In reply, the comandante general did not favor the use of force, but advised that Anza on some pretext, as of an Apache campaign, should visit the Moquis, give them some food, and persuade them, if possible, to settle in New Mexico; otherwise the foundation might be laid for future conversion. The governor continued his efforts, and in August 1780 a message came that 40 families were ready to migrate if he would come in person to bring them. He started in September with padres Fernandez and Garcia, visiting all the towns, two of which were completely abandoned. The 40 families had been forced by hunger 15 days ago to go to the Navajo country, where the men had been lulled and the women and children seized as slaves. Moqui affairs were indeed in a sad condition. Escalante m 1775 had found 7,494 souls; now there were but 798; no rain had fallen in three years, and in that time deaths had numbered 6,698. Of 30,000 sheep 300 remained, and there were but five horses and no cattle. Only 500 fanegas of maize and beans could be expected from the coming crop. Pestilence had aided famine in the deadly work; raids from the Yutas and Navajos had never ceased. There were those who believed their misfortunes a judgment for their treatment of Padre Garcés in 1776. The chief at Oraibe was offered a load of provisions to relieve immediate wants, but he proudly declined the gift, as he had nothing to offer in return. He refused to listen to the friars, and in reply to Anza’s exhorta­tions declared that as his nation was apparently doomed to annihilation, the few who remained were resolved to die in their homes and in their own faith. Yet his subjects were free to go and become Christians if they chose to do so; and finally 30 families were induced to depart with the Spaniards, including the chief of Gualpi. I find no record as to what became of these converts, but I have an idea that with them and others, a little later, the pueblo of Moquino, in the Laguna region, may have been founded.

Not only among the Moquis did pestilence rage, but small-pox carried off 5,025 Indians of the mission pueblos in 1780-1; and in consequence of this loss of population, Governor Anza, by consolidation, reduced the number of missions, or of sínodos, to 20, a change which for the next decade provoked much protest on the part of the friars. Pino, followed by other authors, gives 1783 as the date of a long effective treaty with the Comanches; but as he mentions the defeat of Cuerno Verde in the same connection, this may be a reference to an earlier event. In 1786 Viceroy Galvez, in his instructions to General Ugarte, introduced a new Indian policy in the north, a policy of extermination, the main features of which were to be unrelenting warfare on all tribes to secure treaties, free trade and gifts to tribes at peace, the creation among the savages of needs that could be supplied only by the Spaniards, the distribution of guns and powder of inferior quality, the liberal use of spirituous liquors to demoralize the Apaches, and constant efforts to promote a war of extermination between the different tribes. Little or nothing appears respecting the carrying-out of this policy in New Mexico; but the instructions in some parts had special reference to that province.

Lieutenant-colonel Manuel Flon came from Spain in 1785 with a commission as governor, and started for New Mexico; but there are no indications that he ever assumed the office. Anza’s successor was Fernando de la Concha, who arrived after the middle of 1789, and ruled for a full term of five years. Concha was succeeded in 1794 by Lieutenant-colonel Fernando Chacon, whose rule continued to the end of the century and later. For the last years of the period I find many items in the archives; but nearly all are of so trivial and unimportant a nature that they are not worth reproduction. They relate almost exclusively to Indian affairs, and seem to indicate that all the tribes were behaving tolerably well, except the Apaches, against whom constant warfare was waged, with results not clearly shown by the records.

Evidently not much had been effected in the way of general reform; for in the last decade we have from the pen of Padre Juan Agustin Morfi, not one of the New Mexican friars, an able presentment of the country’s ills similar to those alluded to by earlier writers. Chief among the evils to be remedied were the lack of order in Spanish settlements, the houses being scattered, and the settlers beyond the reach of law and religion, besides being exposed to Indian raids; a vicious system of trade, and absence of money, of which more will be said presently; the free admission of Spaniards and castas to live in the Indian pueblos, these penniless intruders generally succeeding in making the industrious native proprietors practically slaves through debt, or in driving them away to live among the gentiles, the remedy being to forbid the Spaniards to live in the pueblos or own property in them except by marriage; the oppressive tyranny of the alcaldes mayores, more fully noticed elsewhere in this chapter; and finally the unsettled and unfortunate status of the Genízaros, or rescued Indian captives.

Before 1750, as recorded in the preceding chapter, the padres were charged by secular and ecclesiastic authorities with culpable neglect of their duties as missionaries, notably in their failure to acquire the native languages, or to speak Spanish to the Indians, the result being that their preaching and religious instruction had no real effect, that the neophytes were Christians only in name, and that confession of sins through interpreters was generally postponed until the approach of death. While this matter did not in this half-century assume a controversial aspect, yet the charges are sustained by such evidence as exists. Bishop Tamaron in his visit of 1760 had occasion at many points to administer severe reproof; and the friars, while making various excuses for their remissness, denying some of its worst results, and even promising reforms, did not claim the ability to communicate with their neophytes, except through interpreters. Charges of neglect in other matters, of oppressing the natives, of being frequently absent from their posts, and of undue fondness for trade are not supported by any evidence of this period.

It should be noted that the New Mexican missions were radically different from the Californian establishments of later years. Practically, except in being subject to their provincial and paid by the king, instead of being under the bishop and supported by parochial fees, these friars were mere parish priests in charge of Indian pueblos. There were no mission estates, no temporalities managed by the padres, and except in petty matters of religious observance the latter had no authority over the neophytes. At each pueblo the padre had a church, where he preached, and taught, and said mass. With the performance of these routine duties, and of those connected with baptism, marriage, and burials, he was generally content. The Indians, for the most part willingly, tilled a little piece of land for him, furnishing also a few servants from week to week for his household service and that of the church. He was in most instances a kind-hearted man, a friend of his Indians, spending much of his salary on them or on the church. If sometimes reproved by conscience for having lost something of the true Franciscan spirit, he redoubled his zeal in petty parish duties for a time, bethought him of adverse circumstances and of the ‘costumbre del país,’ and relapsed into the customary inertia. If reproved by the governor or bishop or provincial—for even the latter occasionally complained that the New Mexican friars were beyond his control—he had stored up in his memory no end of plausible excuses and counter­charges. The Indians were in no sense Christians, but they liked the padres in comparison with other Spaniards, and were willing to comply with certain harmless church formalities, which they neither understood nor cared to understand. They had lost all hope of successful revolt, but were devotedly attached to their homes and their ancestral ways of pueblo life; dreaded apostasy, because it involved a precarious existence among hostile tribes of savages; and thus, as a choice of evils, they lived and died as nominal Chris­tians and Spanish subjects, or perhaps more properly slaves.

Countercharges of the friars against the governors and alcaldes mayores, as embodied in Padre Delgado’s letter of 1750, were repeated in this period, especially in an exhaustive report of the provincial, Padre Pedro Serrano, in 1761, which included long quotations from a letter of Padre Yaro, the custodio, and from statements of other friars. The last governors, Cachupin, Marin del Valle, and Mendoza, are represented as the worst, but all as speculating tyrants, without skill or experience in matters of Indian warfare or government, habitually sending to Mexico reports of campaigns never performed, bent only on enriching themselves, treating the pueblo Indians most inhumanly as slaves, using their women and all female captives for the gratification of their lusts, cheating the gentiles, and by outrageous treatment keeping alive their hostility. The alcaldes are mere tools or accomplices of the gov­ernors, and jueces de residencia are also in the ring of oppressors. The Indians are the chief victims of these rascals; but the Spanish settlers are hardly less unfortunate, and even the soldiers are cheated out of half their pay. The padres are the objects of hatred, and if they open their mouths in protest are by perjured and suborned testimony made the victims of outrageous calumnies, their reports to Mexico being intercepted on the way. The partisan bitterness and prejudice of the writers, with their allusions to offences, terrible only in the eyes of friars, and the sickening cant and priestly verbiage in which they clothe their charges, indicate clearly enough that the accusations are too sweeping, and often grossly over-colored; yet enough of candor and honest evidence remains to justify the conclusion that New Mexican affairs were in a sad plight, and that the pueblo Indians were little better than slaves. With all their shortcomings, the padres were better men than their enemies. After 1761 not much is heard against the governors, though the friars were not able to prevent the reappointment of Cachupin. Probably there were reforms in some directions under the later rulers; but if we may credit Padre Morfi’s statements, the condition of the Indians was but slightly bettered, since the alcaldes mayores, through the creation of debts, a vicious commercial system, and various abuses of their official authority, still kept the natives in their power as before.

The population of pueblo Indians decreased by about 2,400 during these 50 years, local particulars and approximately exact figures being presented in the final note of this chapter. Of mission history proper in addition to what has been given in other connections, there is little to be said. In 1767 the four establishments of Santa Fé, La Cañada, Albuquerque, and El Paso were ordered to be put under secular curates, and this was perhaps done, though later records seem to indicate that friars were still stationed at those places. The founding of a missionary college was ordered by the king and pope in 1777-9, but nothing was accomplished. In consequence of the small-pox epidemic of 1780-1, as we have seen, the number of missions was reduced by consolidation in 1782, Jemes, Santa Ana, Acoma, Nambé, Tesuque, Pecos, San Felipe, and San Ildefonso being reduced to the condition of visitas, a saving of about $4,000 in sínodos being thus effected. The friars were naturally displeased, and down to the end of the century were constant in their efforts to obtain an increase of missionaries, or of salaries, or the privilege of collecting parochial taxes, but without success. In addition to some references and particu­lars of these and other matters, I give in the appended note a list of friars serving in 1751-1800, including all the names I have found in the various documents consulted, but doubtless far from being complete.

New Mexican industries were agriculture, stock-raising, and barter. There was no mining, though occasional indications of mineral wealth were found. Manufactures, beyond the preparation of skins for home use or a southern market, the weaving of cotton in small quantities at a few pueblos, and the making of pottery at others, were confined to the fabrication of coarse woollen blankets by the pueblo Indians. Agricultural products, chiefly from irrigated lands, were maize, wheat, and beans in the north, or New Mexico proper, with a little cotton, fruits for home consumption, and an inferior species of tobacco known as punche; while the southern district of El Paso was famous for its fruit orchards, vineyards, wine, and aguardiente. Of live-stock, sheep formed the chief element, these animals being raised in large numbers, both for their wool and meat, though there are no reliable statistics extant. Horses and cattle wore also raised, but the former were always scarce in the province on account of the numbers sold to and stolen by the wild Indians. I find no definite indications that cattle were raised to any great extent for their hides and tallow.

But all was subordinate to the commercial industry, and all trade was cambalache, or barter. Each year in July or August the people met the Comanches and other tribes of the plains at Taos, where a grand fair was held. Some trade was done at other frontier points, and also by citizens and pueblo Indians, who went out in various directions to meet customers, but this was discouraged and at times forbidden. To this fair the wandering gentiles brought skins of deer and buffalo, with Indian captives to barter for knives and other iron implements, horses, beads, and trinkets, and to some extent blankets. At the end of the year the New Mexicans went in caravans, sometimes of 500 men, to attend the January fair at Chihuahua, where they exchanged the skins, Indian servants, blankets, and to slight extent other products of the province for cloths, groceries, and various articles for the year’s Indian trade. The value of each year’s exports was estimated by the comandante general in 1788 at $30,000. The departure and return of the caravan were the great events of the year. In 1776 the governor delayed the publication of an important bando till the people had returned from their ‘ordinaria anual salida’; and the provincial in 1788 explains the impossibility of obtaining reports from New Mexico until the people come down to the January fair. There was no trade as yet with the French in Louis­iana, or with the Spaniards in Texas. There was no coin or other money in New Mexico, but the traders for their accounts invented a system of imaginary currency, including four kinds of dollars—pesos de plata, worth eight reales; pesos de proyecto, six reales; pesos antiguos, four reales; and pesos de la tierra, two reales. The beauty of this system was that the traders always bought for the cheap pesos and sold for the dearer kinds, all being ‘dollars’ to the Indians. Profits were enormous, a trader by two or three barters in a year often getting $64 for a piece of cloth which cost him six. Advantage was also taken of the Indians’ weakness for baubles and ignorance of their real value. Señor Trebol bought a guacamaya, or macaw, for eight dollars, and sold the gay feathers for $492. Another system of swindling commerce was the habitual selling of goods to be paid for in future products. Thus, for a little seed grain six fanegas at harvest were promised; or for a bottle of brandy in holy week a barrel was exacted. The natives through debt became practically slaves, besides losing their land, and the poor settlers were hardly less the victims of commercial oppression. While the settlers and pueblo Indians were always in debt to the traders, the latter in turn were debtors to or agents for Chihuahua merchants, who thus monopolized all the profits, and nothing was left for New Mexico, except for certain traders, who as alcaldes mayores utilized their political authority for private gain. Padre Morfi’s proposed remedy for these evils was the encouragement of home manufactures by sending artisan teachers and machinery to the province, with a view to render the inhabitants independent of Chihuahua. His plan was to send criminals of the better class, whose offences were chiefly due to drink and the temptations of a city, from Mexico to the far north, and through them to reform the New Mexican industrial system. This expedient was tried in California later without any brilliant success.

The population in 1750 has been given as 3,779 Spaniards and 12,142 pueblo Indians, a total of 13,521 in New Mexico proper, or 18,721 including the district of El Paso. In 1760 official reports show that the number of Spaniards had increased to 7,666, that of Indians decreased to 9,104, and the total was 16,770, or 21,752 including El Paso. Down to 1788 there was slight change in the figures, but in the final decade there was an inexplicable doubling of the Spanish population; and at the end of the century the figures stood as follows: Spaniards, including of course the castas or negroes and mixed breeds, 18,826, Indians 9,732, total 28,558, or, including El Paso, 34,138.