PEACEMAKER: ‘After his return to [Rancho] Alisal, the ex-visitador ['Don Guillermo Arnel' (William Petty Hartnell)] became ill from overwork and worry’

CHAPTER 7

CONTEST FOR CALIFORNIA

 

THE GOVERNOR made no attempt to appoint another visitador de misiones.  The position became extinct with the resignation of Don Guillermo.  And little importance ever was attached, by anyone, to Alvarado’s reforms of 1839 and 1840 as carried out by Hartnell.  They came too late.  Certain abuses could be checked, but the outlook continued bleak.

After his return to Alisal, the ex-visitador became ill from overwork and worry.  No salary ever materialized out of the Pious Fund, as planned by the padre presidente and Governor Alvarado.  Writing Eustace Barron of Tepic, at the end of 1840, Hartnell referred to “my unfortunate debt to you [Barron, Forbes and Company] ….. The truth is that I can hardly find words to express my feelings of regret and shame at not having been able, long since, to pay it.”  In excuse, he says: “Last year I was chosen Visitador of the mission with a salary of 2000 pesos, increased this year to 3000 pesos all of which still is owing me.”  He asks Barron and Forbes for an extension of time purely out of friendship, for he can offer no security save “my houses and the cattle at the rancho and you know very well that these are not easily converted into cash.”

In conclusion, Don Guillermo explains that he no longer holds the position of visitador, because “circumstances have occurred which do not allow me to discharge my duties with honor, and without honor I neither seek nor wish riches.”

Writing to his father-in-law at this ebb tide of his life, when he not even has the satisfaction of a job well done, Don Guillermo reveals an intensification of his religious faith, and makes a vow that he will continue to live by conviction, whatever the cost in health and wealth.  The understanding old man encourages him: “Keep firm in your resolution, entreating the help of our Merciful Father.  This also I shall do, unworthy as I am, in my humble prayers to our Crucified King.”

Fortunately, de la Guerra does more than pray for his dearly loved yerno.  He sends his son Pablo on a “grand tour” of Europe, which act vacates a lucrative job in the Monterey customhouse.  He advises his son-in-law to apply for it at first opportunity.  In doing so, Hartnell must state his qualifications.  He asks Eustace Barron to sponsor him, saying (translation):

‘I have been almost nineteen years in California and am married to a native daughter by whom I have had thirteen children.  In the year 1827 I loaned to this [the Mexican] government 7,800 pesos in cash and goods to meet the needs of the [Monterey] garrison, and nothing has been paid back to me.  I have sound knowledge of all the languages needed to serve as interpreter in the customhouse; and sometime ago I undertook the administration of customs to the entire satisfaction of the government.  For a year and a half I was visitador de misiones, also to the satisfaction of the government and all the reverend fathers.’

When Hartnell became chief customs official, his health returned to him along with peace of mind.  As Father Short once said, such a position suited his talents; and from it he earned a fair living, in addition to finding time for necessary ranch work.  Once again he could divide his days between Alisal and the capital.

For the past two years he had been preoccupied with the gloomy subject of mission decay.  He had acquired a hopeless outlook of unhappy resignation.  But this soon was altered by the scope of his new position.  Hartnell found it an exciting time to be directing affairs of the aduana.  The world came and went, and ambition charged the atmosphere.

California’s internal weaknesses under Mexican rule slowly had become known outside her own boundaries.  For many years sea captains and travelers had carried tales, and books had been published in many languages, about this land so fabulously endowed by nature, yet so badly governed as to cry out for intervention and exploitation.  Russians, Frenchmen, Englishmen, and Americans all had gone on record as advising a California protectorate to be established by Russia, France, Great Britain, or the United States, as the case might be.  But the world’s interest did not actively manifest itself until the 1840’s.

In the first half of that exciting decade, ideas of empire which had been brewing for a long time suddenly began to bubble, to boil, and to spill over the top of the diplomatic teapot.

The hour was Hartnell’s.  Many times in the past his ventures had been ill timed, but now he occupied a key position in the capital, and presided over a home which was Monterey’s unofficial embassy for every nation.  Contemporary records show that scarcely a foreigner of importance failed to call upon Monterey’s most distinguished resident and his unfailingly gracious wife.  Often, in the absence of any hotel, callers became house guests for varying lengths of time.  The Hartnell position became comparable, in the capital, to that of the de la Guerras in Santa Barbara.  A stranger often carried an introductory note from Don Jose, or from one of Don Guillermo’s acquaintances in South or Central America, Europe, Sitka or Sandwich.

Even in hard times, Hartnell hospitality had been unfailingly warm and gay.  And now, as always, pretty little daughters of the house would hasten to bring refreshments, whatever the larder afforded.  The mother, increasingly plump with the years, would settle herself in a comfortable chair, smoke a cigarette with the company, and serve in a queenly way whatever her daughters produced.  Music usually followed refreshments.  At Alisal there was a piano brought round the Horn by a sea captain of the father’s acquaintance. A guitar stood in the corner there, as in the town house.  Always a member of the family or a friend could be prevailed upon to play and sing, sometimes with real knowledge and haunting beauty.  Dona Teresa seldom stirred from her chair, presiding benignly like an Oriental deity, but the young ones and young-spirited Don Guillermo soon would be dancing with each other and guests who risked the inticacies of California dance steps.

How quickly such an atmosphere relaxed the reserve and lightened the loneliness of a sea-weary, homesick soul!  Don Guillermo excelled at the art of conversation; his gift of tongues and knowledge of world affairs always astonished visitors.  With ease he could induce the confidential mood, even in a Russian, and listen as skillfully as he could converse.  Guests usually revealed more than they intended of themselves, and their host added the kernel of each conversation to his store of knowledge.

From the time of Beechey’s first visit, in 1826, Hartnell had corresponded with the British captain on a world of subjects.  It was with mounting excitement that, ten years later, he awaited the appearance of Beechey’s new command, H.M.S. Sulphur.  She left England for California, as scheduled, but on the outward passage her captain became violently ill.  Beechey was relieved at Panama by Sir Edward Belcher, who had served as a lieutenant on the Blossom the previous decade.  With his superior officer, Belcher had visited the Hartnell family when its prospects were brightest, and had shared with them the easy and happy life of that pastoral interlude in California’s history.  He returned to find sad changes, unmistakable evidence of deterioriation and decay.  Sir Edward spoke with the tone of prophecy as early as 1836:

‘Another fate attends this country.  Their hour is fast approaching.  Harassed on all sides by Indians, pestered by a set of renegade deserters from whalers and merchant ships, who start by dozens and will eventually form themselves into a bandit gang and domineer over them; unable from want of spirit to protect themselves, they will soon dwindle into insignificance.  The missions, the only respectable establishments in this country are annihilated; they have been virtually plundered by all parties.  They sadly want the interposition of some powerful friend to rescue them.’

Belcher intimates that this friend, for California’s sake, should be Great Britain.

Since the days of the mission contract, William Hartnell had corresponded with the British trader, Alexander Forbes, partner of his good friend Eustace Barron of Tepic.  From an extensive correspondence with prominent Californians, maintained by both partners and their associate Robert Wyllie (Hartnell’s ubiquitous cousin), Forbes composed the contemporary portions of his famous book on California.  His illustrations were from the “elegant pencil” of that same William Smythe who had illustrated Beechey’s original Narrative; and his authorities on the past were of the best, being Venegas, Palou, La Perouse, Vancouver, Langsdorff, and Captain Beechey.  The book, simply called California, was published in London in 1839 and aroused more widespread interest than any previous piece of Californiana published in any country.  The was time ripe.

 

[Serialization of Susanna Bryant Dakin's The Lives of William Hartnell, pages 241 - 245]

LA ROSA TRANSCULTURAL PROPAGANDA 2009