American Namescape: Our Story
Chapter 6: The Pearlfisher and the Carmelites. c1595–1605.
Under the 1580 union of Spanish and Portuguese crowns, Philip II claimed sovereignty over the entirety of North and South America. He considered the Atlantic a closed sea, forbidden to foreign fleets. Spanish convoys, swollen by Portuguese mariners, soon extended the king's reach across the Pacific. Most arduous of ocean journeys was the four-month passage of the Manila Galleon across the North Pacific. While the easterly trade winds carried outbound ships towards King Philip's Philippines, westerlies blew inbound ships to the far north coast of California. Cast upon uncharted shores, laden with spices, silks, and chinaware, Spanish galleons then followed the coastline to Mexico.
In 1595 Portuguese captain Sebastian Rodriguez Cermeno led a Spanish galleon across the North Pacific to the northern coast of California. Under the orders of the outgoing viceroy of New Spain, Luis de Velasco, he was to thoroughly chart this coastline before completing the final leg of the voyage to Mexico. During an autumn storm along the coast, the captain anchored in a crescent bay that he could not identify from Cabrillo's old charts. Reluctant to rename the bay, he held conference with the ship's Franciscan friar, named Francisco de la Conception. Extolling the virtues of his order's founder, the friar suggested the captain baptize the bay in the name of St Francis of Assisi. But before the Spanish could sail out of the bay, heavy swells wrecked the ship against the rocky shore. Fray Francisco was among those who drowned in the turbulence. As survivors huddled into a launch for the long voyage home, Cermeno squeezed into the craft two things of great value to him: the captain's log and a prized set of deer antlers 11 feet in length. Following the coastline 2,000 miles south, the bedraggled sailors finally arrived in Mexico. Their clothes were torn to shreds but they had retained the captain's antlers and the logbook bearing the bay's name of SAN FRANCISCO.
Several historical coincidences yet shifted the name of San Francisco. Cermeno had arrived on the same California shores that Francis Drake called 'Nova Albion.' In fact, the bay called 'San Francisco' by Cermeno may have been that wherein Drake had careened the Golden Hind. To support their claims on California, the English played upon a resemblance of names. What Spanish cartographers called 'Puerto de San Francisco,' shrewd English mapmakers altered to 'Puerto de Sir Francisco Draco.' Over time, the name of Sir Francis Drake prevailed at DRAKES Bay. The name of St Francis was later transferred to a bay of much greater volume.
In his last years, Philip II lamented that, 'God, who has given me so many kingdoms, has not given me a son fit to govern them.' In 1598 he died at his enormous palace-monastery complex of El Escorial outside of Madrid. Having outlived his three eldest sons, he was succeeded by his fourth and last, Philip III (1598-1621). Among the new king's first decrees was one to rechart the entire northern coastline of California. The king left the particulars of the expedition to the viceroy of New Spain, Gaspar de Zuniga y Acevedo, 5th Count of Monterey.
As a trader on the Manila Galleon in the 1580s, and a pearl fisherman in the Sea of Cortes in the 1590s, Sebastian Vizcaino knew California's shores as well as any Spaniard. More merchant than conquistador, he remained devoutly Catholic while pragmatic in his dealings with heathens – earning the esteem of the new viceroy, the Count of Monterey. In 1601 the viceroy chose Vizcaino to rechart the California coastline north to Cape Mendocino, sounding out sheltered harbors in his course. In return, Vizcaino would receive command of the Manila Galleon.
Embarking from the inhospitable southern coast of California in 1602, Captain-General Vizcaino commanded three ships – the San Diego, San Tomas, and Tres Reyes. Their provisions proved insufficient almost at once. Spanish sailors sustained themselves on schools of sardines and anchovies washed dead upon the desert shores. Three mendicant Carmelite friars prayed for a more blessed journey ahead.
On November 10, Vizcaino guided his ships into a large bay, where they found safe anchorage sheltered from the ocean. They saw plentiful schools of fish in the water; flocks of quail and thrush overhead; herds of deer and colonies of rabbits onshore. Sixty years earlier, on September 28, 1542, Cabrillo had entered the same sheltered bay and named it for the feast of St Michael, 'San Miguel,' also the name of one of his three ships. Now, on November 12, 1602, the three Carmelite friars celebrated mass for the feast day of St Didacus of Alcala – also called St James – whom the Spanish called San Diego. Alighting from his flagship, the San Diego, on the feast day of San Diego, Vizcaino was struck by the synergy of names and baptized the bay SAN DIEGO.
The devout Carmelite friars frequently reminded Captain Vizcaino of the Church Calendar. Sighting islands off the coast, the friars prevailed upon the captain to name them after early Christian martyrs. Vizcaino named one island SAN CLEMENTE, for St Clement of Rome, whose feast day fell on November 23. He named another island SANTA CATALINA, for St Catherine of Alexandria, whose feast day fell on November 25. Surrounding the Spanish ships in large, well-crafted canoes, local Indians led them to safe anchorage.
Through late November, Vizcaino navigated the broad channel between rocky offshore islands and the long sandy beaches of the mainland. Sixty years earlier Cabrillo had seen plumes of smoke rising from the same shoreline and called one inlet, 'Bahia de los Fumos,' the Bay of Smokes, and the 'Bahia de los Fuegos,' the Bay of Fires. Vizcaino now cruised by the bay without remark, not bothering to provide a name for it in his journals. But maps produced from expedition records show the name of SAN PEDRO; the feast day of St Peter of Alexandria fell on November 26.
The Spanish explored more offshore islands in early December, once more marveling at Indian canoes. Vizcaino reported, '...since Noah's Ark a finer and lighter vessel with timbers better made has not been seen. Four men rowed, with an old man in the center singing...and the others responding to him.' On December 4, the feast day of St Barbara, Vizcaino passed through the channel between the mainland and an island he called SANTA BARBARA. On December 6, the feast day of St Nicholas of Myra, he saw the island of SAN NICOLAS. Separated from the mainland by the Santa Barbara Channel, this small archipelago was long known as the 'Santa Barbara Islands.' Over time, the generic replaced the specific and they became the CHANNEL Islands.
Across the Americas Indians often knew Spaniard interlopers more by the sword than the cross – with the names of Catholic saints masking the irreligious motives of mercenary soldiers. But Vizcaino's Catholic saints were bestowed with religious conviction in concert with gentle persuasion. The captain showered gifts upon wary island Indians while the friars gave mass for their salvation. Finding the Indians worshipping a demonic statue with two horns, Vizcaino made no attempt to topple it. Leaving the idol upright, he placed upon it a crucifix.
Following the coastline west, Vizcaino assigned more Christian names to prominent features of the mainland. On December 8 he sighted a promontory projecting out into the sea; since it was the feast day of the Immaculate Conception, he named the point, 'Concepcion,' now CONCEPTION. After rounding Point Conception, the Spanish pushed north against the California current. Stark cliffs rose from the shoreline, with coastal summits rising almost a mile high. On December 13, the feast day of St Lucy of Syracuse, Vizcaino named the soaring coastal range SANTA LUCIA.
Thus far, Vizcaino had dedicated almost a thousand miles of coast to the saints and the church. But he had dedicated nothing to the viceroy under whose direct authority and patronage he sailed; entering a large half-moon bay, Vizcaino set to remedy this oversight. Onshore he found voluminous quantities of freshwater, the solid timber of pines and oaks, and a verdant land abounding in game birds and animals; awestruck mariners watched hulking bears devour the body of an enormous, beached whale. Every feature of the bay convinced Vizcaino that it would make an ideal anchorage for the Manila Galleon and could easily sustain a Spanish settlement. Deeming it 'sheltered from all winds' and 'the best port that could be desired,' he crowned it with the viceroy's title: Gaspar de Zuniga y Acevedo, 5th Count of MONTEREY.
In 1542 Cabrillo had noted an abundance of pine trees along the same shoreline and called it the Bay of Pines – 'Bahia de los Pinos.' Exploring the same bay, Monterey Bay, in late December 1602, Vizcaino found a southern promontory decked in pines and called it Point PINOS. The Monterey Pine, prized for its rapid growth and durable lumber, would become the most cultivated pine in the world and spread the viceroy's title across the globe.
With provisions critically low and scurvy now killing crewmen, Vizcaino sent the San Tomas back to Mexico with the sickest of his men; only nine survived the journey home. Vizcaino remained with the San Diego and Tres Reyes. An icy winter began to fall, crowning the inland mountains with snow, and freezing the Spanish stores of water. Vizcaino sent a party inland to investigate Indian reports of a mountain stream flowing to the sea. Finding a gushing coastal river, pious Spaniards thanked the Lord for revealing this freshwater to them. Under the influence of the Carmelite friars, they named it after the Biblical mount from which their order took its name: CARMEL.
Sighting a group of granite islets offshore, Vizcaino humbled the Carmelites once more by naming the islets after the Friars, 'Frayles.' Yet expedition records also refer to the rocky outcrops using the generic Spanish term of FARALLONES. Once again, a generic term outlasted attempts to impose a Christian name.
As 1603 dawned on the expedition, Vizcaino neared the northern limits seen by Cabrillo 60 years earlier. The first prominence seen in the New Year was duly christened Point ANO NUEVO. Scurvy-stricken crewmen barely toasted the occasion. Those still strong enough to stand spent their energies gathering wood and water. But with their gums swelling larger than their teeth, many men could barely drink water, much less eat rotting provisions.
On January 6, the expedition reached a sharp projection of the Californian coast. Being the feast day of the Three Kings, 'Tres Reyes' – the name shared by his second ship – Vizcaino honored the Kings at Point REYES. The following day, the Tres Reyes and the San Diego became separated in inclement weather; the Tres Reyes would ultimately make its own way back to Mexico, with only five survivors.
Vizcaino pushed on in the San Diego. On January 12, he identified a point of land as Cape Mendocino, completing one of the expedition's major objectives. After convoking a council of officers, and reviewing his infirm crewmen, the captain agreed to return south. Yet fierce winds and strong currents carried the San Diego farther north for another week. The tempestuous conditions did not abate until January 20, by which time they had been blown beyond the 42nd parallel. Since this was the feast day of his namesake, Vizcaino named the cape 'San Sebastian,' now de-sanctified as Cape SEBASTIAN. At this fortuitous naming, the captain finally turned back south toward Mexico. Vizcaino had voyaged little farther than Cabrillo – but he had voyaged far enough to supersede almost every name set down by Cabrillo on and off the Californian coast.
The Count of Monterey commended Vizcaino for his endeavors, especially intrigued by his resounding endorsement of Monterey Bay. But back in Spain, Philip III writhed under the rampant inflation caused by the influx of gold and silver bullion from the Americas, while the cost of maintaining that American empire emptied crown coffers. The king's newly appointed viceroy of New Spain, Juan de Mendoza y Luna, 3rd Marquess of Montesclaros, decried the excessive spending of his predecessor and shelved all plans to return to California. Discounting Vizcaino's efforts, the new viceroy refused him command of the Manila Galleon; he even charged the expedition's cartographer with forgery and had him hanged. More than a century and a half would pass before the Spanish launched another such expedition to California.