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Update on Research: Just to update you on what I have been doing this past week as far as finding out about the women of Alta California, I've been doing the following:
- Spent last Wednesday afternoon at the Hayward Historical Society reading newspaper articles, books, etc on the Peralta family. Lots of the same stuff on Guillermo Castro. Frustratingly though, not much on Maria Luisa Peralta. Made copies of possibly useful info. Look below for some cool facts:)
- I spent time reading the book Testimonios: Early California through the Eyes of Women, 1815-1848 which has given me an up-close and personal look at the lives of several Californio women. Because they're narratives, they tend to be short and about a specific historical event, such as the Bear Flag events so that limits me quite a bit. There is nothing on Maria Luisa but there is a narrative of Rosalia Vallejo who lived in Sonoma and Monterey so life couldn't have been too terribly different.
Courtesy of The Bancroft Libray, University of California, Berkeley as it apprears in Testimonios: Early California through the Eyes of Women, 1815-1848. Cerruti interviewing Rosanna Leese(daughter of Rosalia Vallejo) . Present are( from left to right): Cerruti, Jose Abrego, Mariano Vallejo, Rosanna Leese, and Vicente P. Gomez.p.xix.- I've also had some time to read an ebook from our library. In Telling Identities: The Californio Testimonios, Rosaura Sanchez dedicates one chapter on gender issues of Californio women which is entitled Politics of Gender. It deals with the amount of children these women had, seriously though, 17 kids and in some cases 25. She refers to them as "breeders. "Did they have any choice? And how many of these children actually lived long enough to be a viable part of their family? She quotes a german marxist and feminist by the name of Frigga Haug who argues that by the mere fact that women desire marriage and motherhood they "become willing accomplices in their own oppression." (Sanchez, 190) Sanchez explains the need for women to bear many children attributing it to the need to populate the Alta California territory. Bodies were needed to upkeep the missions, presidios as well as ranchos. (Sanchez, 191) More on this next week...
Story of a Californio Woman: Hopefully, I haven't put you to sleep but if you are feeling a bit dozy here's a short account of one of the Californio women, so get cozy.
Maria Antonia Rodriguez comes from a family that had a unique part in the history of California. Her father, a carpenter, was recruited by Junipero Serra to come to California from Jalisco, Mexico. In San Diego, he likely helped rebuild the mission after it was attacked by Kumeyaay Indians in 1775. In Monterey, he married the daughter of a presidio soldier. Maria Valvanera Antuna gave birth to twelve children. They're sixth child was Maria Antonia. At the age of fifteen, Maria married Feliciano Soberanes, together they had fourteen children (yikes!).
The narrative begins with Cerruti paying a visit to the "widow of Feliciano Soberanes" by this time she was an old woman. Maria Antonia had experienced much in her life. When she was only eight years of age, she witnessed the burning and sacking of the Monterey presidio by a pirate named Bouchard and his lieutenant, Gomez. She was very Catholic attributing her safety of that frightful night to the Virgin Mary.
At the time of Cerruti's visit. Maria Antonia was living with her daughter,Anita Shaw. During the visit, she asked Anita to play the piano for their guest. Cerruti claims that she played "admirably." Maria Antonia relates to Cerruti of customs and traditions in courtship. She again asks her daughter to play, this time, she asks her to play the jarabe. "The jarabe is a dance that is quite similar to the jig that is all the rage with Americans," she explains then goes on to tell him about the customs surrounding dances and social gatherings. (Beebe and Senkewicz, 43-48)
Conclusions about Californio Women:
- Women married at a very young age
- Women had as many children as was physically possible
- The women came North with their husbands and families to Alta California to establish missions, presidios and start a new life.
- Through Rodriguez' narrative, we learn that women were not to accept large gifts from men without appearing interested in him.
- Californio women were culturaled and musically talented
- Women were part of the history of California
- Californio women were faithful Catholics
- Women were loyal to their way of life
Update on Peralta Women:
From the sources at the Historical Society I learned that her father Sgt. Luis Maria Peralta was born in 1759. His baptismal records show that he was baptized in Mission Guevari therefore, it is supposed that he ws born in the Tubac garrison nearby. (Bowman. 1)Tubac was a Spanish colonial garrison in Southern Arizona that lay on the Camino Real from Mexico to Spanish settlements in California (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tubac). He came with his parents, Gabriel and Francisca Valenzuela Peralta, on the Anza expedition in 1775 to Monterey, California. He married Maria Loreta Alviso (age 13) in 1790 at Mission Santa Clara. They had seventeen children of which nine reached the age of maturity.Maria Luisa was born in 1810 and died December 15, 1873 at the age of 63. Not bad. She was the fourteenth of the seventeen children (Bowman, 2). She married Guillermo Castro in 1829 at the age of 19 and, unlike her mother, Maria only had seven children, four boys and three girls. I made the connection that her life coincided with "California's transistion from a colony of Spain to a State of the Union." From this same book, I learned that her father Don Luis Maria Peralta died in 1851. (Sandoval)
