Franciscans and the Bishop

Franciscans were not beyond Bourbon reforms that emphasized accountability and metrics for measuring success. Along with financial support came audits and inspections to verify report accuracy.

Ferdinand of Aragon had negotiated control of church moneys in 1502 when pope Alexander VI "conferred the tithes of all the Indies on the king on condition that he should endow the churches and provide an adequate maintenance for their ministers." This bull coincided with the onset of Columbus’s fourth voyage, and ensured the church’s standing in the New World.

He already had been granted the power to nominate high ecclesiastical leaders during the conquest of Granada in 1486. Julian II extended patronato to the New World in 1508. The two agreed any proposal for a new mission would be reviewed by the audiencia, the viceroy, and the bishop before being presented to the Consejo de Indias. In return, the Vatican gained control of the Papal States on the Italian peninsula.

Philip V, grandson of Louis XIV of France, used patronato real to nominate religious leaders in the New World who appreciated the need for centralized secular power. He appointed Juan de Vizarrón arzobispo de México in 1730. The Andalusian had studied in Rome at the College of San Clemente before serving in Seville where he was Philip’s chaplain.

In 1734, Vizarrón renewed the church’s efforts to collect diezmo from Jesuit haciendas. The order proposed a "temporary arrangement" to the audiencia, who rejected it. The members felt both they and the archbishop/viceroy had been "insulted." They ordered full payment of tithes from 1734, and forwarded the paperwork to Madrid. According to Hubert Howe Bancroft, the "king’s council" ordered payment and demanded "sworn statements" declaring the value of the order’s estates.

In Nuevo México, subordination of religious orders to secular clergy was more important than tithes. The mere fact the obispo de Durango visited Santa Fé in 1730 was seen as an affront. Benito Crespo’s ensconcement of Santiago de Roybal as Vicario y Juez Esclesiástico was taken as provocation. The Franciscan’s local custodio, Andrés Varo, considered himself to be the legitimate local vicar.

Philip had appointed Crespo in 1722. Born in a small village in Castile near the border with Estremadura, he had trained at San Marcos de León in Salamanca and was a knight of Santiago. That military order had been under crown control since Ferdinand asserted his authority in 1499.

Roybal had been ordained in México by Crespo. He, no doubt, was selected because he was the son of Francesca de Gómez Robledo and Ignacio de Roybal. They had sent the boy to Mexico City for his education.

On his way back to Durango Crespo wrote the viceroy that the Franciscans were collecting fees for 40 friars, but only had deployed 33. The Santa Cruz parish was included in the endowment for Santa Clara, "where he has never resided." He recommended transferring Santa Cruz, along with the other Spanish-speaking parishes, to his jurisdiction, and consolidating Santa Clara and San Juan de Caballeros into the mission at San Ildefonso.

The Franciscan’s immediate response was to send Juan Miguel Menchero north in 1731 to develop a counterstrategy. Soon after, Santa Cruz began keeping better baptismal records that would prove they were serving the villa and would document the numbers of souls brought into the church. They had kept reasonably complete records from 1710 to 1714. After that only chance notes survived.

In a separate letter to the viceroy, Crespo criticized the fees charged by friars for baptisms, burials and other sacraments because they were "so high and exorbitant that there were no fixed schedule except the will of the father missionaries." To encourage more participation by parishioners and natives, he fixed price schedules. He cited a royal order from 1725 as his justification.

Menchero countered with an order that "no friar was to charge an Indian any fee whatsoever for administering the sacraments."

Year	Baptisms	DM's	Marriages
1710	2	1
1711	8	1
1712	8	1
1713	43
1714	12	5
1715	3	3
1716		4
1717		4
1718		8
1719		5
1720	2	5
1721	27	1
1722		2
1723		6
1724
1725		4
1726	1	3	4
1727		6	6
1728		3	7
1729			1
1730		1	12
1731	3		4
1732	50		1
1733	35		16
1734	62		7
1735	38		6
1736	26		9
1737	2		15
1738	48		8
1739	19		10
Santa Cruz de la Cañada

Santa Cruz, Santa Clara, and San Juan de los Caballeros were given bound books in 1726 for recording baptisms, marriages, and deaths. They’re our only detailed record of the population between then and 1760. The diligencias matrimoniales are missing. Angélico Chávez believed Roybal, "kept or removed only the DMs pertaining to his term," but suggested no motive. It also may be the Franciscans refused to forward them to him, and they subsequently were lost.

With a forgivable bias towards the Franciscans, Chávez believed Roybal, "with the brashness of youth, had continued enraging some of his adversaries," and was moved to El Paso in 1733.

That didn’t relieve Menchero of secular oversight. Crespo sent Juan Bustamante in his place.

He was another second generation migrant from northern Spain who had ties with the local elite. Chávez believed he was the son, nephew or brother of the earlier governor from El Paso, Juan Domingo de Bustamante.

Notes: The New Mexico Genealogical Society began transcribing and translating the sacramental books in 1976. They’ve published their extracts for Santa Cruz baptisms and marriages, and for Santa Clara and Juan de los Caballeros marriages. Microfilms of the originals are available.

Adams, Eleanor B. Bishop Tamarón’s Visitation of New Mexico, 1760, 1954.

Archdiocese of Puebla. "Excmo. Sr. Don Benito Crespo (1734-1737)," their website.

Bancroft, Hubert Howe. History of Mexico, Volume III, 1600-1803, 1883.

Chávez, Angélico. "El Vicario Don Santiago Roybal," El Palacio 65:231-252:1948.

_____. New Mexico Roots, Ltd, 1982; on missing diligencias matrimoniales.

_____. Origins of New Mexico Families, 1992 revised edition; on Bustamante.

Crespo y Monroy, Benito. Letter to the viceroy, Juan Vásquez de Acuña, 8 September 1730; translation in Adams; recommended consolidating missions.

_____. Letter to the viceroy, Juan Vásquez de Acuña, 25 September 1730; translation in Adams; on fees for services.

Crivelli, Camillus. "Mexico," The Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 10, 1911; quotation summarizing bull of Alexander VI.

Kessell, John L. Kiva, Cross and Crown, 1995; Menchero quotation.

Traboulay, David M. Columbus and Las Casas: The Conquest and Christianization of America, 1492-1566, 1994.

Wikipedia. Entry for Juan Antonio de Vizarrón y Eguiarreta."

Table: Data from New Mexico Genealogical Society.

New Mexico Baptisms, Santa Cruz de la Cañada Church, Volume I, 1710 to 1794, transcribed by Virginia Langham Olmstead and compiled by Margaret Leonard Windham and Evelyn Luján Baca, 1994.

100 Years of Marriages, 1726-1826, Santa Cruz de la Cañada, New Mexico, extracted and compiled by Henrietta Martinez Christmas and Patricia Sánchez Rau.

A number of Apaches were baptized in 1713.

Entrepreneurs in the South

Jean l’Archevêque was with another Frenchman when he was ransomed by the Spanish in 1688. Jacques Grollet had been born in the Huguenot port of La Rochelle. Little is known about his family. Stanley Hordes said his particular neighborhood was one where conversos settled in the 1500s. Grollet described himself as an "experienced sailor," and indeed sailed on a fishing voyage with the Saint Jacques in 1682. Two years later he was with La Salle when his flotilla embarked from La Rochelle.

There’s no reason to believe Grollet and Archevêque were close before La Salle was murdered. Grollet had deserted earlier to live with the Tejas and Cenis tribes, but rejoined the survivors after La Salle died. Later he and Archevêque abandoned the group to live with the Hasinai.

When they heard Spaniards were in the area, the two sent a message asking to be rescued. They then spent years in jail together in México and Spain. When the men finally were released to Nuevo México, the one stayed in Santa Fé while the other moved to the Río Abajo.

Grollet married Elena Gallegos in 1699. Her brother’s daughter married Felipe Silva in 1722. He was the man who first was reported selling wool in 1734 to the commander of the presidio at Jano in Sonora in the post for 6 March 2016.

Elena’s cousin, Josefa Baca, never married, but had several sons. In 1745, Manuel Sáenz de Garvisu financed a partido contract with Capitán José Baca. This son of Josefa Baca received 417 young sheep, and committed to deliver 160 lambs and 150 fleeces each year for three years.

Sáenz was from Navarre and serving in the presidio under Gaspar de Mendoza. He probably met the Bacas through his wife’s uncle. Diego Lucero was married to Margarita Baca, who was the first cousin of Josepha and Elena. A year after his contract with José, Sáenz had enough money to buy property in Santa Fé from Maria Gómez de Robledo.

As the market for fleeces developed, the use of partido spread, and with it economic stratification. The business relationship had originated in Spain in the 1300s when it had been used as a way to pay shepherds. John Baxter said, it was in México that it became "a way of lending capital at interest."

The older usage survived in the north. When Lugarda de Quintana died in Santa Cruz in 1750, she had just inherited 110 sheep from her father who died the year before. She had some sons still at home, but her husband was "absent and I do not know where." All the children without parents whose baptisms she sponsored were girls. She had animals, little available labor, and mentioned no grazing land.

She said she first traded some sheep for some cattle. She apparently loaned them out on unspecified terms. She only stipulated what she was owed. Some may have been studs sent out in return for payment in kind. Miguel Trujillo owed her two rams while Miguel Martín and Eusebio Durán each owed her one. Juan Esteban owed a three-year-old bull.

Except for the last, these men were relatives or men of substance. Trujillo’s sister was married to Lugarda’s husband brother, Hilario Archuleta, and he himself was wed to María Antonia Archuleta. If Durán were Eusebio Durán y Chaves, he was born in the Río Abajo and would marry Vibiana Martín Serrano in 1752 in Alameda.

Antonio Martín died in 1749, and his estate still owed her a lamb. An indio who worked for him, Gerónimo, owed 10 animals. Antonio’s and Miguels’s relationships to the Martíns weren’t clear to Angélico Chávez. That means no records survived or they were captives or meztisos given the Martín name or they were descended from one of the wayward branches.

Several of the other people who owed her livestock were indios like Gerónimo, or lived in a pueblo. She said the cacique owed her a yearling sheep and a goat. An Indian woman named Magdalena, who may have been the Apache baptized by Antonio Bernal in 1732, owed a goat. So did Juan, who was ransomed by Marcos Martín.

This sharing a few animals, either as studs or with poorer individuals, was very different than the economy in Santa Fé where Cristóbal Baca, a brother of Josefa, left more than 900 ewes when he died in 1739. When Ignacio de Roybal died in 1756 he left fewer animals - 350 sheep and goats - but they were "loaned at interest on partido for 30% of the wool, lambs and kids produced annually."

Even larger numbers of animals were available for loan down river. In 1760, Capitán Juan Vigil gave Ignacio Jaramillo 605 pregnant ewes. He was expected to make yearly payments of 130 wethers and fleeces. While Vigil’s return was greater than his investment, he agreed to share the costs of losses to native raids. Jaramillo’s incentive for managing the animals was he enjoyed the sales of 80% of their fleeces for four years and owned the flock outright after five years.

The drought years accelerated economic trends in the second and third generations after the Reconquest. At the top were families and military men who shared an entrepreneurial attitude with the rising merchant classes in La Rochelle, Bristol and London. Beneath them were men like Jaramillo who could use other men’s capital to create their own wealth. And beneath them were men like Francisco Sáez who didn’t pay his share because he had used some animals to pay existing debts and gambled away the others, or like the former captives who owed Quintana one or two animals.

Origins of Men Involved in Wool Trade, Río Abajo

Cristóbal Baca, son of Antonio, son of Cristóbal
	Manuel Baca
		Josepha Baca
			José Baca contract with Manuel Sáenz de Garvisu (Navarre)
			Antonio Baca
		María Magdalena Baca marry Jose Vásquez de Lara (México)
			María Vásquez Baca marry Diego de Padilla
		Cristóbal Baca
	Catalina Baca marry Antonio Gallegos
		Elena Gallegos marry Jacques Grollet (La Rochelle)
		Antonio Gallegos
			Juana Gallegos marry Felipe de Silva
			Felipe's sister Gertrudis marry Gerónimo Jaramillo
	Ignacio Baca
		Margarita Baca marry Diego Lucero

Notes: Most of the details on the growth of the wool industry came from Baxter; most about the families came from Chávez. Sáez was discussed in the post for 6 March 2016. Jaramillo probably was related to Gerónimo, who married a sister of Felipe Silva, or to Francisco Silva who married an aunt of Garvisu’s wife. Vigil may have been the son of Manuel Montes Vigil, a soldier in the presidio who died before Garvisu arrived.

Antonio Baca, another son of Josefa Baca, married Mónica de Chaves. Two of their sons later married daughters of Sáenz. Diego Padilla, also mentioned in the post for 6 March 2016, was Josefa’s nephew-in-law by her sister María Magdalena. Grollet’s captivity was mentioned in the post for 14 May 2105.

The two translations that exist for Quintana’s will differ in their understanding of her livestock. Lomelí translated the phrase "declaro tener ciento y diez cabezas de ganado menor que de unas reses que traje de herencia de mi padre" as "110 head of goats and cattle from my father’s inheritance." Christmas made it "110 head of sheep, for which I traded some cattle." "Ganado menor" was a generic term for small livestock that included both sheep and goats.

Baxter, John O. Las Carneradas, 1987.

_____. "The Ignacio De Roybal House," The Historic Santa Fe Foundation, Bulletin, January 1980; on his estate.

Chávez, Angélico. Chávez: A Distinctive American Clan of New Mexico, 1989.

_____. Origins of New Mexico Families, 1992 revised edition.

Grollet, Jacques. Testimony, published on "La Salle: Building a French Empire in the New World," University of North Texas website.

Hendricks, Rick. "Wills from El Paso del Norte, 1754-1817," Nuestra Raíces 6:161-167:1994.

Hordes, Stanley M. To the End of the Earth, 2005.

Maldonado, Gilbert. Maldonado Journey to the Kingdom of New Mexico, 2014; on descendants of Catalina Baca.

Migrations.fr website. Département de La Rochelle, "Le St Jacques of La Rochelle Bound la Pêche à la Morique, 14 Mars 1682."

New Mexico Genealogical Society. New Mexico Baptisms, Santa Cruz de la Cañada Church, Volume I, 1710 to 1794, transcribed by Virginia Langham Olmstead and compiled by Margaret Leonard Windham and Evelyn Luján Baca, 1994.

Quintana, Gertrudis Lugarda de. Will, 12 May 1749; original in Ralph Emerson Twitchell, Spanish Archives of New Mexico, volume 1, 1914; English and Spanish versions in Francisco A. Lomelí and Clark A. Colahan, Defying the Inquisition in Colonial New Mexico, 2006; English translation available at Henrietta M. Christmas, "(Getrudis) Lugarda Quintana - Will 1749," 4 August 2014 posting on 1598 New Mexico website.

Entrepreneurs in the North

Spain never had effective Protestant movements like those in England, Scandinavia, and parts of Germany and France. Ferdinand established the Spanish Inquisition in 1478 to unify the peninsula and deflect interference from the pope.

When he expelled the Jews in 1492 and the Moors in 1502, he exiled much of his educated class including his bankers and progressive farmers. Members of the nobility did not rush to fill the void, although men who entered trade in the far north were less likely to be denounced as conversos or convertos.

In Nuevo México, the men who developed the wool trade had ties either to the Protestants of France or to recent immigrants from the north of Spain. Santiago de Roybal, mentioned in the post for 9 March 2016 as the man most interested in opening trade through Pierre Mallet in 1740, was the son of an immigrant from Caldas de Reyes in Galicia near Compostela who enlisted with Diego de Vargas.

His father, Ignacio Roybal, had married Francisca Gómez Robledo. Her uncle, Francisco Gómez Robledo, was the encomendero and trader tried as a Jewish converso in the 1660s. One of their daughters married Jean l’Archevêque and another married his son, Miguel. As mentioned in the post for 7 July 2015, Jean was descended from Huguenots.

Jean groomed his son to be a trader. It’s likely the young man continued the business after his father died in 1720. When Miguel died, his widow, María, married a Cantabrian-born merchant. José de Reaño de Tagle’s parents were José de Reaño and Teresa de Tagle Bustamante.

When he died in 1743, Reaño’s inventory of trade goods included 90 fanegas of piñon, 300 buckskins, dressed buffalo hides, Navajo baskets, Mexican pack saddles, and bundles of carpet. He left 1,300 wethers and 1,000 pregnant ewes worth 4,300 pesos. His ranch was south of Santa Fé, but he also owned a league of pasture land in the Piedra Lumbre where he built corrals and a wooden shelter.

His employees included a foreman, Antonio de Sandoval, who had claim to some wethers, a mulato slave from México named Pedro, and "7 little Indian herders." Gerónimo Martín owed him fifty pesos "which he agreed to give the year of ‘forty’ 200 lambs with the assurance of herding them at his expense until the year forty-three."

Reaño had been using his livestock as venture capital since at least 1739, when he gave 600 ewes to Francisco Sáez on the understanding he would be given back 114 lambs every year for five years. He probably expected Sáez to graze them on his land at Piedra Lumbre, or perhaps farther south at Ojo Caliente.

The partidario was the son of Augustín Sáez of Parral and Antonia Márquez. His mother’s stepfather was Diego Arias de Quirós, a soldier from Asturias who enlisted with de Vargas. In 1714, while Francisco was still a child, he married María Gómez de Robledo. She was the great-aunt of Reaño’s wife through her mother, Francisca Gómez Robledo.

Another of Francisca’s sisters, Margarita, married Jacinto Peláez. Like Ignacio de Roybal, he came as a soldier with de Vargas. After the native of Asturias was granted land at Jacona, east of San Ildefonso, Ignacio requested the adjoining tract. Margarita’s daughter, María, was raised by Francisca and Ignacio. It was her daughter, María Francisca Fernández de la Pedrerea, who married the member of Mallet’s party who stayed in Santa Fé, Juan Bautista Alarí. Her father had come from Galicia.

Francisca’s third sister, Lucía, married a man from Ciudad de México. Their son, Felipe, married his second cousin, who was the sister of the woman who married Alarí. He died young, and Santiago took over rearing their son, Blas. In 1753, he donated a flour mill located on the river above the city to him.

The web of relationships built on kinship, shared cultural backgrounds, and military experience brought Santiago and his family into contact with the governors. In 1740, Gaspar de Mendoza let Pierre Mallet leave the kingdom. In 1744, Joaquín Codallos lifted the embargo on wool exports and intervened to protect the estate of Santiago’s sister María when Reaño died.

He returned the favors in 1745 when Mendoza’s fourteen-year-old daughter married Codallos. As the only secular clergyman in the kingdom, Santiago was able to shield the politicians from scrutiny by the Franciscans by performing the marriage himself.

Gómez de Robledo Family
Francisco Gómez de Robledo
	Francisco Gómez de Robledo, tried by Inquisition
		Antonio Gómez de Robledo - [Juana Luján]
	Andrés Gómez de Robledo
		Margarita Gómez de Robledo marry Jacinto Peláez (Asturias)
			María Peláez marry Juan Fernández de la Pedrera (Galicia)
				Francisca Fernández de la Pedrera marry Juan Bautista Alarí (Québec)
				Teresa Fernández de la Pedrera marry son of Lucía Gómez Robledo
		María Gómez de Robledo marry Diego Arias de Quirós (Asturias)
			Stepdaugher Antonia Márquez marry Augustín Sáez
				Francisco Sáez contract with José de Reaño de Tagle
		Francesca Gómez de Robledo marry Ignacio de Roybal (Galicia)
			Manuela Roybal marry Jean l’Archevêque (France)
			María Roybal marry Miguel l’Archevêque
				Marry José de Reaño de Tagle (Cantabria)
			Santiago de Roybal
		Lucía Gómez Robledo marry Miguel de Dios Sandoval Martínez
			Felipe de Dios Sandoval Martínez marry Teresa Fernández de la Pedrera
				Blas Felipe de Sandoval Fernández de la Pedrera

Notes: Most of the details on the growth of the wool industry came from Baxter; most about the families came from Chávez. Francisco Gómez Robledo was discussed in 2014 posts for March 22, March 23 and March 24. A friar, Francisco de la Concepción González, in fact did try to prevent the Mendoza-Codallos wedding, according to Norris.

Baxter, John O. Las Carneradas, 1987.

Chávez, Angélico. Origins of New Mexico Families, 1992 revised edition.

Center for Land Grant Studies. "The Piedra Lumbre Grant," available online.

Christmas, Henrietta Martinez. 1598 New Mexico, blog.

Codallos y Rabal, Joachin. Estate proceedings, José Reaño, 17 April 1744, Santa Fé; translated by Christmas, entry for 23 April 2014.

Hendricks, Rick. "Gaspar Domingo de Mendoza," Office of State Historian New Mexico History website.

Norris, Jim. After "The Year Eighty," 2000.

Reaño de Tagle, José de. Will and inventory, 1743, in Twitchell.

_____. Will and inventory, 1743; published by Christmas, entry for 21 April 2014.

Twitchell, Ralph Emerson Twitchell. Spanish Archives of New Mexico, volume 1, 1914; on flour mill.

Pierre Mallet Returns

Pierre Mallet’s third expedition to Nuevo México differed from his earlier ones, and not only in its outcome. When he came in 1739, he and his men were Canadians whose views of trade were those of the coureurs de bois: a simple exchange of goods that profited both sides.

When he returned in late 1750, he came from New Orleans where the plantation economy was based on African slavery. André Fabry de la Bruyère had promoted tobacco in the 1740s, but some growers had switched to indigo. Mallet’s supporters intimated, "if the Spaniards wanted negroes, they would send as many as needed to open the road against any enemies that might be in the vicinity."

When Mallet arrived the first time, he was a novelty that posed no threat. The alcalde personally boarded him and his party.

When he appeared the next time, the reputation of all Frenchmen had been sullied by Louis Moreau who had been executed for inciting rebellion against the kingdom by captives. Mallet didn’t know this and innocently carried a "letter addressed to Morenne who lives in the vicinity of the Santa Fé." The governor, Tomás Vélez Cachupín, had him and his men arrested, and their goods impounded.

Mallet’s first expedition had no recorded sponsors, though one presumes the commander at Fort de Chartres had approved his party’s departure. This trip was the idea of Louis-Xavier de Lino. He commanded Arkansas Post in the early 1750s where Mallet and his brother Paul had settled. Lino was related to the new governor of the territory, Pierre Rigaud. Abraham Nasatir said, he took Mallet to New Orleans to meet his kinsmen. He noted, no official funds were available, but he suspected both officials "may have invested privately in the expedition."

In his deposition, Mallet admitted he had support this time from some merchants. He left with a letter "for a merchant of the city, written by Monsieur Duran, a very rich man, and Monsieur Fuillet, also a wealthy man." The Mississippi port by then had a number of merchants, large and small, who traded in goods purchased from vessels and from planters’ crops. I haven’t found these particular names, though Duran may have been an agent specializing in tobacco.

Mallet left no record of the goods he intended to trade from Illinois country. What we know of his merchandise the next time is fragmentary. Vélez apparently was more interested in removing him from the kingdom, than investigating his packs. The surviving inventory was made by Bernardo Miera y Pacheco, who was appointed alcalde at Pecos by the next governor, Francisco Marín, in 1756.

Some goods on Miera’s list were odd: an old cloth hood, an old and torn scarf, a damaged petticoat of old chintz, an old striped smock, and some very badly worn overcoats. Although it was possible the city merchants were disposing of unsellable inventory, it seems more likely that people snuck into the pueblo store room, took things, and left whatever wasn’t useful to make the packages look untouched.

Other items were described as damaged. This may have been because Mallet’s party was stopped by the Comanche who "opened all our merchandise, taking pieces of wool and calico" or things may have been stored poorly.

Also, it was possible the New Orleans merchants were less than scrupulous, or it may have been Miera was denigrating some things so he or Marín’s could declare them worthless. Then, one or the other might have been permitted to take the salvage for resale.

As a result of repeated depredations, the inventory found by Miera may have represented those items with the least use in the pueblos and settlements, and not what was perceived as goods for trade by Mallet. Like the calico and wool, the most desired items may have disappeared.

Much of what survived was piece goods that required a tailor or dressmaker to convert into clothing. These included heavy nankeen, cambrics and brittany, all of which were made from cotton or cotton mixes. The merchants also sent papers of buttons, measures of thread and 156 sewing needles. The last were described as "worn."

John Garretson Clark observed that after normal shipping had resumed after the end of War of Austrian Succession, "a certain amount of opulence and splendor clothed New Orleans, evidenced by an increasing demand for luxury items, especially among the planters. Women dressed in high style."

The inclusion in the load of more luxurious taffetas and unembroidered silks reflected this taste, as did the black beaver hats, women’s linen blouses, and pairs of stockings for men and women. The two old shirt fronts with silver bottons were anomalous, because one can’t imagine anyone not keeping the buttons from old clothing.

The list of personal property owned by Mallet taken by Joseph Manuel Morales may have been more honest. Since Angélico Chávez didn’t mention him in his Origins of New Mexico Families, it’s impossible to know when the inventory was made.

Still, we know, that, in addition to blankets and saddles and the other impedimenta for using horses for transportation through open land, Mallet had a "bison hide overcoat," a flask, "three firearms, two of which are fusils, and one a shotgun," a small sword and a bag of rope. He also carried a copper pot, "a handmill and three chocolate cups."

Since there were four men in the party, the others may have carried the utensils needed for cooking and eating in the wild.

Notes: Mallet’s first expedition and Moreau were discussed in the post for 9 March 2016. For more on the importance of indigo in these years, see the post for 16 January 2011 on mercantilism in South Carolina. Lino’s full name was Louis-Xavier Martin de Lino de Chalmette. Pierre Rigaud also was known as the Marquis de Vaudreuil

Blakeslee, Donald J. Along Ancient Trails, 1995.

Chávez, Angélico. Origins of New Mexico Families, 1992 revised edition.

Clark, John Garretson. New Orleans, 1718-1812: An Economic History, 1970; includes a chapter on New Orleans merchants in this period.

Mallet, Pierre. Letter dictated to Tomás Vélez Cachupín, governor and captain-general; translation in Blakeslee. Negro is lower case in the original text.

Miera y Pacheco, Bernardo. List of Pierre Mallet’s goods; translation in Blakeslee.

_____. Memorial on his own background, manuscript in Edward A. Ayer Collection, Newberry Library; cited by Chávez.

Morales, Joseph Manuel. List of Pierre Mallet’s personal property; translation in Blakeslee.

Nasatir, A. P. "Mallet, Pierre Antoine," in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, volume 3, 1974.

French Traders

Peace returned in 1748, and with it the French. The treaty ending the War of Austrian Succession was signed on 18 October 1748. The British attacked Havana just days before, on October 12. Their last major naval battle with France occurred January 31 near Brest. During the fighting in New England, the British armed the Iroquois Confederacy and the French used the Wabnaki Confederacy of the Abenaki, Mícmac, Penobscot, Passamaquoddy and Maliseet tribes.

The detritus of combat floated toward Nuevo México. In February of 1748, before the war’s end, seven Comanche went to Taos where they reported 33 Frenchmen had come to their settlement on lands once associated with the Jicarilla. They traded muskets for mules, perhaps war surplus that had seeped west. Most had left but two were still interested in coming to the fair. Herbert Bolton found no record they did.

Names at the top changed. Ferdinand VI became king and Francisco de Güemes became viceroy in 1746. Juan Rodríguez de Albuerne had been entrusted with northern frontier defense strategy in 1742 by the intervening viceroy, Pedro Cebrián. Tomás Vélez Cachupín arrived as governor in 1749.

Soon after, three Frenchmen arrived in Taos who claimed to be deserters from Arkansas Post: Luis Febre, Pedro Saltre, and Joseph Miguel Riballo. They had traded with the Jumano, who took them to the Comanche. There they joined their hunts.

Vélez had them questioned, and send their responses to Albuerne, who thought their answers too vague to be trusted. Vélez proposed keeping them since they were skilled in trades needed in Santa Fé. He had them requestioned in March of 1750, and Febre’s response forwarded to the auditor de guerra. This time they were allowed to stay if they were watched.

Before the case of the deserters was complete, another victim of the wars appeared in Taos. Felipe de Sandoval had been on a Spanish ship captured by the British in 1742, and kept as a prisoner on Jamaica. He escaped on a French vessel to Mobile. There he became a hunter in Louisiana. He eventually made his way to Arkansas Post where he learned the way to Nuevo México from the Mallets who had settled there.

Sandoval was part of a group of six who left there for the Jumano. From there they moved to a Comanche village where again he proved himself with his hunting skills. The Frenchmen joined the Comanche going to Taos to sell captives. The German in the group refused to continue because he feared the Spanish Inquisition.

The Comanche had been attacking the kingdom’s frontiers since 1746. Perhaps because he had his own ideas on how to deal with them, mentioned briefly in the post for 2 March 2016, Vélez didn’t attribute their activities to either the recurring droughts or to Comanche traditions.

He wrote Albuerne, "I regard as most mischievous the permission given to the first Frenchmen to return" and added "They gave an exact account and relation, informing the Governor of Louisiana of their route, and the situation and condition of New Mexico."

Vélez didn’t understand that Mallet had been passed from one band to another with the distribution of gifts. Likewise, the later men, who knew a little more about the location of Santa Fé, also were guided by natives who worked in exchange for goods, often after the Frenchmen proved their worth as hunters.

The governor also didn’t understand the dynamics of the fur trade that was moving farther west with each conflict with the British and with each war with unhappy natives. Bolton mentions at least four fur traders appeared about which nothing more was recorded.

He certainly didn’t understand the repercussions of the captive trade. The Mallets had started up the Missouri, and been directed south by the Arikara. When the finally met the Comanche, they had an Arikara captive who "had been a slave among" the Spaniards and "had been baptized by them." The Mallets ransomed him to use as a guide.

Instead, Vélez blame the nefarious French, and so framed his responses to Albuerne. They agreed all Frenchmen who arrived in the future should be sent to Sonora, as far from Louisiana as possible. Since most were good shots Vélez suggested they be conscripted.

Thus, when Mallet returned in 1750 along the Arkansas, he and his party were arrested. More traders appeared in 1752 with a letter from the commandant of Michilimackinac, and a license from the commandant of Upper Louisiana. They too were arrested, their goods seized and sold to Tomás Ortiz, who, in turn, resold them for a profit.

They had gone to Fort Chartres south of the confluence of the Missouri with the Mississippi, where they met the governor, Jean-Baptiste Benoit. They moved through the Osage and Pawnee on the Missouri, were attacked by the Comanche, guided by an Aa, and brought to Pecos by members of the Jicarilla and Carlana bands of Apache.

The fate of Mallet’s party after they were sent to Sonora is unknown. Since Jean Chapuis and Luis Foissi had official papers from a French governor, they were sent to Spain.

Vélez probably felt his policies were responsible for stopping any more French traders from coming to Nuevo México. More likely, it was the Seven Years War between France and Great Britain that began in 1763.

Notes: Benoit is better known as the Sieur de Saint-Clair. The viceroy in 1750 was Francisco de Güemes. The Jumano were French allies. Arkansas Post was mentioned in the entry for 2 March 2016.

Luis Sánchez de Tagle migrated to Nueva España from Asturias where he amassed great wealth and power. He married María Pérez de Bustamante, and was named Marqués de Altamira. When there were no female heirs, the title passed through the female line. Albuerne became the marquis consort when he married the granddaughter of Luis’s nephew.

Bolton, Herbert Eugene. "French Intrusions into New Mexico 1749-1752," H. Morse Stephens and Herbert E. Bolton, The Pacific Ocean in History, 1917.

Mallet, Pierre. Journal of the expedition, 29 May 1739 to 24 June 1740, summarized by Jean Baptiste Le Moyne and translated by Henri Folmer; included in Donald J. Blakeslee, Along Ancient Trails, 1995.

Vélez Cachupín, Tomás. Report to the viceroy, 8 March 1750; quoted by Bolton.

Wikipedia for details on wars, alliances and Marqués de Altamira.

Limits of Mercantilism

Spain, despite Philip V’s attempts to introduce competition, still adhered to a mercantilist philosophy that posited the monarchy was self-sufficient. It should produce everything it needed, import as little as possible, and contradictorily, export as much as possible. Currency was meant to be concentrated in the hands of the state.

The economic policy postulated colonies existed to provide raw materials and consume exports from their homelands. They weren’t allowed to become incipient rivals by manufacturing their own goods.

France and England were more successful at developing their own industries. Spain did not, perhaps because it, ultimately, was subservient to the Hapsburgs in Austria until 1714. England and Spain were more successful in controlling activities in their colonies, perhaps because theirs fit the model as consumers or producers of raw materials.

Nouvelle-France lacked the mineral wealth found in the Spanish colonies. Whatever it exported to its parent country came from trade with Natives for furs. Its governors understood the needs to make allies of as many western bands as they could, even promoting peace between enemies in the hopes of trading with both sides.

Disequilibriums proliferated. Nueva España, but especially the far north, never received enough manufactured goods or currency. Frenchmen were constantly searching for new trade opportunities. However, the only times traders were reported on the frontiers of Nuevo México were the brief periods of peace between continental conflicts.

The War of Polish Succession officially ended 18 November 1738, although fighting had stopped earlier. In February of the next year, Pierre Antoine Mallet left Kaskaskia with eight men, hoping to open trade relations. They arrived at Picurís on July 21 and were taken down through Santa Cruz, La Cañada, and Santa María. They arrived in Santa Fé the next day where they were received by the alcalde, Juan Páez Hurtado.

The governor, Gaspar de Mendoza, saw no reason to be hostile. After eight months waiting for a decision from the viceroy, the men were allowed to return through Pecos to French territory.

They took with them a letter from Santiago de Roybal. One of sisters had married Jean l’Archevêque and another had married his son Miguel. In it Roybal said, the provinces were "completely devoid of money," but that some might be obtained from Chihuahua "where the inhabitants of this country go to trade."

He went on, the traders had led him to believe "I could ask you for merchandise that I need for business and to provide for the needs of my family." He attached a list of what was desired, with the necessary language to establish credit.

The men had come along the Platte and left by the Arkansas. Part way back, the group split with some taking their knowledge of the way to Santa Fé north to Illinois country. Mallet, his brother Paul, and the others went south to New Orleans.

Before they returned war had erupted again in Europe, this time the War of Austrian Succession. Even so, the governor of Louisiana, Jean Baptiste Le Moyne, sent Mallet "back to the said province with considerable merchandise, along with my four companions and ten soldiers" led by André Fabry de la Bruyère in 1741. They squabbled, then broke into smaller groups. After 18 months, Mallet wrote "we suffered the disgrace of losing all the merchandise in the Red River" and returned to New Orleans.

He and Roybal both said there were nine men in Santa Fé, but only named eight: Joseph Bellecourt, Petit Jean David, Manuel Gallien, Pierre Mallet, Paul Mallet (Pierre’s brother), Louis Morín (or Moreau), Phillippe Robitaille, and Michael Beslot, who may be the one they called La Rose.

Herbert Bancroft said two stayed in Santa Fé. One was Moreau who had married Juana Muñiz in 1740 as Luis María Mora.

Mendoza condemned him to death for trying to "incite the Indians of this kingdom to revolt." It took eight months for him to hear of activities that began "when he saw the new converts" in October. Before he could have "his heart taken out through his back," the Inquisition pressed its own claim to try him. He finally was "shot in the public square in this capital town of Santa Fé" on orders of the next governor, Joaquín Codallos.

Moreau so soured Codallos that when another Frenchman appeared in Pecos in 1744 with no papers, he immediately dispatched him to the governor of Nueva Vizcaya. All that’s known now of Jacques Velo is he came from Illinois

The unnamed man with Mallet may have been Juan Bautista Alarí. He married a widow, María Francisca Fernández de la Pedrerea, in March of 1741. Her father, Juan Fernández de la Pedrerea had lived with Roybal’s father’s family and married a girl they raised, María Pelález. According to Angélico Chávez, Alarí became a solider.

Notes: The Páez mentioned in post for 16 August 2015 died in 1724. He had a son Juan Domingo, who died in 1742. He might me the one whose name was translated as Jean Paëz Hurtado. The viceroy was Juan Vizarrón. Le Moyne also was known as Sieur de Bienville.

Mallet’s journal indicated they "arrived at noon at another mission called Sainte Croix, and after dinner they passed another called La Cañada, and they spent the night at a town called Sainte Marie" before going to Santa Fé the next day.

Bancroft, Hubert Howe. History of Arizona and New Mexico, 1530-1888, 1889.

Blakeslee, Donald J. Along Ancient Trails, 1995.

Chávez, Angélico. Origins of New Mexico Families, 1992 revised edition.

Clark, John Garretson. New Orleans, 1718-1812, 1970.

Codallos y Rabal, Joaquín. Letter to Antonio Durán de Armijo, 4 March 1748; translation in Ralph Emerson Twitchell, Spanish Archives of New Mexico: Compiled and Chronologically Arranged, volume 1, 1914; quotation on shooting Moreau and comments on Velo.

Mallet, Pierre. Journal of the expedition, 29 May 1739 to 24 June 1740, summarized by Jean Baptiste Le Moyne and translated by Henri Folmer; included in Blakeslee.

_____. Letter dictated to Tomás Vélez Cachupín, governor and captain-general; translation in Blakeslee.

Mendoza, Gaspar Domingo de. Letter to Pedro Navarette, 30 June 1743 in Adolph F. A. Bandelier and Fanny R. Bandelier. Historical Documents Relating to New Mexico, Nueva Vizcaya, and Approaches Thereto, to 1773, volume 3, 1937, translated and edited by Charles Wilson Hackett.

Roybal, Santiago de. Letter to Nicholas Ignatius de Beaubois, 1740, translation in Blakeslee. Beaubois was the Jesuit superior in New Orleans. According to Clark, the Jesuits located in New Orleans were active traders in Illinois country.

The Wool Trade

Attacks on Spanish ships colluded with drought to create shortages within México and Nuevo México. In 1743, a British admiral captured a Manila galleon on its return home. Lost with the ship were the year’s profits that would have financed the next year’s voyage. Bruce Cruikshank believed no ships docked in Acapulco in 1744 or 1745. Two arrived in 1746, but then none appeared the next two years.

By 1744, scarce commodities and hoarding plagued Puebla. Two years later, the only fabrics available to the elite were piece goods smuggled from England and Flanders.

México had developed a textile industry in the 1590s when Spain’s was in decline. Silkworms had been imported and wool introduced. Merchants financed workshops that employed immigrant artisans. Eventually native women took their places in the obrajes of Puebla.

Sales to the wealthy dropped when galleons from the Philippines introduced silks from Asia. The embargo between 1718 and 1734 hadn’t restored the industry. Woolen production moved to Querétaro when new lands were opened for grazing in Nuevo León after 1635. When the silver mines moved farther north, the obrajes relocated to Bajio and Guadalajara to provide the necessary rough woolens.

At the same time fewer goods were arriving in Veracruz and Acapulco for transport north to Nuevo México, disruptions in trade with Apache and Comanche meant there was less to send back. With dry conditions, buffalo may have shifted their range or not been as fecund.

Men sponsoring the annual convoys between Nueva España and Santa Fé may have been the ones who initiated the trade in wool. Pedro de Rivera noted in 1728 that convoys leaving El Paso for Santa Fé were provided military escorts twice a year. In 1760, Pedro Tamarón reported 500 to 600 men used the cordons that left in December for Vizcaya. Those entering Sonora were given an escort by the presidio at Janos.

In 1733, José Dias del Carpio was named commander at Jano. He had migrated from a village in Álava. The next year he was contracting for wool with Felipe Silva. It was probably a side investment made with a man who used his services when he was traveling in Sonora. It would have augmented the Basque’s 600 peso annual salary, without distracting from his military duties.

A three year drought slowed growth in the fleece trade. In 1735 Gervasio Cruzat y Góngora stopped all "exports of sheep, cattle, wool, or grain." The next year, the governor called a public meeting to discuss continuing the embargo. John Baxter said, the group "decided that commodity reserves were still insufficient for outside sales."

The next governor followed suit in 1737, but exempted products collected to pay tithes to the Bishop of Durango. Ranchers in Albuquerque, led by sons of Fernando Durán y Chaves protested, but Enrique de Olavide knew he was expected by the viceroy to handle threats of famine.

When drought hit Nueva Vizcaya the next year, the governor there used his own money to buy corn and wheat elsewhere in Nueva España. 1739 was worse. He had his alcaldes inventory all available foodstuffs. Like Cruzat, he then forbid both the sale and export of crops.

While drought persisted in parts of the west, the effects of naval attacks in the Caribbean became more severe in Puebla and Mexico City. In May of 1744 the mayordomo for a mule team delivering goods to Santa Fé offered to buy clips for his back haul. This time the governor, Joaquín Codallos, agreed since "there was no local market." The agreement was renewed the next year, which was unusually wet.

Baxter noted, no mention was made of shipping live animals. While churros were reputed to "substitute morning dew and succulent plants for drinking water," they still needed to eat when the were being driven south. Forage, especially in the jornado del muerto between modern-day Socorro and Las Cruces, may not have revived enough to support both flocks and pack train animals. In addition, raids by hostile bands had increased. Live animals were more likely to attract attention than fleece. The sale of fleeces before the drive exempted men from the risks of losses during the convoy.

The shift from livestock to wool completed a transformation in the Río Abajo economy that had begun when men began raising more sheep than cattle during the dry years. When Diego de Vargas brought livestock north for the settlers in the 1697, there were 100 sheep for every 16.5 cows or bulls. When Diego Padilla died in 1739, he left 1,700 sheep and 141 cows, or 100 sheep for every 8.3 cows.

Notes: The merchant who owned the mule team in 1744 was Manuel de Anaya Villagrán. A descendant has learned he was an orphan born in Huichapan, Hidalgo. The use of the term huerfano on his baptismal certificate might mean he was came from a well-to-do family, but may also have been the name of a godparent sponsoring an illegitimate child. The mayordomo, Francisco de Vargas, is even more obscure. Felipe Silva was the brother of Francisco Silva mentioned in the post for 24 February 2016.

Bass, Steve. "Basques in the Americas 1692-1792," posted 2 September 2009 on Euskal Kazeta website; on Dias del Carpio.

Baxter, John O. Las Carneradas, 1987; quotations not otherwise attributed.

Blake, Alice. Discussion on Nuestros Ranchos website about problems tracing Anaya Villagrán.

Boyle, Susan Calafate. Comerciantes, Arrieros, y Peones: The Hispanos and the Santa Fe Trade, 1994; 1742 population of San Felipe area.

Cruikshank, Bruce. "Directory of Manila Galleon Voyages, 1565 through 1815," his website.

Gran Enciclopedia Aragonesa. Entry on "Fuenclara, Conde de" mentions hoarding in Puebla.

Hamnett, Brian R. A Concise History of Mexico, 2006; history of textile industry.

Rivera Villalón, Pedro de. Inspection report, 1728; translation in Thomas H. Naylor and Charles W. Polzer, Pedro de Rivera and the Military Regulations for Northern New Spain, 1724-1729, 1988.

Salvucci, Richard J. Textiles and Capitalism in Mexico, 1965.

Tamarón y Romeral, Pedro. The Kingdom of New Mexico, 1760, translation in Eleanor B. Adams, Bishop Tamarón’s Visitation of New Mexico, 1760, 1954.

Wikipedia. Entry on "Francisco de Guemes y Horcasitas" mentions smuggling.

[Wikipedia Esp Hist I1]

_____. Entry on "Textiles of Mexico" discusses silk industry.