My father, said he [i.e., Olivera],... was one of a company of sixty mounted men under the Alferez Gabriel Moraga, accompanied by the Padre Muñoz for chaplain, who left Monterey in August, 1806 ... and crossed over into the Tulares by the way of San Juan Bautista.... We traversed the whole of the country from where the San Joaquin comes out of the Sierra Nevada to a long way up north along the Sacramento River and found multitudes of Indians everywhere along the streams.[43] We passed fifteen days at one camp on the Sacramento, whence we made trips up into the snowy mountains.... We were obliged to encounter great dangers in this trip and did not get back till November after being out over a hundred days,[44] for, from the melting of the snows and the overflowing of the rivers and not knowing our whereabouts, we had to keep well on the lower hills and creep along by the eastern trail the best way we could until we found ourselves near the King’s River and the Big Lakes,[45] and picked our way among great numbers of Indian rancherias, until we came to the passes called the Tejon and Las Ulvas, and so made our exit at the Mission of San Fernando....
There was also another expedition from Santa Barbara in the fall of 1815, which went over into the Tulares, where they met another party from Monterey who had come through the Estrella from San Miguel. That was commanded by Captain Juan Ortega, when Don Pablo Vicente de Sola was Governor. I was also along with it, but we did nothing particular, excepting to bring in a great many Indians for the reverend Padres to make Christians of. The pobre infelices lived like so many brutes in dirt and filth, and were always fighting each other like so many wild cats and dogs, muy mestanjes. The girls among them used to run after the soldiers—pobrecitas—and the people gave us the orphan children, and in this way many of their souls were saved who would otherwise have been lost with the diablos.
Felipe Santiago García’s Account of Moraga’s 1807 Expedition
Pertinent passages have been selected from a manuscript entitled “Story of an Old Dragoon of Monterey,” in Alexander Taylor’s Discoverers, Founders and Pioneers of California (2:141-151).
In the year 1807 I went to the Buena Vista Lake[46] as we called it, as a soldier in a company of Cavalry of twenty-five men under Alferez Gabriel Moraga. Each of us had eight horses and they made a big caballada. Miguel Espinosa was our serjeant and we had to keep constant watch that the Indians did not steal our horses; they were everywhere.... We went from Monterey to San Miguel Mission, and from there to the Laguna we called Buena Vista in one day and a half, and we went after the runaway neophytas [and] tried to bring in others for the Padres to make Christians; but did not get any. We went away into the Snowy Mountains, or near where the snow was, and the Indians stole one-half of our horses and killed two of our men. Where we went into the mountains there was a Portosuello [portezuelo, an opening or gap], called by our Captain “Salinas de Cortez” which had great quantities of nitre, quisas tequesquite.[47] We crossed the San Joaquin River several times and everywhere there was Indians, and the Captain made up his mind to go back by the way of San José Mission where we arrived in good order.
I went several times to the Tulares and to the Sacramento, both on horseback and once in boats. In all the rivers we saw many beavers; bears were everywhere and very dangerous. Elk and antelope and deer used to run before us in bandados [bands] and we found plenty of mustangs, wild horses,[48] in 1807 and afterwards many others with the mission brands, and lots and lots of the mission cattle, muy cimarones.
IV. JOSÉ PALOMARES’ EXPEDITION TO THE TULARES, 1808
In 1808 there are two accounts of significance, Moraga’s trip to the Sacramento Valley (Cutter, 1957) and José Palomares’ expedition through the southern tip of the San Joaquin Valley, probably in the same year.
Report on the Expedition to the Tulares
(Cal. Arch., Prov. St. Pap., Mis. and Col., I: 229-239)
On the 25th [of October][1] I left the Presidio with six men, and, taking another one from San Buenaventura, I went as far as Simi,[2] where we spent the night. On the following day I went with one soldier toward San Fernando, leaving the other six at Simi awaiting further orders. Having arrived at this mission I talked to the Reverend Fathers and asked them where the fiesta was. They answered that they did not know and inquired of some Indians who told them that the fiesta was at a village called Quariniga and that the dancing had already begun. This being the situation I spent the 26th and 27th provisioning and on the latter day sent a soldier to Simi to tell the others to start out in the afternoon and arrive at the mission in the evening. This they did. At about nine o’clock at night, taking with me four men from this garrison, I set out with considerable secrecy for the rancho through which I passed at about one o’clock in the morning of the 28th. We went as far as a canyon, at a distance of about five leagues from the said rancho, arriving at dawn, or about eight o’clock. We had with us a list of the names of the Indian men and women fugitive from this mission [San Fernando] and also two interpreters, one Spanish, the other familiar with the language of all the Valley Indians. He also was well acquainted with the country. While we were at this place some Christian Indians arrived, who were on furlough and who had originated in this village. They told me that the people were beginning to arrive and that the dance was going to start on the night of the 29th. For this reason it seemed to me desirable to remain there till the 30th. The place was well arranged and isolated, with water and forage for the horses.