Mission Nuestra Señora de la Soledad

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**Mission Nuestra Señora de la Soledad**
Location	Soledad, California
Looking toward the rebuilt chapel at Mission Nuestra Señora de la Soledad in December 2004.
Name as Founded	La Misión de María Santísima, Nuestra Señora Dolorosísima de la Soledad ^[1]
English Translation	The Mission of Mary Most Holy, Our Most Sorrowful Lady of Solitude
Patron	Our Lady of Solitude, Our Most Sorrowful Lady of Solitude ^[2]
Nickname(s)	"The Lonely Mission" ^[3]
Founding Date	October 9, 1791 ^[4]
Founding Priest(s)	Father Fermín Lasuén ^[5]
Founding Order	Thirteenth ^[2]
Military District	Third ^[6]
Native Tribe(s) Spanish Name(s)	Chalon, Esselen, Yokuts Costeño
Native Place Name(s)	Chuttusqelis ^[7]
Baptisms	2,131 ^[8]
Marriages	648 ^[8]
Burials	1,705 ^[8]
Secularized	1835 ^[2]
Returned to the Church	1859 ^[2]
Governing Body	Roman Catholic Diocese of Monterey
Current Use	Chapel / Museum
California Historical Landmark	#233

Mission Nuestra Señora de la Soledad was founded on October 9, 1791 to minister and take in the Indians of the Salinas Valley. It was the thirteenth of the Spanish missions founded in California by members of the Franciscan Order.

1 Precontact
2 History
3 Notes
4 References
5 See also
6 External links

[edit] Precontact

The current prevailing theory postulates that Paleo-Indians entered the Americas from Asia via a land bridge called "Beringia" that connected eastern Siberia with present-day Alaska (when sea levels were significantly lower, due to widespread glaciation) between about 15,000 to 35,000 years ago. The remains of Arlington Springs Man on Santa Rosa Island are among the traces of a very early habitation in California, dated to the last ice age (Wisconsin glaciation) about 13,000 years ago. The first humans are therefore thought to have made their homes among the southern valleys of California's coastal mountain ranges some 10,000 to 12,000 years ago; the earliest of these people are known only from archaeological evidence.^[9] The cultural impacts resulting from climactic changes and other natural events during this broad expanse of time were negligible; conversely, European contact was a momentous event, which profoundly affected California's native peoples.^[10]

[edit] History

The Ohlone the original residents of the valley, were converted and brought to live here, followed by Esselen and Yokuts. Governor José Joaquín de Arrillaga was buried in the chapel after he died on July 24, 1814 during a visit to the Mission. Though prosperous in its early years, the Mission declined after 1825. Nevertheless, Father Vicente Francisco de Sarría stayed on in poverty to serve the Indians until his death in 1835, when the mission was secularized. This was an attempt by the Mexican government to turn the California missions over to the Indians on whose lands the missions had been established.

The Mission lands were subsequently "regranted" to the Bishop of Monterey in 1859. For over a century after secularization the Mission sat crumbling in the wind and rain. In 1954, when restoration was begun, only piles of adobe dirt and a few wall sections from the cuadrángulo (quadrangle) remained. The chapel was reconstructed and dedicated under the auspices of the Native Daughters of the Golden West on October 9, 1955. The ruins of the quadrangle, cemetery, and some of the outer rooms can still be seen. Governor Arrillaga's grave was identified and given a new marker.

Mission Nuestra Señora de la Soledad today serves as Nuestra Señora de La Soledad Catholic Church in the parish of Soledad. It is open to visitors, but is not used as a parish church.

[edit] Notes

Mission Nuestra Señora de la Soledad in 1984.

^ Leffingwell, p. 109
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Krell, p. 224
^ Ruscin, p. 111
^ Yenne, p. 120
^ Ruscin, p. 196
^ Forbes, p. 202
^ Ruscin, p. 195
^ ^a ^b ^c Krell, p. 315: as of December 31, 1832; information adapted from Engelhardt's Missions and Missionaries of California.
^ Paddison, p. 333: The first undisputable archaeological evidence of human presence in California dates back to circa 8,000 BCE.
^ Jones and Klar 2005, p. 53: "Understanding and when humans first settled California is intimately linked to the initial colonization of the Americas."

[edit] References

The ruins of Mission Nuestra Señora de la Soledad circa 1900.

Forbes, Alexander (1839). California: A History of Upper and Lower California. Smith, Elder and Co., Cornhill, London.
Jones, Terry L. and Kathryn A. Klar (eds.) (2007). California Prehistory: Colonization, Culture, and Complexity. Altimira Press, Landham, MD. ISBN 0-759-10872-2.
Krell, Dorothy (ed.) (1979). The California Missions: A Pictorial History. Sunset Publishing Corporation, Menlo Park, CA. ISBN 0-376-05172-8.
Leffingwell, Randy (2005). California Missions and Presidios: The History & Beauty of the Spanish Missions. Voyageur Press, Inc., Stillwater, MN. ISBN 0-89658-492-5.
Levy, Richard. (1978). in William C. Sturtevant, and Robert F. Heizer: Handbook of North American Indians. Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC. ISBN 0-16-004578-9 / 0160045754, page 486.
Paddison, Joshua (ed.) (1999). A World Transformed: Firsthand Accounts of California Before the Gold Rush. Heyday Books, Berkeley, CA. ISBN 1-890771-13-9.
Ruscin, Terry (1999). Mission Memoirs. Sunbelt Publications, San Diego, CA. ISBN 0-932653-30-8.
Yenne, Bill (2004). The Missions of California. Thunder Bay Press, San Diego, CA. ISBN 1-59223-319-8.