Rancho Santa Teresa was a 9,647-acre (39.04 km2) Mexican land grant in present day Santa Clara County, California given in 1834 by Governor José Figueroa to José Joaquín Bernal.[1] The grant extended west from Coyote Creek to the Santa Teresa Hills, and included present day Santa Teresa.[2][3][4]
José Joaquín Bernal (1762–1837), a member of the 1776 De Anza Expedition, was a soldier at the Presidio of San Francisco and by 1805 at the Pueblo of San José. In 1819 he retired from the army, and in 1826 he settled his family of eleven children near Santa Teresa spring, ten miles south of San Jose.
In 1837, Jose Joaquin Bernal died, leaving an estate to be divided equally among his widow and his ten children. Four of his children were granted Rancho Valle de San Jose in 1839. In 1844, the Treaty of Santa Teresa was signed at the rancho by Governor Micheltorena and former Governor Alvarado.[5]
With the cession of California to the United States following the Mexican-American War, the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo provided that the land grants would be honored. As required by the Land Act of 1851, a claim was filed by Agustín Bernal, son of José Joaquín Bernal, with the Public Land Commission in 1853. The grant was one square league, and 4,460 acres (18 km2) was confirmed by the U.S. District Court.[6] But the 1867 official survey and patent to Agustín Bernal in 1867 was for 9,647 acres (39 km2).[7]
In 1855, another of José Joaquín Bernal's sons, Bruno Bernal (1799–1863) moved to his Rancho El Alisal, leaving the ranch to his sons Ygnacio (1841–1906), Francisco and Antonio.
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