Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo

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Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo

The façade of the capilla (chapel) at Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo.
Location	Carmel-by-the-Sea, California
Name as Founded	La Misión San Carlos Borromeo del Río Carmelo [1]
Patron	Saint Charles Borromeo [2]
Nickname(s)	"Father of the Alta California Missions" [3]
Founding Date	June 3, 1770 [4]
Founding Priest(s)	Father Presidente Junípero Serra [5]
Founding Order	Second [2]
Headquarters of the Alta California Mission System	1771–1815; 1819–1824; 1827–1830 [6]
Military District	Third [7]
Native Tribe(s) Spanish Name(s)	Esselen, Ohlone Costeño
Native Place Name(s)	Ekheya [8]
Baptisms	3,827 [9]
Marriages	1,032 [9]
Burials	2,837 [9]
Secularized	1834 [2]
Returned to the Church	1859 [2]
Governing Body	Roman Catholic Diocese of Monterey
Current Use	Parish Church
Coordinates	36°32′34.15″N, 121°55′1.79″W
National Historic Landmark	#NPS-66000214
Date added to the NRHP	October 15, 1966
California Historical Landmark	#135
Web Site	http://carmelmission.org

Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo, also known as the Carmel Mission, is a historic Roman Catholic church in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California.

[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.^[10] 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.^[11]

[edit] History

The mission, first established on June 3, 1770 in nearby Monterey (near the native village of Tamo), was named for Charles Borromeo, Archbishop of Milan, Italy. It was the site of the first Christian confirmation in Alta California.^[5] In May 1771, the Viceroy approved Father Junípero Serra's petition to relocate the Mission to its current location near the present-day town of Carmel-by-the-Sea.^[12] Serra's goal was to put some distance between the Mission's neophytes and the Presidio of Monterey (the headquarters of Pedro Fages, who served as military governor of Alta California between 1770 and 1774, with whom Serra was engaged in a heated power struggle).^[13] The original site continued to operate as the "Royal Presidio Chapel" and later became the Cathedral of San Carlos Borromeo. "Mission Carmel" (as it came to be known) was Father Serra's favorite, and being close to Monterey (the capital of Alta California) served as his headquarters. When he died on August 28, 1784, he was interred beneath the chapel floor.

The Esselen and Ohlone Indians who lived near the Mission were taken in and trained as plowmen, shepherds, cattle herders, blacksmiths, and carpenters. They made adobe bricks, roof tiles and tools needed to build the Mission. In the beginning, the Mission relied on bear meat from Mission San Antonio de Padua and supplies brought by ship from Mission San Diego de Alcalá. In 1794, the population reached its peak of 927, but by 1823 the total had dwindled to 381. On November 20, 1818 French privateer Hipólito Bouchard raided the Monterey Presidio, before moving on to other Spanish installations in the south.^[14] The Mission was in ruins when the Roman Catholic Church regained control of it in 1863. In 1884 Father Angel Casanova undertook the work of restoration. In 1931, Monsignor Philip Scher appointed Harry Downie to be curator in charge of Mission restoration; it became an independent parish two years later. In 1961, the Mission was designated as a Minor Basilica by Pope John XXIII.

Mission Carmel has been designated a National Historic Landmark by the National Park Service. In 1987, Pope John Paul II visited the Mission as part of his U.S. tour. It is also an active parish church of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Monterey.

[edit] Notes

The Mission at Carmel, circa 1910. Note the reduction in the roof line in the modern-day photo above.

[edit] References

A drawing of Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo prepared by Captain George Vancouver depicts the grounds as they appeared in November, 1792. From A Voyage of Discovery to the North Pacific Ocean and Round the World.

• 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. 
• 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. 
• Smith, Frances Rand (1921). The Architectural History of Mission San Carlos Borromeo, California. California Historical Survey Commission, Berkeley, CA. 
• Vancouver, George (1801). A Voyage of Discovery to the North Pacific Ocean and Round the World, Volume III. Printed for John Stockdale, Piccadilly, London. 
• Yenne, Bill (2004). The Missions of California. Advantage Publishers Group, San Diego, CA. ISBN 1-59223-319-8. 

[edit] See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo

• Cathedral of San Carlos Borroméo (aka Royal Presidio Chapel), Monterey, California
• USNS Mission Carmel (AO-113), a Buenaventura Class fleet oiler built during World War II.
• USNS Mission San Carlos (AO-120), a Buenaventura Class fleet oiler built during World War II.

[edit] External links

The Mission cemetery (campo santos).

• Elevation & Site Layout sketches of the Mission proper
• Early History of the California Coast, a National Park Service Discover Our Shared Heritage Travel Itinerary
• Mission Carmel at Find-A-Grave
• Early photographs, sketches, land surveys of Carmel Mission, via Calisphere, California Digital Library

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