Full name: Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe
Founding date: July 25, 1834 Mission #27
Catholic Order: Dominican
Founded by: Padre Felix Caballero (after Mexico’s independence from Spain)
Condition: No remains. Footings added at site in 1998 to simulate mission.
Closing date: Abandoned in 1840.
GPS: 32.091944, -116.574250
Access: Mex. #3, Km. 77. To find the mission, take the paved road going into town, at the gas station for Guadalupe (Francisco Zarco). Go 1 mile to a cross street. Ahead the road is divided, turn left to the mission museum, passing a school.
Read more: HERE
June 2017 (by David Kier):
October 2012 Photos by David Kier:
2001 Photos at the mission compound by David Kier:
1955 Photo by Howard Gulick:
1949 Photo by Marquis McDonald:
1929 site map by Peveril Meigs:
Site plans from INAH https://www.inah.gob.mx/
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The following chapter is from my book, Baja California Land of Missions Order your own copy from Amazon Books: HERE
#27 Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe (1834-1840)
Ojá Coñúrr (Painted Rock) was the native Indian name for the
location of the final mission to be established in both Baja
and Alta California. Dominican Padre Félix Caballero named
this new mission in honor of Mexico’s patron saint,
Guadalupe. The founding date has been given as June 25,
1834. The mission is sometimes called “Guadalupe del Norte”
to differentiate it from the Jesuit Mission Guadalupe (1720-
1795) in southern Baja California.
Padre Caballero arrived in northern Baja California in late
1814. The records show he performed a burial service at
Mission San Vicente on December 15 of that year. In May
1815, Caballero was assigned to Mission San Miguel to
replace Padre Tomás Ahumada, who had been the resident
missionary there since 1809. Caballero was one of just five
missionaries in northern Baja California that year.
In 1819, two more Dominicans arrived in Baja California and
Felix Caballero was placed in charge of Mission Santa Catalina
from 1819 to 1822. Major events transpired in 1822 for the
people of Baja California. They learned that Spain had lost
Mexico after eleven years of war and they were to pledge
their allegiance to the new Mexican Empire. Also, in 1822,
Chilean ships and soldiers, led by English Admiral Thomas
Cochrane, attacked San José del Cabo, Todos Santos, and
Loreto in an attempted invasion.
Mexico’s new emperor, Agustín de Iturbide, was soon
banished by General Santa Anna, and the young country
became a republic. The California missions would continue to
operate without any government assistance, as they had
done for several years during the war. The few remaining
mission padres had to survive on what they could raise or
from trading goods with foreigners. Padre Caballero was able
to succeed at Mission El Descanso, which he re-founded in
1830. Some potentially rich farmlands were just southeast in
a valley called San Marcos. Caballero was anxious to develop
the valley. Chief Jatiñil, who helped Caballero build the new
church at El Descanso, also helped him construct this new
mission. Jatiñil came from Nejí, in the mountains, twenty-five
miles northeast.
Guadalupe, like the new church at El Descanso, was a
personal project of Caballero. The Spanish mission program
was over, and while Mexico ordered that the missions be
secularized in 1833, the law was rescinded for the California
missions in 1835. They could continue to operate and serve
the Indians until each mission was abandoned or the priest
of that mission died.
According to the research of Rev. Albert Nieser, O.P.,
Caballero built the mission for newly arriving mainland
settlers, not the Indians. Chief Jatiñil provided help for
Caballero every year with harvesting crops as well as
constructing Caballero’s mission buildings. Jatiñil also helped
Caballero in fighting other Indian tribes that attacked Mission
Santa Catalina. Jatiñil’s father had told him that the land
would belong to the gente de razon or “people of reason”
(whites and mixed bloods), and the chief had accepted this
reality.
The Guadalupe mission church had two altars and a choir loft.
The mission compound had shops and a residence for the
priest. Caballero made Guadalupe the administrative center
of the northern peninsula missions. The mission sat on a
small mesa overlooking the valley from near the center-west
side. Two miles of irrigation canals were constructed down
both sides of the valley. One six-acre plot, just north of the
mission, was where vegetables and fruit were raised. Cattle
seemed to be the chief commodity with nearly 4,915 head
reported in 1840, the largest of any Dominican mission. A
letter to Caballero on May 29 of that year from Don Juan de
Jesús Ozio, however, claims the count was only 1,915.
In 1836, some 400 Yuma Indians attacked Guadalupe, but the
garrison of soldiers stationed there were able to save the
mission. More attacks came until the final one by Caballero’s
own supporter, Chief Jatiñil. He revolted against Caballero
because the priest continued to force baptism of his tribe and
tried to make them live at the mission. An attack in October
1839 was reported to have sacked the mission, but an
eyewitness to the attack gave the date as February 1840,
as recorded by Manuel Clemente Rojo. Jatiñil’s goal was to kill
Padre Caballero, but the padre was able to persuade María
Gracia, an Indian woman, to hide him in the mission’s choir
loft. Caballero escaped death and left northern Baja
California for Mission San Ignacio in the southern half of the
peninsula. There he began to acquire property and
attempted to have his Guadalupe mission cattle delivered to
him.
On the morning of August 3, 1840, at Mission San Ignacio,
Caballero said Mass and drank his daily cup of chocolate.
Sharp stomach pains hit him, as though he had been
poisoned. Felix Caballero died a few hours later. The
extensive property of Caballero would cause government
officials in Baja California to frown on the Dominicans who
remained. The missions were in decline, the Indians were few
in number, and the mission churches often continued to
serve the newly arriving mainlanders. Dominicans were
replaced by parish priests. The last operating California
mission to close was Santo Tomás in 1849. The last two
Dominicans left Baja California from La Paz in 1855. Catholic
parish priests had been replacing the Dominican missionaries
at several of the old missions during those final years.
By 1929 the adobe walls of Mission Guadalupe were already
destroyed by treasure hunters, but some of the wall’s stone
foundation was present and measured sixty yards on one
angle and thirty yards on the other. Pieces of red floor tiles
were inside the angle. It was reported that broad steps led
down the slope from the mission to two cement water tanks
fed by a spring.
In recent years, the mission site has been developed as a
historical park and includes a museum. It is located in
Francisco Zarco (the government’s official name for the town
of Guadalupe). Take the paved side road going into town
from the gas station on Highway Three. In about a mile, turn
left at the cross street (where the road ahead becomes
divided). The mission and museum are overlooking the river
valley.
Dominican Missionaries recorded at Guadalupe (del Norte):
Félix Caballero 1834-1840