073: Presidios and Soldados in California Part 1 | Author Michael Hardwick

In this episode, I delve into the often overlooked history of the Spanish Presidios in California with expert Michael Hardwick, author of Spanish Arms and Armaments of the Presidios in California. 

Michael shares his extensive research on Spanish military fortifications during the colonial period. We discuss the arms, armaments, and strategies of these garrisons, their role in supporting the missions, and their adaptation to coastal defenses. 

Michael also shares personal anecdotes from his years of archaeological work at Presidio sites and his exploration of historical records, providing a fascinating glimpse into California's early military history.

00:00 Introduction to Spanish Presence in California
00:36 Meet Michael Hardwick: Expert on Presidios
03:17 Michael's Background and Work on the Presidio Project
04:22 The Historical Significance of Presidios
07:55 Uncovering the Foundations and Artifacts
16:08 The Evolution and Role of Presidios
22:06 The Armament and Defense Strategies
31:14 The Legacy of Spanish Artillery
40:26 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Purchase Spanish Arms and Armaments of the Presidios in California
or email Michael: mrhardwick@icloud.com
Michael's Book on Mission La Purísima

Watch on YouTube

Transcript

Damian Bacich's video recording: 0:00

When we read or hear about the Spanish presence in California and in the whole Southwest, for that matter, the main focus tends to be on the missions, which were a very, uh, important religious and cultural, uh, institution. But at the time. That the missions were being established. The other arm of that Spanish presence

0:25

was the

Damian Bacich's video recording: 0:26

Presidios, the Presidios, which were the military presence on the frontier of the Spanish Empire. Today I'm talking with someone who is a real expert on Presidios and a real expert on the Spanish history of California. his name is Michael Hardwick and he just wrote a book called Spanish Arms and Armaments of the Presidios in California. Michael, graduated with a degree in anthropology from the University of California in Santa Barbara and worked on archeology at the Presidio of Santa Barbara, which eventually become, became the state historic park of El Presidio. He worked also at Laima as a ranger and he established the archive there. And for many years he, helped interpret and preserve Laima mission on top of it, he's a veteran of the US Navy, and so he has a very firsthand knowledge of military munitions and armaments and strategy. And so

1:39

I think he's an

Damian Bacich's video recording: 1:40

excellent person to talk to about this. As a final note of an interesting note, he founded a reenactment group, very unique one, which is called Los SDOs Re Pre Santa Barbara, which was a reenactment group dedicated to, reenacting Spanish military costumes and armaments, et cetera in California. And it started back in 1990. So Mike's gonna talk about writing

2:07

this book the

Damian Bacich's video recording: 2:08

Discoveries he made along the way,

2:10

and he's gonna

Damian Bacich's video recording: 2:10

introduce us to a lot of little known facts about California's early military history. I think you're really gonna like it. Um, Just one note, if you're listening to this and not watching it, Mike refers to images from a presentation he made. So if you wanna see the images, you should make sure and check it out on YouTube. Of course, he describes what's going on in those images, so if you're just following this on purely audio format, that's fine. But if you wanna see the pictures. Uh, I would go and watch it on YouTube and purchase the book because all of the pictures are also in his book. So, for more information about that, listen, and I've included all the information about how to get the book and how to contact and know more about Mike in the notes to this episode. So here's my interview with Michael Hardwick.

Damian Bacich: 3:17

Well, thank you for agreeing to come on the podcast. As I was mentioning to you before, and I'm really looking forward to hearing about the Presidios, the Presidio soldiers, what they've meant for our history here in the West. my, uh, personal experience with Presidios was going to visit my, uh, grandparents, you know, my grandmother in San Francisco and my Uncle George, God rest his soul. He used to take us, he was a retired naval officer, had served in World War ii, and so he used to take us to lunch at the officer's club at the Presidio in San Francisco.

Michael Harwick: 3:53

Been there, done.

Damian Bacich: 3:55

yeah. And he used to play golf there, too. And so that was, I didn't know it had anything to do with Spain or our, our particular history here in California. It wasn't until later that I learned that. So I'm. I'm grateful, Mike, that you've, you've written this book and, uh, that you're willing to come talk about it and, and give us some background on, on Presidios and the soldiers that occupied them and their place in California.

Michael Harwick: 4:22

Well, yes, I've, uh, I've been involved with the Presidio Project. Uh. Uh, since its inception really, it started in 1965 and we were digging in Santa Barbara here in a parking lot. And, um, I got started on that and then I, I was in the, uh, I was in the Navy at the time and I got, I got shipped to Vietnam, so I spent some time over there on a, on a cruiser. Um, and, uh, then I came back to Santa Barbara in 1969 and, uh, UCSB and, and got into anthropology and history, and then again, got affiliated with the Presidio. So my, uh, research and, uh, association with that project here in Santa Barbara, which is. El Presidio State Historic Park, which is, uh, that's what it is now. Uh, but when it started it was just a, a backyard parking lot, you know, and we were trying to find the foundations and whatever for it. So unfortunately, I got hooked and my family got hooked. And, uh, I spent 50, 60 years of my life researching and reenacting, you know, doing all that sort of thing that went along with it and, um, um, and couldn't get away from it, and still stuck in it. And my whole library is Spanish Colonial history. Pretty much. I can give you a little bit of a background on who I am and what I've done, uh, and then we could lead into the book.

Damian Bacich: 5:52

Yeah. that would be great. In fact, we, um, we had, uh, Jerry Jackman on a couple of times and his, uh, overviews of his history at the San, at the Santa Barbara Presidio were really enlightening and really helpful. But, uh, I'm really interested to hear what you have to say about Santa Barbara and all the other Presidio. So yeah, tell us a little bit about your

Michael Harwick: 6:15

Well, Jerry and I are, are, are joined at the hip. If you can say that. Um, he was, uh, the executive director of the Presidio when I was there, and we worked hand in hand and are to this day, brothers in arms, uh, sort of in Valli Thoses from the, from the Presidio Project. Um, but, uh, this is a little bit from a talk that was given in 2015 by him, uh, at the Presidio. And he starts off by saying, let's begin with his service in the US Navy during the Vietnam War. That's me, uh, where he sat off shore for six months or so on the Admiral Ship Light Cruiser, USS, Oklahoma City flagship of Seventh Fleet. Mike worked in communication ship, uh, equipment. I. Uh, the Admiral receiving received like 7,000 messages a day. He said, he says that duty made a strong impression on him, uh, as a young man for many reasons, but for our purposes, uh, is experiencing those huge ship canon. Firing at targets on shore in Vietnam was something he never forgot, and that's probably true. I think I got some gun cotton in my veins. Anyway, it piqued his interest in arms and armament and, and interest that carried over into his internet. Interest in, uh, Spanish period can, in fact, it is more than an interest. It is a passion. He has produced, uh, a several hundred page manuscript on the arms and armaments of the Santa Barbara Presidio. Now, this was in 2015. Uh, what what happened was as we were uncovering the foundations, uh, we had gone to the, one of our, uh, uh, individuals that work with us. Dick Whitehead, uh, had gone to the Bancroft Library and acquired just about everything that was known on the Presidio, most of it in Spanish. And he had copies of it made and brought it to the Presidio, and then had it, most of it translated, and this later became a book, uh, which he wrote called Citadel on the Channel. Uh, and it pretty much, uh, described the history of the Presidio. And out of this also came a map. Written by pa, drawn by Pedro Fajas, uh, at the time of the Presidio. So we had a foundation map of what the Presidio was supposed to be. So Dick used to be a surveyor when he was in the Army, and he was also a Public works director at the county of Santa Barbara retired. So he started chasing foundations and uh, we began to find that the foundations were still there Oh. Uh, around several properties. So that became the impetus for d sort of chasing the foundations and ultimately restoring the Presidio. Um, well the interesting thing about all that was, um, um, I got interested in, uh. The records that he had acquired from the Bancroft Library. And, um, he went through them and wrote a nice history of the Presidio, but he, he was, he pretty much ignored annual inventories that were taken. It was a garrison, you know, military garrison. And so they were inspected every year and they come down and wanted to know the status of the armaments and what was in the, in the magazines and that kind of stuff. And so there were all these reports, annual reports of what was at the Presidio. So I just decided I was gonna start, I'm an anthropologist, so for me, I wanted to get. Down to what, what made that operation function, you know, Garrison, what makes it function are arms, you know, and armament supplies to, to, to keep all that going. So I got in there and started putting this stuff together and I came up with a pretty interesting chronology of, uh, what was there at various times. And, uh, it was a manuscript for a lot of years and it just recently until 2025, uh, became an actual book, arms and Arm of the City of California. But just to go on a little bit with my history, um, one of the things that happened as a result of, um, um, the Mexican War in 1845, um, the, a lot of these Spanish. Uh, pieces of artillery disappeared from California and they disappeared because many of them were captured as trophies of war and sent back to the East Coast, and they ultimately wound up at, uh, Annapolis, the Naval Academy. Um, so in 2012, uh, um, Jerry and I went back to Annapolis to photograph, um, these cannons and find out what was there prior to that I had, uh, um, discovered in, uh, 1783. Well, one of the things about this, uh, Presidio that we had, uh, found the map of, there were two gun bastions on opposite ends of the corner of each of the, of the bas, of the bastion. And, um, so we suspected that, uh, these were there for cannon. But, uh, nobody really knew what, uh, we suspected they were just, I mean, uh, light pieces of artillery or whatever. Um, so I got intrigued with this, you know, and then I found a inventory in these records, these Bancroft records, that indicated that in 1782 there were, uh, two bronze, uh, four pounder Cannon at the Presidio that had been ordered in. This was standard equipment for Presidios of a, of a garrison of that type. And, um, so I, uh, I saw in the inventory where they said they were bronze and they were four pounders, and they weighed 760 pounds a piece. I thought, those are not small cannon. Well, indeed, they were, they were, they were considered light artillery during the time, and they were called, uh, Spanish terminology was canons, dea. You know, field cannons, and this was what was standard issue for the presidios of the time, of the time. But of course, all these things were missing, so I didn't really know, you know, uh, what that was. But I did have a weight and I had studied these cannons a little bit, and I noticed, you know, these cannons all have markings on them. And I'm intrigued with these bronze Spanish cannons, because to me they're cul. Uh, they're, they're, they're pieces of sculpture, you know, they've got, they've got, and, you know, engravings on them. They've got the King's Crest is on the breach, you know, uh, the dates and all that sort of thing. And then if you look at the ions, you can actually, if you interpret the Spanish, uh, symbols of weight, you can get the weight off the ion of the cannon. So I had all that.

Damian Bacich: 13:48

Remind us what's aronian.

Michael Harwick: 13:50

Okay, well, a cannon, uh, of that time period, uh, is, uh, a long bronze tube, right? Um, the ian ions are the pin pivots that stick out from the side. You know, one side of of that is, is of, of that trion is marked on it. What, what the, what the gun metal composition is. They, they might say something like, uh, bro de Peru, Mexico, or something, you know, reuse bronze. And then the other side is, is got markings on it. Scratches, which say like something like pesa P for P for pesa, which means weight. And, um, so, uh, and, and the, the, the weights are like, in Libre, a Libre is roughly equivalent to an English pound. A robust, a robot is like 25 pounds. And then, uh, sort of, so they'll, they would have like p you know, um, seven, uh, seven L and then so many, so many at sign a robust, you know, and that sort of thing. So you could interpret that and get, and get the weight of the gun. So anyway, I was intrigued, we were intrigued with the fact that what happened to the Spanish artillery?'cause if you look at, for, if you look for cannons in California from the Spanish period, you know, there's only a few of'em left. Most of them are up at like San Francisco and then there's one, there's a couple of them down in San Diego, and, uh, that's about it. You know, so what happened to the rest of'em? Well, they got, a lot of'em got captured and, and transferred east and the one that finally, they wound up at the Naval Academy. So we went there in 2012 and, um, and, and, and, and found these things and lo and behold, and I'll get to this, I wish I could show my, I wish I could square, show my, share my screen here. I I've got pictures of this stuff. There we are.

Damian Bacich: 16:02

Okay.

Michael Harwick: 16:03

Uh, there you go. That's good.

Damian Bacich: 16:08

Okay.

Michael Harwick: 16:09

Well, this gets us into Presidios a little bit.

Damian Bacich: 16:11

Hmm.

Michael Harwick: 16:12

Uh, you can, you can page ahead as we go. Right.

Damian Bacich: 16:15

Yes.

Michael Harwick: 16:16

Okay, well we start off with some of these bullets here. Uh, Presidio, lemme give you a little background of Presidios. Uh, they, they started in New Spain. They go back to the 16th century in, uh, in New Spain. Uh, and that's Mexico. And, uh, within two centuries there was a line of Presidio, Spanish Presidios that existed in the American Southwest all the way from Texas to California. And this is, as the Spanish were moving up in, uh, northern Mexico. Um, they, they encountered all these native peoples, uh, some of which were pretty hostile. So they evolved this whole, uh, frontier, uh, method of, uh, of controlling and, and managing these, uh, these people. So that was along the whole Southwest. So, uh, when it came time to. Um, colonized California from in 1769, they used the same basic concept. You know, they'd, they'd bring in the presidios and the, uh, the garrisons to support the, uh, colonization effort and then support also the foundation of the missions.

Damian Bacich: 17:27

Can I ask you a

Michael Harwick: 17:27

So, yeah.

Damian Bacich: 17:29

Is, uh, was the Presidio only used in the northern part of New Spain or were there presidios in other, uh, territories in the Spanish Empire? In the, in the Americas? Or is this peculiar to, to our region?

Michael Harwick: 17:45

Uh, the actual Presidio itself, uh, actually, I I if you really wanna say where it began, it began in, in, in, uh, north Africa, you know, when the Spanish were fighting the Moores and whatever, they built these garrisons, which were like presidios, and they were like, um, enclaves of Christianization and. Uh, a sea of, uh, Muslim activity kind of thing. So it's a very ancient kind of concept, and it, it can, a lot of people like to say, oh, Presidio comes from the Latin Presidium, which, you know, means a garrison and Presidio and, and later Mexican, um, language in implies a prison, you know, uh, but in the 18th century and before it wasn't that it was a garrison, uh, of, of, of troops that were organized in a military fashion. And originally they, they sort of happened, um, haphazardly and eventually grew over two, two centuries into a sort of a military organization of indigenous people who were. You know, and command of horses and, uh, were, were mestizos that lived on the frontier, rugged, uh, troops. And they were adapted to that lifestyle and they were supported then, uh, as, as a form of military in the new world by the Spanish government.

Damian Bacich: 19:20

I see.

Michael Harwick: 19:21

so from the years, this is, we're looking at the la the latter evolution of the Presidio concept and the, probably the later, the la the last edition was the little Spanish, uh, uh, form of California when they, when they settled California in 1769. This was. Uh, coastal settlement, and they, uh, they were trying, the Spanish, were trying to get control of this area all the way up because the Russians were coming down from the north and, uh, they were one to check that, uh, advance and claim the territory for Spain. So they used the Presidios as a, as a method of doing that. Uh, so from 1769 to 1782, there were four Spanish Presidios in, in, in Alta California. California was broken up into Alta, uh, a higher area, and, and Baja, the lower area. And the first Presidio was in Loreto, uh, of Baja, California. So, um, so from 1769 to 80 82, we have four Presidios in California. Um, you know, one was, uh, San Diego was the first. Uh, it, because that's where they started. Uh, and it be, it formally became a Presidio in 1773, but it was actually established in 69. Uh, then Monterey was 1770 later that became the, the, the capital ultimately of Alta California. San Francisco happened in 76 with, uh, with Anza who came through. And, uh, uh, one of his, uh, uh, members founded that Presidio. And then probably the last Presidio ever founded by the Spanish in the southwest was the Santa Harbor Presidio in 1782.

Damian Bacich: 21:21

Now what about Sonoma? Because I know they call it a Presidio, but it was more of a a, a small garrison.

Michael Harwick: 21:28

right. It was under Vallejo. That happened later. I don't, you could probably technically be called, uh. Presidio, but it was, um, more during the Mexican period, I think that we look at that area. So Valerio, uh, Vallejo had a garrison up there and, um, uh, yeah, I think you could probably call it, call it a Presidio, but it wasn't, I don't think it was really founded during the Mexican period, uh, Spanish period. It came during the Mexican period.

Damian Bacich: 22:01

right.

Michael Harwick: 22:03

So what were these garrisons like? Um, they supported mounted, mounted soldier companies of leather jacketed soldiers known as Soldado Deta. And these guys were, as I said, unique. Um, and they ultimately got their own royal regulations, which specified the arms and armament that the soldiers of these garrisons would, would have. And we go to the next slide. You can see, um, the line of presidios that was established across the southwest here, and you can see it goes all the way across. Uh, the idea being that if one Presidio got in trouble, another one could come and reinforce it. So they ultimately got this line going and, uh, in the 1770s they moved. Uh, they were, this was such a. Diverse area that needed control, that they formed a cia, general Inal in a place called a re space Sonora. And he, he was staffed, that was staffed by a, um, you know, a common, a common common commandant general, uh, a picked by the Spanish king. And he had almost the same powers as a Viceroy. So his, how, his, his purpose in that administrative center, the purpose of that was to, you know, control these presidio and try to maintain, you know, some level of control on that south, on that frontier, that northern frontier.

Damian Bacich: 23:43

Now I notice that there's, te and fronts are, are very close to one another. And this is just a particular question I have about the ans. Expedition. I think some of the, some of the members, some of the settlers were from RAs and some were from Tete. Were they, was he gathering people from different presidios?

Michael Harwick: 24:07

right. Yeah. He had, he had gotten, uh, they wanted to try to get a land route, uh, across to California. And, uh, so he was, uh, empowered by the Viceroy Viceroy, uh, Buca, uh, Belli, I believe it was to try to try to break through and see if he can get, if he could get a supply, uh, line going from this area, from that area, uh, through Yuma and ultimately to California. Because everything, all the supplies that were going up to California were going by sea, and it was very expensive to, to keep all that going. So Anzo was, was, uh, empowered to, to do that and to break trail for that.

Damian Bacich: 24:56

Gotcha.

Michael Harwick: 24:57

Right. We go to the next one. Well, here's our Sodo Dera. This is what they look like. Uh, they manned the presidios of the, of the frontier of New Spain, and they were named for their, for their Cora coats of, uh, leather jackets. You can see they, uh, they're on horseback. They have muskets and lances and, uh, shields, which they called a DGA and that sort of thing. Uh, we go on the next one. Um, the, the two left, uh, pictures of a bronze statue and, uh, um. Arizona in, uh, Tucson from the museum there. It's a very, very well done. You can see the equipment that that soldier carries. He's got his aga and his saddle and his his pistol and cartridge box. And, um, um, so they, they were pretty real. They pretty heavily armed. They had a lance, a shield, two pistols, a shortened musket shirt, short sword cartridge box, and each soldier had a mule and six horse horses that had to support him. So, you know, this guy just, just to himself, to to arm one soldier took quite a bit.

Damian Bacich: 26:25

Now were the soldiers, if they have a mule and six horses, are they responsible for taking care of those animals themselves or were there, uh, staff at the, uh, at the Presidio who were in charge of, of taking care of them?

Michael Harwick: 26:43

presidios that, that's the point we're gonna get at Presidios are the garrisons. And so they typically, they would have the horse herds that supported the soldiers. So they had livestock that were outside of the presidios that they maintained, and they, they kept horses there at the Presidio, at the ready in case they needed them, that sort of thing. So this is the substance of, you know, the inventories that I got into. Uh, when you consider the fact that the equipment, livestock powder, and shot. Light artillery. These were all supplied and inventoried on inventoried under royal regulations for each Presidio. And, uh, interestingly enough, th those magazine stores included fireworks, which you wouldn't think was a big thing, but they, they used the fireworks for, you know, uh, festivals and that sort of thing. And you consider the fact that presidial companies were 35 to 60 men. Now you start multiplying that by pistols, swords, lance blades, you know, powder shot, all that. You know, they had to keep all that in, in, in supply there at the Presidio to, to keep these soldiers, uh, you know, equipped. That's what I got into later.

Damian Bacich: 28:02

Can I ask you a question? I might be getting ahead of myself, but in terms of their armament, you know, you mentioned that they carry a, a musket sword, uh, cartridge box. Well, and two pistols. I noticed in, in, in some of the material, the book that you said that the lance was their preferred weapon. Why is that?

Michael Harwick: 28:27

Well, most of these soldiers were mestizos and, uh, uh, virtually cowboys. I mean, they were proficient with the use of the horse and the lance, you know, um, relatively, they got very proficient at using a lance, a mounted lance. So there's a lot to using one of those things. And, uh, uh, that's pretty, pretty from the standpoint of, uh, a formidable foe on the frontier. Uh. First of all, if you're on a horse, second of all, if you've got some, if you've got a a lance and you can use it and you've got a shield, you can pretty much, um, you know, hold your own against a lot of the Indians. And, and you can also, you wear that leather jacket, flack jacket, and you can, you can get rid of you, you can stave off some of the arrows, especially with the aga that they might shoot at you. So these were, let's say, they were, at least they were, they were some of the things that these guys were really good at using. And then you add the, the, the firearms, uh, there's a little more technical involvement there. Uh, they had to get proficient at using'em, had to have the powder and shot, you know, available. Um, you know, had to, had to maintain these things'cause they broke, keep them up and that sort of thing.

Damian Bacich: 29:58

And weren't, they weren't the Californias, for example, using Lance into the 1840s at the Battle of San Pasqua, for example. They were, they were still very good with them.

Michael Harwick: 30:10

Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I've actually, uh, when I was reenacting this, I was, I built, I got my own lance and I was trying to figure out how to use it and, uh, mount it. I always wanted to try it on a horse, but you gotta be very careful when you're using one of those things because, uh, you can, you can flip yourself off the horse real easy if you're not, if you're not delved at the way you handle the, the lance. And they got to where they could, they could twirl'em. And bring them around in an attack position with the lance over the top of the arm. So if it impaled something and you had to release it, you know, you could let go and it would, it, it wouldn't, it wouldn't take you off the horse, you know, that sort of thing. So they were very good at using these things. In fact, they called them lancers of the king.

Damian Bacich: 31:02

There you go.

Michael Harwick: 31:08

So we go to the next slide there. Uh, okay, now I mentioned this earlier about the cannon, uh, and when we went to the Naval Academy, lo and behold, in front of the administrators, three star Admiral Administrators, uh, house at the academy were two. Light pieces of artillery bronze cannons that exactly matched what I had seen in the inventory at the Presidio of San Santa Barbara, uh, 1782, and I don't know if you can see this, but there is the, one of the ions upper, the second photograph top,

Damian Bacich: 31:57

Yeah, I can see it.

Michael Harwick: 31:59

yeah, it says seven Q 68, A seven Quintal, 768 pounds. So that's, that was the clue. I, I, I knew that by the measurements of the, of the, of Canon front, um, that I was a four pounder, uh, the weight exactly matched what was on the inventory. The bronze plate on the back says, captured from the Mexicans in California, 1845. And then the, the, the clincher here, the, uh, the cassbell in the back, written across there says who the gun founder was. Josef Bonno, bar Barola and Barcelona. Uh, uh, 1765. So these cannons were made in Barcelona, cast designed by Barola, the gun gun designer. And they came from bar, the Barcelona, uh, Royal Foundry in 1765. And in my book I talk about the Barcelona. Gun foundry and they, they, uh, specialized in light artillery for the, for the, uh, for the colonies. So these guns were the, this was the gun. Not, probably not the gun, but the type of gun that was at my, our Presidio in Santa Barbara. And indeed most of the presidios because this was standard issue for garrison's of that type. So there you, there you see it as a four pound cannon light artillery of the time and, uh, matches the 1782 inventory.

Damian Bacich: 33:54

There it is.

Michael Harwick: 33:55

There it is. So this, this was like a first being able to, um, identify what, what canon was there.

Damian Bacich: 34:04

And these are on display in the open it seems, from the photo.

Michael Harwick: 34:08

Yeah,

Damian Bacich: 34:09

yeah. So you didn't have to dig back behind some building somewhere.

Michael Harwick: 34:13

Yeah. And when you wander around, well, they're right in front of the, you know, the admiral's house that runs the academy. You know, there's two of them there. They have a name on the gun each, but they, the thing that they don't have is they don't have the king cipher on the, on the breach. So that was that. Let's go to the next one. So you get an idea of what the presidios were at the 17, early 17 hundreds. They were there as garrison's and they were mostly interested in, uh, being able to preserve themselves from uprisings and supporting the foundations of the missions and whatever. And so California was divided up into four military districts, and each one of these military districts had a presidio and a garrison. They had, uh, soldiers were dispatched from the Presidio to establish missions. And indeed, all the missions, each mission had what they called an olta, uh, detached from the, from the Presidio. They would live at the mission and protect the, the friars and, uh, sort of keep the peace, you know, uh, during the time that missions were being founded and even after. So that was the, that was the main goal initially, that after 1790, the emphasis became, uh, that of sea defense at the Presidios because, um, you know, more ships were plying the coast and even pirates, uh, were off the coast. So it became necessary to build, uh, to provide coastal defense. And this is where we get into, uh, construction of what they call Castillos or. You know, um, coastal defense, uh, uh, uh, constructions now, there were basically, go ahead.

Damian Bacich: 36:21

can we just jump back for one second? How long was a typical enlistment or contract for a Presidio soldier, or Yeah. How many years did he normally serve?

Michael Harwick: 36:32

hard to say, but I think, um, many of them actually did that. As, you know, they were, they actually retired doing that, you know, being soldiers. So it became like a, a profession for them. I mean, you know, when you think about being on the frontier, if you're in the army and supplied by for food and munitions and stuff, and your family is there and you're living, um, that's, that's a job. You know, that's a way to subsist. So a lot of those soldiers were, became career soldiers. Had families and then eventually, you know, got ranches and, and that sort of thing.

Damian Bacich: 37:15

Right. Okay.

Michael Harwick: 37:18

So anyway, these royal engineers, after 1790 started putting in, uh, garrisons on the coast. Problem is you, you, you can't, uh, fend off shipping with light artillery four pound cannon. You need, you need heavier ordinance for that. Well, unfortunately, California was way out in the, in the boondocks and trying to get pieces, heavy pieces of artillery across the isus from Spain into California was almost impossible. Um, so what they did is they went down to Peru and they liberated all these ancient, uh, Elizabeth and Cannon that were down there. I. Brought'em up to, brought'em up for coastal defense. And the remnant of that is, you can see at the San Francisco Presidio, all of those cannons date from about 1600 and something. They were all cast in Peru, and they're roughly eight pounders. Um, the other thing that happened when they brought these cannons up, these are 16, uh, cannons minted and, and manufactured in the 16 hundreds. The boar sizes were different than the 18th century cannons, which had standardized. So now you had a problem of cannon balls. Where are you gonna get'em? Because you're not, you're not able to cast iron on the, on the, you know, on the West coast. Uh, there weren't the, weren't the foundries for that, but they did. And were able to cast copper. It bel it melts at a lower temperature. So now a lot of these cannon balls that you're gonna find. Are made outta copper to fit these new cannons or these old cannons. So, uh, that's what was fired out of those things. So these guns were at the Presidio and built, interestingly enough, cannons just like this, and with the same dates minted in Peru are at the, at the, at the, uh, uh, Naval Academy in Washington or Annapolis. And you can see the same guns, the same Peruvian cam, you know, Canon and stuff like that. Even canon that were, um, uh, captured in Monterey. Uh, a couple of them with the names that were on the guns there at the Naval Academy.

Damian Bacich: 39:43

Ah.

Michael Harwick: 39:44

So these, if you take another, my book describes each one of these guns at the San Francisco Presidio, and they all have their interesting history of, of, of who the, you know, what is on the breach, who manufactured them, uh, the weights or scribbled kind of in a funny way on the, on the back of the cannon. So there's a history there too. These are beautiful pieces. And the ones that, the ones that are at the Naval Academy are in not as good a condition because the weather back there is, is eating away at all the inscriptions.

Damian Bacich: 40:19

Oh, what a shame.

Michael Harwick: 40:21

yeah. But these at, uh, San Francisco are in much better condition. So were these casillos ever used? Um, there were two, two battles, uh, sea battles with foreign shipping. Uh, one of them was at Monterey when the pirate bouchard attacked. He sacked Monterey, held it for six days and burned it, and then came down the coast and attacked, uh, FUO here in the Santa Barbara area. And then also, uh, the, uh, the, the, the Castillo in San Diego fired on a, uh, American ship that had, uh, uh, illegally come into the uh, area. So those are the two. But the big thing you were doing with those big guns is, you know, you're, you're bringing them out, you'd lay em out and foreign shipping would come and they'd see you had these cannons and they'd report it. So it was more show and go than, than anything else.'cause it got very, very hard to build these castillos and they didn't last very long.

Damian Bacich: 41:28

I was gonna ask you that I only, maybe a few years ago when I started researching the US Mexican War in California, that I found out about the Castillo San Joaquin, and I didn't realize there was one in San Diego as Well, What, what happened to these, You said that they didn't last long. How? How come they're not around anymore?

Michael Harwick: 41:51

these things required, uh, uh, you know, maintenance upkeep right on the ocean there. The one at San Diego is right there at Point Loma L. Point Loma, um, very, very close to the submarine base. Um, and, uh, it, it was laid out, uh, in such a way that, um, you know, it could, it could control the entrance to the harbor there. So, um, in fact, there is one cannon, actually two Cannon in San Diego, left. From that, uh, Fort Curos is is called, and, uh, one of them it's in the book. Uh, was El Capitan, an iron piece that was on, uh, downtown, uh, old town San Diego for a long time. And the other one is El Jupiter. That, uh, is a bronze cannon that's in the S Museum. Uh, and it was, it's been there for, for ages. The interesting thing about the, uh, Jupiter is that it was, uh, it was cast in the Philippines, um, and all the inscriptions on it, uh, allow you to, to kind of trace, trace it. And, uh, the Philippine foundry didn't get started until the 18th century, so it was one of the early guns that came out of that foundry. But if you wander around the San Francisco Presidio, you'll see a number of bronze 24 pounders that were captured during the Spanish American War and relocated, you know, to the garrison there at Presidio. And, and many of them are cast in Manila, and they're beautiful things. They weigh, they weigh an excess of 6,000 pounds.

Damian Bacich: 43:38

Wow.

Michael Harwick: 43:39

They're all over the place. You know, at the entrance you come in, there's a couple of, couple of cannons on the, on the gate there, down by Chrissy Field. I think there's a couple of'em.

Damian Bacich: 43:50

Yeah,

Michael Harwick: 43:51

Those, you know, those guns,

Damian Bacich: 43:52

That concludes part one of my interview with Michael Hardwick about Presidios and SDOs on the California frontier. Stay tuned for the next episode when we continue our conversation and talk about, among other things, pirates on the coast of California.