The Berryessa Family
Preface
There are many branches of the descendents of Nicholas Antonio Berryessa, all of which are very interesting. I have concentrated on his granddaughter, Clara Berryessa Beasley, since she is my direct ancestor. I would like to follow her life after she left Sonoma County but thought I should start with her "roots". My daughter, Kathryn (S. Howard) Crow, helped assemble my research for this publication. Roger Rhem, of the Yolo County Historical Society, had accumulated much information on the Berryessa family, which he generously made available to me.
Betty (Elizabeth Ann Kendall) Howard
Arriving in New Spain[1]
The father of Jose de Jesus
Berrelleza (name unknown at this time) and his wife (name unknown at this time)
came as a married couple to Sinaloa, New Spain in the 1680s, from the Basque
provinces of Spain.
Mexico started
civilizing Mexican land and its inhabitants with a handful of Jesuit priests and
a small military force. Starting in
1600, they made their way northward, valley by valley, until they got to the
River Sinaloa. It was there that
they had major confrontations with Yinckui Indians. It took many years before security was
achieved. The priests separated and
lived somewhat of a lonely life.
During the
1680s some 600 Spanish families came to live in the “north”. Approximately 1200 people found
themselves starting their own ranches with their livestock and their own capital
that they brought from Spain. As
Sinaloa became an important place for arrivals, many people lived there. We know that the father of Jose de Jesus
Berryessa and his wife came as a married couple[2]
from the Basque provinces of Spain.[3]
Jose
de Jesus (Cayetano) Berrelleza
Jose de
Jesus (Cayetano) Berrelleza was born in
1717, in Sinaloa. He married
Maria Nicolasa Micaela Leyba in 1735, in Sinaloa. They are the parents of Nicholas Antonio
Berrelleza and Ana Isabel Berrelleza.
Nicholas
Antonio Berrelleza
Nicholas
Antonio Berrelleza, b. 1761
Sinaloa; d. 19 October, 1804; buried Mission Santa Clara
Nicholas came north with
the 2nd De Anza Expedition in 1776 with his sister Ana Isabel (b. 1754, wed to
Juan Jose Peralta, brother of Maria Gertrudis Peralta, in San Francisco, April
7,1777. They had no children.)
The Spanish
government desired colonists to occupy the California territory, which was part
of Mexico, so in 1775 it commissioned army colonel Juan Bautista d Anza to form
and expedition party of immigrants to the California Territory to fulfill the
purpose. Anza set about recruiting
a party of approximately 200 men women and children, including quite a number of
enlisted soldiers who were provided as a means of protection for the
immigrants. Each of the recruits
was equipped with a set of clothing from head to foot and given pay and rations
for the journey. The party set out
for California on 23 October, 1775 and arrived in the San Francisco area on 27
March, 1776. Included in the party
were the two children of Juan (Cayetano ) and Maria
Leyba
The story has
come down through generations that these two young people were very unhappy over
the arrival of a stepmother in their home after their mother died. Seeing a chance to leave home, they
joined the Anza Expedition. At the time, Isabel was 21 and Nicholas was just 14.
They made the journey in the company of Gabriel Peralta family.[4]
Arriving
in Alta California
Nicholas
Antonio Berrelleza married Maria Gertrudis Peralta, 12 October, 1779 in Mission
Santa Clara.
Nicholas
Antonio Berrelleza, b. 1761,
la Villa Sinaloa; d. 19 October 1804, 20 October; 1804 buried at Mission Santa
Clara
Nicholas came north on the second De
Anza Expedition in 1776, at the age of 14 with his sister Ana Isabela, age
21. Ana Isabel, b. 1754, married
Juan Jose Peralta (brother of Maria Gertrudis Peralta) in 7 April 1777 and did
not have any children. Nicholas
enlisted in the San Francisco Company, 1 October, 1782. At the time of his death
he was a corporal.
Maria
Gertrudis Peralta, b. 1766 in
Presidio de Tubac, Sonora; d. 19 October, 1804 or 31 December, 1802; buried 1
January, 1803, Mission San Jose.
Gertrudis came with her parents,
Corporal Gabriel Antonio Peralta and Francisca Xavier Valenzuela from Presidio
of Tubac, Sonora, in the second De Anza Expedition of 1776.
The burial register of
Mission San Jose reveals that Father Gil y Taboda officiated on New Year’s Day,
1803, at the funeral of one of earliest pioneers...Gertrudis Peralta, who had
passed away at the prime of her life at the age of 36… As a 9 yr old child she
had left her native province of Sonora with her parents. At the age of 15, she became the bride
of her childhood sweetheart, Nicholas Berrelleza. It was Gertrudis’ brother, Luis Maria
Peralta, who in 1820 received the San Antonio Rancho from Governor Sola, as a
reward for his 40 years of military service in California. Today, on that famous
rancho, stand the cities of Oakland, Alameda and Berkeley.
The
Large concourse of Spanish settlers who assembled to pay their respects to the
beloved young matron at her funeral, rode again, in throngs, to the mission six
months later.
this time in gladness, to
attend the marriage of her
beautiful young daughter,
Maria de luz Berrelleza, to the dashing caballero, Joaquin Soto.[5]
Nicholas and Maria Gertrudis
had nine children:
1.
Maria Gabriela b. 26 November, 1780, Mission
Francisco Castro; d. 21 December, 1851; buried San Francisco de
Asis
2.
Maria de la Luz Ynez b. 21 January, 1783,
Mission Jose Joaquin Sate; bapt. 1 June, 1803, Mission Santa Clara, 1803; d.
1812; buried Mission Santa Clara
3.
Jose de los Reyes b. 6 January, 1785,
Mission Santa Clara; m. Maria Zacarias Bernal (daughter of original pobladores);
d. 28 June, 1846
Jose de los Reyes was one of the first victims of the war
of conquest. Fremont’s men killed
him 28 June, 1846, as he landed by boat at San Rafael on his way to Sonoma to
visit his son, the alcalde of Sonoma.
With him were twin sons of Francisco de Haro, Francisco and Ramon,
bearers of dispatches from Castro to his lieutenant Joaquin de la Torre.[6]
Details[7]
4.
Jose Nasario Antonio b. 28 July, 1787, Mission Santa Clara; m. Maria Antonia
Villela
5.
Nicolas Antonio
II, b. 12 June, 1787, Mission Santa Clara; bapt. 12 July, 1789, Mission Santa
Clara (Eventually he became a soldier de cuera of the Presidio of San
Francisco); m. Maria de (en) Gracia Padilla, 13 February, 1811, Mission Dolores;
Grantee of las Milpitas Rancho (160,000 acres) from the Spanish
Government
6.
Juan Jose, b. San Francisco de Asis
1792
7.
Ignacio Maria, Mission Santa Clara
1794-1794
8.
Juana Ignacia, b.1796-1796, Santa Clara
Mission
9.
Maria Antonia Trinidad, b.
1797
Nicholas m. 19 November,
1803, Maria Ignacio Amador; b. 1790 in San Francisco
Nicholas and Maria Ignacio
had one child:
1. Josofia Antonia Gregoria, b. 1805,
d.1840
Nasario Antonio
Berryessa
(child 4.)
Nasario (Jose) Antonio Berryessa married Maria De Jesus Antonia
Villela in 1806.
Nasario Antonio Berryessa, b. 28 July, 1787, Mission Santa Clara;
bapt. 29 July, 1787; m. Maria de Jesus Antonia Villela (age 13)
1806
He was a
corporal at the San Francisco Presidio from 1819-1824.[8]
In the 1830s, Nasario Antonio moved onto the land that was once a lush valley
and is now covered by water and known as Lake Berryessa. He brought with him 100 Indians who were
to work his cattle ranch. The land
was so rich that the Pomo Indians who had called this area home for thousands of
years had been able to live a life of ease due to the wide-ranging game and
natural vegetation.
As the white
man settled there, the Indians retreated.
For several years, Nasario Antonio ran herds of 5,000 cattle and 20,000
horses on this land and over the mountain into what is today Capay Valley. In later years James Clyman, an American
adventurer and trapper, stated his memories of Nasario’s valley and ranching
operation.
Crops were
grown under the care of the Indians, who protected them from roaming stock. The mountains were full of bear and
deer. The bear made trails over the
mountains that if followed made the trip to the Capay Valley possible for men
and cattle.
Meanwhile, two
of Nasario’s sons, Sexto (Sisto) Antonio and Jose de Jesus, were in the Mexican
army and stationed in San Francisco.
In 1838, at age 20, Sisto married Nicholasa Higuerra in Santa Clara. Jose married Nicholas’ twin, Maria
Anastasia Higuerra, the same year.
(In 1839)… the two couples moved up to their father’s
ranchero.
In 1842, (Sexto
and Jose de Jesus or) Nasario petitioned the governor (Micheltorena) for the
land grant, El Rancho de las Putas, in the name of his two sons (and for the
good of the family)[9]. (On November 3rd )… 1843 it
was official. The grant was 8
leagues or 35,515 acres.[10]
Maria
de Jesus Antonia Villela,
b. October 1793, Monterey Presidio: christened 6 October, 1793, Mission San
Carlos
Maria’s father, Marcos Villela, came in the
second De Anza Expedition and her mother was Viridiana Maria, neofite of San
Carlos Mission (Indian)[11]
Nasario and
Maria had sixteen children, many of whom died in infancy. Children 1-7 are boys:[12]
1
Hipolito Casiano b. & bapt. 7 August,
1807, Mission San Francisco de Asis; buried 18 August, 1807, Mission San
Francisco de Asis
2
Pedro y Pablo b. & bapt. 3 July, 1810,
San Francisco de Asis; d. 3 April, 1812; buried San Francisco de
Asis
3
Jose de Jesus b. 31 January, 1815, Pueblo de
San Jose; bapt. 2 February, 1815; m. Maria Anastasis Nicolasa Iguera, 7 January,
1838, Mission San Francisco de Solano
4
Guadalupe b.1816; m. Maria Delores Alviso,
30 November, 1837, Mission Santa Clara
Both
died in 1850 of cholera and are buried in Mission Santa
Clara.
5
Sixto Antonio, b. 28 March, 1818, San
Francisco Presidio; bapt. San Francisco de Asis; m. Maria Nicolasa Iguera
(widow), 10 August, 1838, Mission San Francisco de Solano; d. 23 September, 1847
They
lived in Putas, Napa County, the current location of Lake
Berryessa.
6
Feliz de Jesus b. 19 November, 1819, San
Francisco Presidio; bapt. 30 November, 1819, San Francisco de Asis; d.
1856
7
Jose Martin b. 11 November, 1821; bapt. 12
November, 1821
8
Clara Berryessa, b. 31 December, 1823, Mission Santa Clara; bapt. 1
January, 1824; m. 18 June, 1848, Mission San Francisco de
Asis
9
Ramon Juan, b.
26 December, 1826; bapt. 29 December, 1829, Mission Santa Clara; m.
Evangelista
10
Antonia Maria, b. 15 May, 1828, Mission
Santa Clara; d. October 1829
11
Maria Ynes, b.31 August
1829
12
Miguel Santiago, b. 29 July
1831
13
Maria Antonia, b. 1833
14
Nasario de Jesus (Nacario de Jesus), b. 27
July, 1835
15
Isidoro de Moso Antonio, b. 4 April, 1837[13]
16
Clara Berryessa
Photo taken on her 82nd birthday in
1905
(child 8.)
Clara Berryessa married Jesse Loyd Beasley, 18 June, 1848, Mission San Francisco
de Asis (Mission Dolores).
Clara Berryessa, b. 31 December, 1823, Mission Santa Clara; d.15
January 1915 Willows, California
The father of
her first two children (Polo - buried in Willow’s Cemetery, and Corsuth – died
at the age of 12) was Salvador Vallejo.
Polo Vallejo went with Clara and Jesse Beasley to Willows. Later in life,
Polo was robbed and murdered on his way home to Willows from a family owned bar
in Artois. Clara’s marriage to
Salvador, the brother of Mariano Vallejo, is yet to be verified. The unverified story is that
Mariano, married to Benicia Carillo, wanted Salvador to marry Benicia’s sister,
which he did.
Jesse Loyd Beasley, b. 9 January, 1814 Kentucky; d. 6
February, 1899 Willows, California
Jesse Beasley
was a rancher/explorer/merchant who probably came west from Pennsylvania
(Kentucky)with the Chiles-Walker Expedition, 1843.[14]
He was a member of the Sonoma Town Council in 1847. In company with Cooper 1848
in Sonoma County; and then had Sonoma Rancho in 1849. He lived with Clara at
Stonyford, Colusa County in 1871. It was called originally Indian Valley, later
called Stony Creek Valley and settled in 1850. Smithville, now called Stonyford, was
started in 1860s by John L. Smith.
In 1890 the name changed to Stonyford. Stony Creek Indians were friendly with
local settlers.
Clara and Jesse may have had up to seventeen children,
though this is likely hearsay.
Grave stones of Clara and Jesse
Beasley
Cemetery, Willows, Glen County,
California
Photo taken c.1995
According to Clara Berryessa's obituary in the
"Grizzly Bear", March 1915: Mrs. Clara Berryessa, a native of California, passed
away in Willows, California January 15th, at the age of 92. She is said to have
been the first caucasian girl born at the Mission Santa Clara.
(Child) John Beasley--------------- (wife) Gertrude
Prior
Their children
include Clara Emily, Kate, and John. Clara Emily married Edward Blaisdell
Kendall.
Clara Emily
Beasley
(Child) Clara Emily Beasley married Edward Blaisdell
Kendall
Clara Emily Beasley
Edward Blaisdell Kendall
Clara and
Edward had six children:
1. Edward Hope Kendall
2. Elizabeth Ann Kendall (Grandma Betty!)
3. Spencer Robert Kendall
4. Richard Prior Kendall
5. Mary Katherine Kendall
6. Emily Louisa Kendall
Letters written by Jesse Beasley copied from letters located in the California State Library Archive, Sacramento, California
Beasley, Jesse and
Company
Jesse Beasley, Jesse –
December 13, 1846 – Sonoma
To: Mr.
Davis
Dear sir: I wish you could do me the favor to send
me up to 50 lbs of almonds and wash basins and pitchers 2 pair and three sets of
tea cups and cigars and one puncheon of Brandy and I shall pay you the most of
the money on delivery. If you have
got any dress patterns send me up two pieces and one piece of blue Driel if you
please.
No more at present, but I remain yours
Jesse Beasley
Mr. Davis,
Mar. 24, 1847
Sonoma
Sir, Your launch arrived here on Wednesday with liquor – one hundred
pounds of sugar – I am going to send you 41 hides with the launch likewise the
barrel belonging to Mr. Brown and one barrel for yourself. I wish you to do me
the favor to save for me one barrel of the brandy as low as you can. I
understand that this is two or three vessels arrived at the Yerba Buena. I hope that the liquor will be lower
than it is now but if not buy me one barrel of French Brandy and one barrel of
wine if you can get it. Sir, the piece that you was speaking of that you have
will not suit me for pants. If there is
only almonds in the place send me up one barrel of them likewise some
raisins or currents or some good cigars if you can get them. Certainly there is
some of that kind of things there now as there is so many ships there if you
send the launch with the brandy we shall send you some more hides if you want
them. The hides that we sent you
are thirteen r each as we get them from the McMotters. No more at present but I remain
yours.
Beasley, J.L.
References
1.
California Colonization
– Frontier Settlement up to 1846 – F591 Y25 v. 21
2.
Fremont and
’49, Dullenbaugh, Samuel E415 –
8P4
3.
Vallejo, Son of
California, McKittrick, Myrtle –
308T R65
4.
Pioneer Register
Index
5.
History of
California, Bancroft, pg. 306 – vol.
21, Chiles Walker. Vol. 35,
Padre Viadez (priest at Mission Santa Clara)
6.
History of San
Jose, Hall
(Berryessa)
7.
History of San
Francisco, Elredge vol. I and II
The Beginnings of San Francisco pp. 291 – 306
8.
History of Santa
Clara County, Sawyer, Eugene
Taylor
9.
Saint Mary’s College,
microfilm – Brother Denis 1922 (researched by Barney
Langan)
10.
Los
Californios – a society in Willows,
California
11.
The Pony Express,
Stories of Pioneers and Old Trails
vol. XXXVI no. 5 no. 425 Sonora,
California, October 1969
12.
San Jose Mercury
News, Wednesday, April 4, 1990,
5B