The Presidio of Monterey (POM), located in Monterey, California, is an active US Army installation with historic ties to the Spanish colonial era. Currently, it is the home of the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center (DLI-FLC). It is the last and only presidio in California to have an active military installation.
The Spanish explorer Sebastián Vizcaíno visited, named and charted Monterey Bay (especially the southern end) in 1602. In his official report, Vizcaíno recommended the natural harbor he found as an appropriate site for a seaport, military fortification and colonization. It would be over 150 years, until news of Pacific Coast moves by Spain's European rivals brought the remote area back to the attention of the leaders of New Spain.
In 1768, José de Gálvez, special deputy (visitador) of King Carlos III in New Spain (Mexico), received this order: "Occupy and fortify San Diego and Monterey for God and the King of Spain." Gálvez organized a series of land and sea expeditions from the port of San Blas, today in the state of Nayarit, México, to establish a military post and Catholic mission in Monterey. Spain's rulers had long feared that other European powers would encroach from the north on American territories Spain claimed along the Pacific coast. Gálvez himself spread rumors of schemes by the British and Dutch rulers to add California to their own empires. Then, when a report arrived from the Spanish ambassador in Russia that Catherine the Great planned to establish settlements down the California coast towards Monterey, Gálvez—already planning a northward expansion of New Spain's dominion—trumpeted the threat from Russia. [1] King Carlos gave Gálvez the go-ahead. Spain moved to occupy regions along the Pacific coast of North America that its sailors and soldiers had only seen and claimed from previous maritime explorations.
From March through June 1769, Gaspar de Portolá, appointed "governor of the Californias" (Baja and Alta California), led an overland party—joined by Franciscan friar Junípero Serra—from Loreto to San Diego. Then in July, Portolá mustered a new party—including lieutenant Pedro Fages, cartographer Miguel Costansó, and friars Juan Crespí and Francisco Gómez—to trek north from San Diego to rediscover the port of Monterey by land. They reached Monterey Bay on 1 October, but failed to recognize it as the port described by Vizcaíno 167 years earlier [2] —and continued north, eventually reaching San Francisco Bay. On their return trek to San Diego, they planted two large crosses on the coast of Monterey, whose geographical identity they could not yet confirm. (see Timeline of the Portolá expedition).
In April 1770, Portolá gathered a new and smaller party for another overland journey from San Diego to Monterey. This party included Pedro Fages with twelve Catalan volunteers, seven leather-jacket soldiers, two muleteers, five Christian Indians from Baja California, and friar Juan Crespí. [3] They arrived at Monterey Bay on 24 May. That afternoon, Portolá and Crespí revisited the large wooden cross their party had planted five months earlier on a hill just south of Point Pinos near the northern tip of the Monterey peninsula. "This is the port of Monterey without the slightest doubt," wrote Crespí in his diary. [4]
Miguel Costansó selected the site of the presidio and drew the first plans and maps. Pedro Fages, left in command of the Monterey soldiers after Portolá sailed back to Mexico, imposed strict discipline on his soldiers to construct the presidio. He set the work they had to do in a certain time, harshly punishing soldiers caught resting or rolling a cigarette. Heavy rains punctuated the spring and winter of 1770–1771, but Fages permitted no let-up in the work. His soldiers had to trudge through mud to the forest to chop wood, then drag their mules out of the mud and head home. They had no chance to wash or mend their clothes during the six-day work week; Fages told them to do that on Sundays. This work regime lasted a year and a half, until complaints by the soldiers persuaded padre president Junípero Serra to intervene: Serra told Fages that, as a Christian, he had to observe the sabbath and let men rest on Sundays. In late June 1771, Fages wrote to viceroy Carlos de Croix in Mexico to inform him that the Monterey presidio had been built, sending along a simplified map. [5]
While Fages established El Presidio Real de San Carlos de Monterrey (the Royal Presidio of Saint Charles of Monterey), Junípero Serra founded Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo, with the original location occupying the present day (remaining) chapel Cathedral of San Carlos Borromeo.
Monterey became one of a series of presidios, or "royal forts," built by Spain in what is now the western United States. In 1792, the El Castillo de Monterey was established to protect the port and persido of Monterey. [6] Other California-based installations were founded in San Diego (El Presidio Real de San Diego) in 1769, in San Francisco (El Presidio Real de San Francisco ) in 1776, and in Santa Barbara (El Presidio Real de Santa Bárbara) in 1782. [7]
On 20 November 1818, Argentine privateer Hipólito Bouchard, known thereafter as "California's only pirate", raided the El Castillo de Monterey defended by José Bandini. Its population took refuge in the Presidio's Rancho del Rey San Pedro (King's Farm), in the vicinity of Salinas. [8] [6] The fortunes of the Presidio at Monterey rose and fell with the times: it has been moved, abandoned and reactivated time and time again. The only surviving building from the original compound is the Royal Presidio Chapel. At least three times, it has been submerged by the tide of history, only to appear years later with a new face, a new master, and a new mission – first under the Spanish, then the Mexicans, and ultimately the Americans.
 | This section needs additional citations for verification .(October 2014) |
United States control of the area began in 1846 during the Mexican–American War when Commodore John D. Sloat, commander of the U.S. Navy's Pacific Squadron, landed unopposed a small force in Monterey and claimed the territory and the Presidio for the United States. He left a small garrison of Marines who moved the fort up to its current location on the hill overlooking the harbor, combining in one location the previously separated functions of military headquarters and fortress. The Presidio was renamed Fort Mervine in honor of Captain William Mervine, who commanded one of the ships in Sloat's squadron. [9]
The original Presidio comprised a square of adobe buildings located in the vicinity of what is now downtown Monterey. The fort's original mission, the Royal Presidio Chapel, has remained in constant use since its founding in 1770 by Junípero Serra, who arrived with Portola's party. On a hill overlooking the Monterey harbor is an earthwork—the only lingering connection between the original and present sites of the Presidio. That earthwork was part of the Spanish-built artillery battery defending the harbor. [10]
The 1846 US occupation of Monterey put an end to any Mexican military presence at the Presidio. In 1865, in the closing months of the American Civil War, the fort was returned to temporary life by the arrival of six officers and 156 enlisted men, but was abandoned again in 1866. [11]
In 1902, an infantry regiment arrived at Monterey with the mission to construct a post to house an infantry regiment and a squadron of cavalry. Troops moved into the new wooden barracks, officially named Ord Barracks, in June 1903. It was named for former American Civil War general, Edward Ord. However, in order to perpetuate the name of the old Spanish military installation that Portolà had established 134 years earlier, the War Department redesignated the post as the Presidio of Monterey. The barracks and training facilities for enlisted men, along with General Ord's name, were moved a short way up the coast to Fort Ord in 1940.
A school of musketry was located at the Presidio from 1907 to 1913, and a school for cooks and bakers from 1914 to 1917. In 1917, the Army purchased an additional 15,809 acres (64 km2) across the bay as a maneuver area. This new acquisition eventually was designated as Camp Ord in 1939 and became Fort Ord in 1940.
Between 1919 and 1940, the Presidio housed principally cavalry and field artillery units. However, the outbreak of World War II ended the days of horse cavalry, and those troops left Monterey. The Presidio, subsequently, served as reception center and temporary headquarters of the III Corps until it was deactivated in late 1944.
The Presidio of Monterey was reactivated, under considerable difficulty, in January 1945 to accommodate the Civil Affairs Staging Area (CASA). [12] The Civil Affairs Staging Area was a brigade sized Army / Navy formation created by a joint chiefs of staff directive for military government theater planning, training and provision of military government personnel to liberated areas of the Far East. CASA provided comprehensive training and planning in civil affairs administration to officers coming from six schools of military government established at various universities throughout the country.
In 1946, the Military Intelligence Service Language School (MISLS) was moved to the Presidio of Monterey and was renamed the Army Language School (ALS). In June 1963, the Army Language School was renamed the Defense Language Institute (DLI). In 1976, the Defense Language Institute became the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center (DLI-FLC), the Defense Department's primary center for foreign language instruction. The center constitutes the principal activity at the Presidio. The Presidio serves all branches of the Department of Defense as well as other select government agencies.
From 1946 onward, the Presidio itself was a sub-installation of the nearby Fort Ord. On 1 October 1994, this situation changed when Fort Ord closed and the Presidio of Monterey became a separate installation again, with the continued military areas of Fort Ord becoming known as the Presidio Annex.
US Army Signal Activity (USASA) Camp Roberts, California is a subinstallation of the Presidio of Monterey. [13]
Operational military installations in California | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Army |
|  | |||||||||||||
| Marines |
| ||||||||||||||
| Navy |
| ||||||||||||||
| Air Force |
| ||||||||||||||
| Space Force |
| ||||||||||||||
| National Guard |
| ||||||||||||||
| Coast Guard |
| ||||||||||||||
Mission San Carlos Borromeo del Río Carmelo, or Misión de San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo, first built in 1797, is one of the most authentically restored Catholic mission churches in California. Located at the mouth of Carmel Valley, California, it is on the National Register of Historic Places and is a National Historic Landmark.
Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa is a Spanish mission founded September 1, 1772 by Father Junípero Serra in San Luis Obispo, California. Named after Saint Louis of Anjou, the bishop of Toulouse, the mission is the namesake of San Luis Obispo.
Saint Junípero Serra y Ferrer, popularly known simply as Junipero Serra, was a Spanish Catholic priest and missionary of the Franciscan Order. He is credited with establishing the Franciscan Missions in the Sierra Gorda, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. He founded a mission in Baja California and established eight of the 21 Spanish missions in California from San Diego to San Francisco, in what was then Spanish-occupied Alta California in the Province of Las Californias, New Spain.
Gaspar de Portolá y Rovira was a Spanish military officer, best known for leading the Portolá expedition into California and for serving as the first Governor of the Californias. His expedition laid the foundations of important Californian cities like San Diego and Monterey, and bestowed names to geographic features throughout California, many of which are still in use.
The Defense Language Institute (DLI) is a United States Department of Defense (DoD) educational and research institution consisting of two separate entities which provide linguistic and cultural instruction to the Department of Defense, other federal agencies and numerous customers around the world. The Defense Language Institute is responsible for the Defense Language Program, and the bulk of the Defense Language Institute's activities involve educating DoD members in assigned languages, and international personnel in English. Other functions include planning, curriculum development, and research in second-language acquisition.
Pedro Fages (1734–1794) was a Spanish soldier, explorer, first Lieutenant Governor of the province of the Californias under Gaspar de Portolá. Fages claimed the governorship after Portolá's departure, acting as governor in opposition to the official governor Felipe de Barri, and later served officially as fifth (1782–91) Governor of the Californias.
Joan Crespí or Juan Crespí was a Franciscan missionary and explorer of Las Californias.
The Portolá expedition was a Spanish voyage of exploration in 1769–1770 that was the first recorded European exploration of the interior of the present-day California. It was led by Gaspar de Portolá, governor of Las Californias, the Spanish colonial province that included California, Baja California, and other parts of present-day Mexico and the United States. The expedition led to the founding of Alta California and contributed to the solidification of Spanish territorial claims in the disputed and unexplored regions along the Pacific coast of North America.
Captain José Raimundo Carrillo (1749–1809) was Californio soldier and settler, known as an early settler of San Diego, California and as the founder of the Carrillo family of California.
José Francisco Ortega was a New Spanish soldier and early settler of Alta California. He joined the military at the age of twenty-one and rose to the rank of sergeant by the time he joined the Portola expedition in 1769. At the end of his military duty he would be granted land which he named Rancho Nuestra Senora del Refugio near Santa Barbara.
The Cathedral of San Carlos Borromeo, also known as the Royal Presidio Chapel, is a Catholic cathedral located in Monterey, California, United States. The cathedral is the oldest continuously operating parish and the oldest stone building in California. It was built in 1791-94 making it the oldest serving cathedral in the United States, along with St. Louis Cathedral in New Orleans, Louisiana. It is the only existing presidio chapel in California and the only existing building in the original Monterey Presidio.
José de Gálvez y Gallardo, 1st Marquess of Sonora was a Spanish lawyer and Visitador general in New Spain (1764–1772); later appointed to the Council of the Indies (1775–1787). He was one of the prime figures behind the Bourbon Reforms. He belonged to an important political family that included his brother Matías de Gálvez and nephew Bernardo de Gálvez.
Fernando Javier Rivera y Moncada was a Mexican-born soldier of the Spanish Empire who served in The Californias, the far north-western frontier of New Spain. He participated in several early overland explorations and later served as third Governor of The Californias, from 1774–1777.
Francesc Palou or Francisco Palóu (1723–1789) was a Spanish Franciscan missionary, administrator and historian on the Baja California Peninsula and in Alta California. Palóu made significant contributions to the Alta California and Baja California mission systems. Along with his mentor, Junípero Serra, Palóu worked to build numerous missions throughout Alta and Baja California, many structures of which still stand today. A member of the Franciscan Order, Palóu became "Presidente" of the missions in Baja California, and later of missions of Alta California. Palóu's work in the Spanish mission system spans from his early twenties to his death at the age of 66.
The Free Company of Volunteers of Catalonia was a military company of the Spanish Army serving in the Spanish colonial empire.
This timeline of the Portolá expedition tracks the progress during 1769 and 1770 of the first European exploration-by-land of north-western coastal areas in what became Las Californias, a province of Spanish colonial New Spain. Later, the region was administratively-split into Baja and Alta. The first section of the march was on the Baja California peninsula, and the northern section of the expedition's trail was in today's US state of California.
Matías de Armona also Don Matías de Armona was a governor of Las Californias, serving from June 12, 1769 to November 9, 1770, during Spanish Empire colonial rule of New Spain.
Miguel Costansó (1741–1814), original name Miquel Constançó, was a Catalan engineer, cartographer and cosmographer. He joined the expedition of exploration of Alta California led by Gaspar de Portolá and Junípero Serra, serving aboard ship as cartographer and on land as engineer.
The Portolá Trail Campsite or Portolá Trail Campsite No. 1 is the spot of the first Europeans to travel and camp overnight in what is now Central Los Angeles, California. The Portolá expedition camped at the site on August 2, 1769. The Portolá Trail Campsite No. 1 was designated a California Historic Landmark (No.655) on Sept. 26, 1958. The Portolá Trail Campsite is located in what is now the Elysian Park entrance, at the NW corner of North Broadway and Elysian Park Drive in the City of Los Angeles in Los Angeles County. The campsite is near the Los Angeles River, which they used as their water supply for the camp. Military officer Gaspar de Portolá was the commander of the expedition for the Spanish Empire with the goal of the Spanish colonization of the Americas. The expedition led to the founding of the first mission in the Los Angeles Basin, the Mission Vieja, on September 8, 1771, and of Alta California. The expedition arrived at Portolá Trail Campsite No. 1 from the San Gabriel Valley, were the Mission San Gabriel would be built later in 1776. As they depart Portolá Trail Campsite No. 1 they traveled west towards Santa Monica Bay, stopping at Portolá Trail Campsite 2, which is in present-day Beverly Hills. Portolá Trail Campsite 2 is also a California Historic Landmark (No.665). At San Monica Bay the expedition turned and traveled north to were the future Mission San Fernando would be built in 1797. Form San Fernando the expedition turned west to Ventura, the site of the future Mission San Buenaventura built in 1782.
The San Carlos was a Spanish packet boat built in 1767 at San Blas, Mexico. In 1775, under the command of Spanish naval officer and explorer Lieutenant Juan Manuel de Ayala, the San Carlos became the first ship to enter the San Francisco Bay.
