Cabrillo's Expedition to California (1542-1543)

Cabrillo’s expedition to California in 1542–1543 was the first European voyage to explore the coast of what is now the US state of California. Commanded by Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo and sent by the Viceroy of New Spain, it sailed into San Diego Bay, met the Chumash and other coastal peoples, and charted the coast far to the north. Cabrillo died during the voyage, and Spain did not settle California for more than two centuries afterwards.

Background

By the 1530s Spain controlled central Mexico and was eager to explore further north. Rumours of rich lands and of a sea passage linking the Pacific and the Atlantic, the so-called Strait of Anián, encouraged expeditions by land and sea. At the same time the Coronado expedition was searching the interior for the Seven Cities of Cíbola.

Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo had arrived in the Americas as a young man and served as a crossbowman in the campaign that ended with the fall of Tenochtitlan in 1521. He then accompanied Pedro de Alvarado in the conquest of Guatemala, where he became a wealthy encomendero and a skilled shipbuilder. He built ships for Alvarado’s planned Pacific voyages. After Alvarado was killed in 1541 during the Mixtón War in western Mexico, Viceroy Antonio de Mendoza took over the fleet and gave Cabrillo command of a northern exploring expedition.

The voyage north

On 27 June 1542 Cabrillo sailed from the port of Navidad, on the Pacific coast of western Mexico, with two or three ships. His flagship was the San Salvador, a galleon he had built himself, accompanied by the smaller Victoria and possibly a launch. The crews included sailors, soldiers, enslaved people and a priest.

The ships followed the coast of the Baja California peninsula, which earlier voyages had shown to be a peninsula rather than an island. On 28 September 1542 they entered a fine sheltered harbour, which Cabrillo named San Miguel: present-day San Diego Bay. They stayed about six days.

Continuing north, the expedition visited Santa Catalina Island and a bay filled with the smoke of fires, probably San Pedro Bay near modern Los Angeles. Along the Santa Barbara Channel the Spaniards met the Chumash, who lived in large villages and paddled plank canoes, and noted many towns and their names. Pushing on against storms and contrary winds, the ships reached the area north of Monterey Bay, possibly as far as Point Reyes, by mid-November. Like many later navigators, they missed the entrance to San Francisco Bay, which is often hidden by fog.

The death of Cabrillo

The fleet returned south to winter in the Channel Islands, at an island the Spaniards called La Posesión, generally identified with San Miguel Island. Around Christmas 1542 Cabrillo fell and broke a limb, probably an arm or leg, during a fight with islanders; accounts differ on the details. The injury turned gangrenous, and he died on 3 January 1543. He was buried on the island, but his grave has never been located; a stone once claimed as his gravestone is of doubtful origin.

Before he died, Cabrillo handed command to his chief pilot, Bartolomé Ferrer (sometimes written Ferrelo). In February 1543 Ferrer sailed north again and, according to the surviving summary of the voyage, reached about latitude 42–44 degrees north, probably near the present California–Oregon border, before cold, storms and illness forced the ships to turn back. They reached Navidad on 14 April 1543.

Key people

• Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo (c. 1497–1543), commander and builder of the flagship.
• Bartolomé Ferrer, chief pilot, who completed the voyage.
• Antonio de Mendoza, Viceroy of New Spain, who sponsored the expedition.

Consequences

The expedition found no gold, no great cities and no strait. Its main result was geographical knowledge of more than a thousand kilometres of coast and the first written descriptions of the peoples of coastal California. Cabrillo’s original logbook has been lost; the voyage is known chiefly from a summary prepared from it by an official, often attributed to Juan Páez.

Spanish interest in California revived later in the century, when the Manila galleons crossing from the Philippines needed safe ports on the return route. Sebastián Vizcaíno charted the coast again in 1602–1603 and renamed many of Cabrillo’s landmarks. Permanent Spanish settlement came only in 1769, with the founding of the first of the Spanish missions of California.

Legacy

Cabrillo is commemorated by the Cabrillo National Monument on Point Loma, overlooking the entrance to San Diego Bay, established in 1913. The Maritime Museum of San Diego launched a full-size reconstruction of the San Salvador in 2015. Portuguese American communities have long honoured him as a Portuguese navigator, though recent research suggests he was more likely born in Spain.

Timeline

• 1541: Pedro de Alvarado dies; Viceroy Mendoza takes over his fleet.
• 1542, 27 June: Cabrillo sails from Navidad, Mexico.
• 1542, 28 September: The ships enter San Diego Bay.
• 1542, October: The expedition explores the Santa Barbara Channel.
• 1542, November: The ships reach northern California, then turn back.
• 1543, 3 January: Cabrillo dies in the Channel Islands.
• 1543, February–March: Ferrer sails north, perhaps to southern Oregon.
• 1543, 14 April: The expedition returns to Navidad.

Why it matters

Cabrillo’s voyage put the California coast on European maps for the first time and supported Spain’s later claim to the region. It also left a rare early record of the region’s Indigenous peoples before colonisation transformed their lives.