The Jesuit Expulsion

In July, 1767, Juan Claudio de Pineda, Governor of Sonora, worrily opened an envelope that a special courier had just handed to him. The reason for his worry was that the envelope had the note that it should have been opened three days previously, but because the couried had become sick, the delivery had been delayed. After reading the letter, he started writing some orders to his military subalterns.

To Pimeria Alta, he sent two letters to Captains Juan Bautista de Anza, from Tubac, and Bernardo de Urrea, of Altar. He also added a note to those envelopes, in which he further stipulated that those letters shouldn´t be oppened until July 23.

That date, Captain Urrea opened the seal of his letter, and read it´s contents. Then, with an escort of soldiers, he went to Tubutama. When he passed through Atil, he asked the missionary there, Pedro Rafael Diez, to accompany him.

On arriving at Tubutama, he told the bad news to both, Diez and Rector Luis Vivas. He had received the order to bring to Tubutama all the missionaries from Pimeria Alta, and there to obey a Royal Decree from Charles III, although Urrea didn´t know what the orders were.

We still don´t know precisely the reasons Charles III had to write the following decree:

Having agreed to the counsel of my Royal Council... as well as to what some people of the most elevated character have told me, and stimulated by the grave reasons that I have to keep in subordination, tranquility and justice my towns, as well as other urgent, just and necessary reasons that I want to keep to myself... I have decided to command the expulsion from all of my domains in Spain and the Indias, Philippine Islands and the others nearby, of the religious of the Company...

In this manner, Charles III ordered the expulsion of the Jesuit Order from all of the Spanish domains. This wasn´t an isolated act, as previously, in 1759, they had been expelled from Portugal, and in 1762 from France.

In Spain, in a radical change from the first years of the conquest of America, when under the Hapsburg dinasty the King was seen as a Christian Prince, a champion of the principles of the Church, however through the years and the arrival of modernity, little by little a growing secularization of European regalist powers had gained ground, as well as a greater separation of secular and religious powers. Under this trend, the regalist trend could not see with good eyes another competing power.

But let´s return to Sonora and to Captain Urrea after these considerations. He asked Vives to write to all the missionaries under his jurisdiction to come to Tubutama, although without telling them the reason, and the Rector wrote them, accordingly.

In Guevavi, Father Ximeno didn´t see anything strange when he read the letter that his Rector sent him, asking him to go immediately to Tubutama. The only strange thing was the escort of soldiers sent from Altar to accompany him to Tubutama, and that he wasn´t allowed to make any arrangements for his abscence. But the strangest of all, was that the Captain ordered an inventory made of all the resources of the mission: 700 head of cattle, 24 oxes, 240 sheep, 420 mutton, 88 goats, 6 tame mules, 52 tame horses, 24 colts, and 39 mares,as well as asking the missionary to deliver to him the keys and books of the mission.

In any case, used as he was, being Jesuit, at obeying his Rector, Ximeno did as he was ordered and left, without knowing that this would be the last time he would see the Pimeria Alta and the Guevavi Mission.

When all the missionaries were reunited in Tubutama: Ildefonso Espinoza from Caborca, Francisco Paver from San Ignacio, Diego Barrera from Suamca, Miguel Gerstner from Saric, Luis Vivas from Tububama, Custodio Ximeno from Guevavi, and Antonio Castro, who had just arrived at San Xavier del Bac, all of them were informed of the next step. All the missionaries from Sonora would be united in Matape, where they were finally informed of the Royal Decree.

And there were still months of incarceration waiting for them at San Jose de Guaymas, followed by a march through the whole of New Spain to Mexico City, and from there to Veracruz, where they would be sent by ship to Cadiz, in Spain, to be incarcerated there in the hospice of Santa Maria, from where they originally had left for the New world.

Some of the missionaries couldn´t stand the trip, and died in the road, among them some of the old missionaries at Guevavi. Father Rapicani would die in Ixtlan, while Paver would die in Spain. We don´t know what happened to Ximeno.

While all of this happened, the missions, being left alone, soon fell victim to avarice and negligence. Their overseers took advantage of the situation and spent the reserves of the missions, while the Indians, seeing that they could do whatever they wanted with the warehouses, in a few days ate everything that was left behind.

Barely six weeks after the departure of Ximeno from Guevavi, Captain de Anza wrote the Governor, telling him that the overseer of Guevavi had:

told the Pimas that they are the owners of the resources and that they can do whatever they want with them, he also gave them the keys of the granaries. That was the end of the corn. In a few days they must have eaten in Tumacacori over 50 fanegas...