Rancho Los Capitancillos was a
Mexican land grant
The Spanish and Mexican governments made many concessions and land grants in Alta California (now known as California) and Baja California from 1775 to 1846. The Spanish Concessions of land were made to retired soldiers as an inducement for ...
in present-day
Santa Clara County, California
Santa Clara County, officially the County of Santa Clara, is the sixth-most populous county in the U.S. state of California, with a population of 1,936,259, as of the 2020 census. Santa Clara County and neighboring San Benito County together ...
given in 1842 by Governor
Juan B. Alvarado to Justo Larios. Los Capitancillos means the Little Captains in Spanish.
The grant was south of present-day
San Jose and was bounded on the south by
José de los Reyes Berreyesa's
Rancho San Vicente.
History
Justo Larios (1808–), son of Jose Larios, was a military artilleryman at the
Presidio of San Francisco. Larios was granted the one square league Rancho Los Capitancillos in 1842. Larios sold the whole grant to Grove C. Cook (–1852) in 1845. In 1848, Cook sold the northern part of the grant (
Rancho Cañada de los Capitancillos) to the Guadalupe Mining Company. Cook died in 1852, and Charles Fossat bought the three-quarters of the grant in a sheriff's sale.
With the
cession
The act of cession is the assignment of property to another entity. In international law it commonly refers to land transferred by treaty. Ballentine's Law Dictionary defines cession as "a surrender; a giving up; a relinquishment of jurisdictio ...
of California to the United States following the
Mexican-American War, the 1848
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ( es, Tratado de Guadalupe Hidalgo), officially the Treaty of Peace, Friendship, Limits, and Settlement between the United States of America and the United Mexican States, is the peace treaty that was signed on 2 ...
provided that the land grants would be honored. As required by the Land Act of 1851, a claim for Rancho Los Capitancillos was filed with the
Public Land Commission in 1852. The grant was confirmed by the Commission 1854, by the
US District Court
The United States district courts are the trial courts of the U.S. federal judiciary. There is one district court for each federal judicial district, which each cover one U.S. state or, in some cases, a portion of a state. Each district cou ...
in 1857, but reversed by the
US Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point of ...
, and then approved. The grant was
patented
A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A p ...
to Charles Fossat in 1865.
The
New Almaden Quicksilver Mines were discovered in 1845, and mining operations began in 1847, just in time for the
California Gold Rush. José Reyes Berreyessa laid claim to the mine on the basis that it lay on Rancho San Vicente. Similarly, Justo Larios also claimed ownership. The United States government even stepped in to claim that the mine lay on public land. A complex legal case described by ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' as "one of the most remarkable civil trials in this or any other country", ''
United States v. Andres Castillero'' eventually reached the
United States Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
whereupon it was finally decided in 1862 that, the mine was on Rancho Los Capitancillos, and that the furnaces and improvements of the company below the hill were on Rancho San Vicente. The company bought into these two titles and then sold the entire operation in 1864 to the
Quicksilver Mining Company.
See also
*
References
External links
Diseño del Rancho los Capitancillos : Santa Clara Co., Calif.at
The Bancroft Library
The Bancroft Library in the center of the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, is the university's primary special-collections library. It was acquired from its founder, Hubert Howe Bancroft, in 1905, with the proviso that it retai ...
{{Santa Clara County, California
Capitancillos, Los
Los Capitancillos
Los Capitancillos