NEW YORK — Siegel Auction Galleries in New York will offer a two-page letter by Saint Junípero Serra, one of only 11 North American saints, on Thursday, Sept. 26, during which the letter is expected to sell for $100,000 or more.
Very few Serra letters are privately owned, and this letter is historically important. Written in 1776, it outlines Serra’s plan for a chain of missions in Alta (Upper) California, the region north of Mexico that was part of Spain’s vast colonial empire.
Junípero Serra was an 18th century Spanish missionary who founded a series of missions in California — including Mission San Antonio de Padua near Jolon in South Monterey County — significantly shaping the region’s religious and cultural landscape. His efforts in establishing these missions played a key role in the Spanish colonization of California.
The letter discusses establishing a chain of missions across California “both for the Propagation of the Faith, as the chief purpose, and also for the convenience of travelers, as well as to strengthen the peaceful dispositions of the peoples along the way.”
Serra’s vision was the establishment of a postal system that would increase communication and help spread the Catholic faith to the indigenous population.
The establishment of mail service in California in the 1770s was no easy feat. At the time of George Washington’s administration in 1789, the longest continuous mail route in America was from Falmouth, Maine, to Savannah, Georgia, a distance of 1,100 miles, made up of short lines. By contrast, the distance from San Francisco to Loreto in Baja California was 1,500 miles, which did not even connect to the center of power in Mexico City.
At the time this letter was written, only a handful of missions had been established in California, mostly by Jesuits before they were expelled by the Spanish government in 1767. The San Diego mission, established in 1769, was burned by attacking Native Americans in 1775 and rebuilt in 1776.
In January 1770, Commander Gaspar de Portolá led an exploring party up the coast to Monterey. Conditions on the return trip to San Diego were so harsh, they had to eat their mules to survive. Despite these hardships, new missions were established by the Franciscans: at Carmel-by-the-Sea in 1770; San Antonio de Padua and San Gabriel in 1771; San Luis Obispo in 1772; and San Francisco on June 29, 1776, one month before the letter offered in the auction was written.
The Serra letter is the first item in the auction of The Vaquero Collection of Alta California Postal History. The sale contains other important historical letters from notable figures California history, including William G. Dana.
Those interested in bidding can preregister at siegelauctions.com/profile/login.
