Editing Mission Santa Cruz (section)

== History ==
[[File:Mission Santa Cruz (Léon Trousset, 1876).jpg|thumb|left|Mission Santa Cruz, 1876]]

The outpost was originally established near the Uypi village of ''Aulintak'', located near the mouth of the [[San Lorenzo River]], on August 28, 1791.<ref name="historicmarker">{{cite web |url=http://www.stoppingpoints.com/california/sights.cgi?marker=Site+of+Mission+Santa+Cruz&num=342&cnty=Santa+Cruz |title=Site of Mission Santa Cruz, California State Historical Marker |author=California State Historical Resources Commission tacos |access-date=March 11, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110716145906/http://www.stoppingpoints.com/california/sights.cgi?marker=Site+of+Mission+Santa+Cruz&num=342&cnty=Santa+Cruz |archive-date=July 16, 2011 |url-status=live}}</ref> There the Franciscan brothers erected a tent for worship to bring Christianity to the [[Awaswas]] people. The settlement was named for the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, adopting the name given to a nearby creek by the missionary priest [[Juan Crespi]], who accompanied the explorer [[Gaspar de Portolá]] when he camped on the [[San Lorenzo River]] on [[Timeline of the Portolá expedition|October 17, 1769]].<ref name="yenne112">Yenne, p. 112</ref>

The original mission was a small structure dedicated on September 25, 1791. It was located on the bottom of what would become Mission Hill, near what is today the intersection of River and North Pacific Streets, on the San Lorenzo River's flood plains. The mission was flooded as the river swelled with the rains that winter. Over the next three years until 1793, the padres rebuilt the mission on the hill overlooking the river.

As with the other California missions, Mission Santa Cruz served as a site for ecclesiastical conversion of natives, first the {{ill|Amah Mutsun|qid=Q111585476}} people,<ref name="Amah mutsun">{{cite web |url=http://amahmutsun.org/history |title=Amah Mutsun Tribal Band History |author=<!--Not stated--> |website=Amah Mutsun Tribal Band |access-date=August 9, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180809184020/http://amahmutsun.org/history |archive-date=August 9, 2018 |url-status=live}}</ref> the original inhabitants of the region (called ''Costeño'' by the Spaniards, and later known as the "[[Ohlone]]"). Later, [[Yokuts people]] were brought from the east.<ref name="SHP Santa Cruz">{{cite web |url=https://www.parks.ca.gov/pages/548/files/SantaCruzMissionSHPFinalWebLayout012116.pdf |title=Santa Cruz Mission State Historical Park |author=<!--Not stated--> |website=California Department of Parks and Recreation |access-date=August 9, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170215142927/http://www.parks.ca.gov/pages/548/files/SantaCruzMissionSHPFinalWebLayout012116.pdf |archive-date=February 15, 2017 |url-status=live}}</ref> The settlement was the site of the first [[autopsy]] in Alta California.<ref name="ruscin196">Ruscin, p. 196</ref>

It was one of the smaller missions, in the fourth military district under protection of the [[Presidio of San Francisco]].<ref name="forbes"/>

In 1797, the secular ''pueblo'' (town) of [[Branciforte]] was founded across the [[San Lorenzo River]] to the east of Mission Santa Cruz. The mission padres did not welcome the location of the pueblo so close to the mission, and accused the Branciforte settlers of [[gambling]], [[smuggling]] and tempting the native acolytes to desert the mission.

On October 12, 1812, Father Andrés Quintana was strangled to death by mission neophytes, angry over his use of a metal-tipped whip in the punishment of laborers, Native Americans, and Native children.<ref name="narrative of lorenzo asisara">{{cite journal |last1=Castillo |first1=Edward D. |title=The Assassination of Padre Andrés Quintana by the Indians of Mission Santa Cruz in 1812: The Narrative of Lorenzo Asisara |journal=California History |year=1989 |volume=68 |issue=3 |pages=116–125 |doi=10.2307/25462397 |jstor=25462397}}</ref>

In 1818, the Mission received advance warning of an attack by the [[United Provinces of South America|Argentine]] [[Commerce raiding|corsair]] (simply a [[Piracy|pirate]], from the Spanish point of view) [[Hippolyte de Bouchard|Hipólito Bouchard]] and was evacuated.<ref>There is a great contrast between the legacy of Bouchard in Argentina versus his reputation in the United States. In Buenos Aires, Bouchard is honored as a brave patriot, while in California he is most often remembered as a pirate, rather than a privateer. See [[Hippolyte de Bouchard#California and Central America|Hippolyte de Bouchard]].</ref> The citizens of Branciforte, several of whom were retired soldiers, were asked to protect the Mission's valuables; instead, they were later accused (by the priests) of [[stealing]]. The people from the mission then decided to flee the mission, and they later arrived in a new mission.

One of the only surviving first-person descriptions by a [[Indigenous peoples of California|native Californian]] of life in a mission was given in an interview by Lorenzo Asisara<ref>[https://www.learner.org/series/american-passages-a-literary-survey/slavery-and-freedom/lorenzo-asisara-b-1819/ Lorenzo Asisara]</ref> in 1877. Asisara was born at Mission Santa Cruz in 1819. His father was one of the neophytes involved in the Quintana killing, and Asisara repeated the story his father had told him about those events.