On August 22, 1822, an English whaler, the Orion,
put into Yerba Buena Cove for supplies of wood and water. Captain William
Richardson, described as "tall, fair haired, blue-eyed and young,"
was sighted by Maria Antonia, daughter of Lieutenant Ignacio Martinez
of the Presidio. The Captain, probably with prodding from his daughter,
invited the Captain to stay for a time at their home.
Captain Richardson taught carpentry, boat building and
navigation at the Mission, served as Captain of the Port of San Francisco,
and began building at the Cove the first house of any substance in San
Francisco. The building was to be used as a trading post. Richardson
had charge of several schooners belonging to the Mission Dolores, and
one belonging to the Mission Santa Clara.
The Captain soon married Maria Antonia. In order to do
so, he joined the Catholic Church who baptized him "Don Antonio Richardson."
This was the first great Spanish-Anglo Saxon wedding and it was held
at Mission San Francisco de Asis (Mission Dolores) on May 12, 1826.
In 1838, William Richardson received a Mexican land grant, Rancho Saucelito
(Little Willow Ranch), which is just North of San Francisco across the
Bay in Marin County (a portion of which is now named Sausalito).
The grant contained all the land southeast of Mt.
Tamalpais, and included Redwood Canyon and the lands now within Muir
Woods National Monument. Richardson brought cattle from Spain to his
ranch and hired Vaqueros from Mexico to care for them. Some vaqueros
were Miwoks or Ohlones, Native Americans that lived on the Northern
California coast prior to the arrival of Europeans. Two times a year
the cowboys herded and slaughtered the cattle for hides and tallow.
The tranquil Spanish way of life was maintained until gold was discovered
in California.
Captain Richardson's fortunes waxed and waned from his
businesses, one of which was in building small craft to shorten the
overland route of bringing supplies in from Peninsula cities. His trade
included otter skins as otters were then numerous in the bay and rivers,
and their skins plentiful. Their pelts were sold to Boston traders for
from $40 to $60 each. Captain Richardson commanded a vessel and traded
along the coast as far south as Valparaiso. Trade at that time was practically
all barter -- tallow and hides, sea otter and beaver skins being the
currency.
From the Annals of San Francisco, 1855.)
Captain Richardson was appointed San Francisco's first harbormaster in 1835. In that same year, the Captain formally established residence in Yerba Buena Cove by building a small house there for his family. Captain Richardson watched the town grow from about a dozen houses and fifty residents in Yerba Buena in 1844 to about ninety buildings, shanties, adobes and frame houses, and about 200 inhabitants by the end of 1846.
At one point Captain Richardson employed an Indian by the name of Monica who was about eighty years of age. Monica was a boatman in launches which ran goods back and forth between different points on the Bay. This old Indian told Captain Richardson that his ancestors passed on a story that a long way back there was no Golden Gate; that between Fort Point and right across to the north it was all closed by a mountain range and there was no access to the ocean there. He said the natural outlet of the bay was through the Santa Clara valley, across the Salinas plains, to the Bay of Monterey. Monica relayed the story that in a tremendous convulsion created the passage where the Golden Gate now is and that became the entrance to the Bay. In the course of time the Santa Clara valley and other land between the lower end of the Bay of San Francisco and the bay of Monterey became drained and elevated . . . "
In 1856, ailing and in financial straits, Captain Richardson
put Rancho Saucelito into the hands of an administrator, Samuel P. Throckmorton,
and died two months later.
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