page_title: Mission Santa Inés
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Mission Santa Inés / History
caption_attribution_description: English: This painting by 20th century American artist Alexander Harmer depicts Mexican soldiers advancing towards La Purisima Mission, under fire by Chumash forces.
context_page_description: Mission Santa Inés was a Spanish mission in the present-day city of Solvang, California, and named after St. Agnes of Rome. Founded on September 17, 1804, by Father Estévan Tapís of the Franciscan order, the mission site was chosen as a midway point between Mission Santa Barbara and Mission La Purísima Concepción, and was designed to relieve overcrowding at those two missions and to serve the Indians living north of the Coast Range.
  The mission was home to the first learning institution in Alta California and today serves as a museum as well as a parish church of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. It is also designated a National Historic Landmark, noted as one of the best-preserved of the 21 California missions.
context_section_description: Most of the original church was destroyed on December 21, 1812 in an earthquake centered near Santa Barbara that damaged or destroyed several California missions. The quake also severely damaged other mission buildings, but the complex was not abandoned. A new church, constructed with 5-to-6-foot-thick (1.5 to 1.8 m) walls and great pine beams brought from nearby Figueroa Mountain, was dedicated on July 4, 1817. 
  A water-powered grist mill was built in 1819, about half a mile from the church. In 1821, a fulling mill was added, designed by newly arrived American immigrant Joseph John Chapman. He oversaw the building of a grist mill for Mission San Gabriel, and he prepared timbers for the construction of the first church in Los Angeles. The mill he built near San Gabriel is now a museum. Chapman was baptized at San Buenaventura in 1822, and that same year married Guadalupe Ortega of Santa Barbara, with whom he had five children. In 1824, Chapman bought land in Los Angeles and developed a vineyard, but still continued to perform odd jobs at the missions.
  On February 21, 1824 a soldier beat a young Chumash Native. Two separate Chumash accounts, written in the early 1900s, state that around the time the Native was beaten, a Spanish page overheard Santa Inés priests talking about having the Natives of the mission killed the next summer when they arrived. The page was found out by the priests after having alerted the Natives, and his tongue and feet were cut off before he was burned to death. Upon learning of this news, the Natives sought the help of the other Santa Barbara Channel Mission Natives and a week later the Chumash Revolt of 1824 was sparked. When the fighting was over, the Natives themselves put out the fire that had started at the mission. Many of the Indians left to join other tribes in the mountains; only a few Natives remained at the mission.
  In 1833 the missions in California began to be secularized, however, it was not until 1835 that the Santa Inés Mission became secularized by the Mexican government. Secularization involved replacing the Padres as managers of the missions with government appointed overseers. In this case, the existing Spanish Franciscans were replaced by Mexican Franciscans who were restricted to provide only for the spiritual needs of the Chumash. The Chumash were mistreated under this new policy and began to leave the mission, returning to their villages or working at settlers’ ranches. As a result, much of their land was given to settlers in land grants.
  In 1843, California's Mexican governor Micheltorena granted 34,499 acres (139.61 km²) of Santa Ynez Valley land, called Rancho Cañada de los Pinos, to the College of Our Lady of Refuge, the first seminary in California. Established at the mission by Francisco García Diego y Moreno, first Bishop of California, the college was abandoned in 1881. By then the mission buildings were disintegrating.
  Highwayman Jack Powers briefly took over Mission Santa Inés and the adjacent Rancho San Marcos in 1853, intending to rustle the cattle belonging to rancher Nicolas A. Den. Powers was defeated in a bloodless armed confrontation.  He was not ousted from the Santa Barbara area until 1855.
  The Danish town of Solvang was built up around the mission proper in the early 1900s. It was through the efforts of Father Alexander Buckler in 1904 that reconstruction of the mission was undertaken, though major restoration was not possible until 1947 when the Hearst Foundation donated money to pay for the project. The restoration continues by the Capuchin Franciscan Fathers.
caption: Mexican soldiers advancing toward La Purísima Concepción Mission during the Chumash Revolt of 1824. Painting by Alexander Harmer.
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