From Bourbon Reform to Open Markets in California, 1801-1821

Abstract

The Consulado de México was the mercantile guild that acted as commercial nerve-center of Spain’s empire in the Americas. From 1801 to 1821, one of its members, Pedro González de Noriega, influenced California’s economic growth by putting his nephew, José de la Guerra y Noriega, into the colony’s military supply line. In 1801, for what purpose did De la Guerra y Noriega come to California? Whatever his intention, his life-plan changed in 1810, when insurgency broke out in New Spain, and military payroll ceased to arrive in California. Between 1811 and 1821, how did De la Guerra y Noriega adapt to this structural change by negotiating with international merchants from Manila to San Blas and Lima to supply California? As Spain’s empire unraveled, we follow the microhistory of the Noriega mercantile network, as it reconfigured to the macroeconomic context of political transformation of the Pacific Rim in the context of Mexican independence from Spain. The De la Guerra Collection at the Santa Bárbara Mission Archive-Library reveals that Guadalajara was Mexico’s emerging center for Pacific commerce, with San Blas as Guadalajara’s principal port. By Mexican independence in 1821, De la Guerra had established Santa Bárbara, California as the center of his family’s business, rather than Mexico City. Even as Manila merchants relocated to Tepic, he maintained ties with them.  He also traded with the British in Callao, Peru, which is how he came to send his son to be educated in Liverpool with the Brotherston family.