STEALING ARIZONA - EIGHT

 

I doubt James Reavis-Peralta (above), could have imagined a worse person to review his new filing for the Peralta grant than Royal A. Johnson. They New York lawyer's  son had come west out of curiosity, and been one of the clerks who had received the original voluminous Perlata Grant filing in 1883. And from that morning he'd been suspicious of Reevis.

Then in 1884 Democrat Grover Cleveland won the White House, and in the wholesale shifting of political favors, Royal was replaced as Surveyor General by the Democrat John C. Hise, a realtor and  the son of rancher from Payson, Arizona.  Thus, when Reavis-Peralta filed his new claim, it was John Hise who was to pass judgment on the it. However, Hise was also suspicious of Reavis, and delayed making his decision.   So  in1888, when the Republican Benjamin Harrison was elected President, in July of 1889 Royal Johnson, the one man who knew almost as much about the Peralta Grant as James Reavis, was back in as Surveyor General.

Even during the four years he was out of office, Royal had continued to investigate the grant. So in September, when the acting United States Commissioner of Land sent Royal a letter asking, "please report to me the exact condition of said grant...and all the information you can obtain in regard to it.", Royal was loaded and ready to fire. His broadside was released on 12 October (Columbus day), 1889 and the title said it all; “Adverse Report of the Surveyor General of Arizona, Royal A. Johnson, upon the alleged Peralta Grant”. The word “alleged” must have particularly stung Reavis.

First, Johnson noted that the Royal Cedula, the document which had supposedly started the entire enterprise, was written in a form different than every other Royal Cedula every issued, and in such bad Spanish that Royal suggested it must have been written by an American using “bad California Spanish”.  In addition, the seal on the Royal Cedula had been printed on the page, and not impressed into it, as it was in every other Cedula. Finally, the signatures had been made with a steel pen, not invented until a century after the 1748 date on the page.

Considering the report of the "Mexican Holy Inquisition", Royal observed that the seal was legitimate, but it had been glued on the page and not impressed, and it was cracked and had a brown tinge, suggesting it had been heated and removed from another document. And when discussing the Viceroy's decree directly awarding the grant, Royal wrote, “No certificate of a modern date nor any other reliable certification appears on the copies which would point to the originals being at present in the custody of some custodian of archives where they could be readily located and seen...to enable me to ascertain the whereabouts of originals or to prove their existence, and if they were to be obtained it is the duty of the claimants to produce them or to obtain and submit undoubted proof of their existence in their proper archives ... .”

In fact, at times the Surveyor General seemed to be scolding Reavis. “...it seems in poor taste that the old books of the San Xavier Mission, wherein were recorded the births, marriages and deaths of persons under the cognizance of the Church, should be selected to have inserted, and rudely inserted, among its withered leaves a copy of the grant of Peralta by the viceroy, and a copy of Peralta’s will." 

Royal went on to point out the obvious signs of a forgery committed under time constraints and in difficult places. "In the first place, the (forgery) is pasted in at right angles to the other sheets and is one-third larger than the regular sheets. The upper end of the pasted-in sheet is inserted in that part of the binding that holds the back of the large book together, instead of being in regular order...”

Royal further noted that under the laws existing during the 16^th century, the King would not have communicated to the Viceroy of New Spain, but rather through the bureaucracy, to the Council of the Indies, who would have then contacted the Viceroy.  And there was no copy of the Peralta Grant in the Council's archives. And, asked Johnson, why was there no record or even mention of the noble deeds achieved by Maguel Peralta to justify this grant, anywhere in any other records? 

Given that this was the largest individual land grant made in the Americas by the Spanish crown, should not the achievement equal its reward?  Noted Johnson, Spanish law at the time said, “No memorial from any person whatever shall be received for services which shall not be supported by certificates from viceroys, Generals, or other chiefs under whom such services shall have been performed, except those persons who shall have served in the councils.” And, again, the Council of the Indies had no record of the Peralta grant.

Royal also noted that although the Inquisition was extremely powerful in Mexico, no obsessive Spanish bureaucrat – and any good bureaucrat is obsessive - would have asked that body to investigate the Peralta Grant. It should have been reviewed by the Audiencia Guadalajara Nuev Galidia.  And in those records there was, again, no mention of the Peralta Grant.

Then, Royal Johnson dealt with the conflicts between the 1883 and 1887 claims. Noted the Surveyor General, if the 1864 Willing bill of sale was legitimate, then that superseded Sophia's inheritance.  

And,  as to the photograph of Sophia standing next to the “Inicial Monument” (above), Johnson showed that the Peralta family crest carved into the rock was, in reality, a native American holography.

The report went on to detail the vagueness of the boundaries of the claim, pointing out that under long established property law in America and in Mexico, you cannot claim what you cannot locate. “Speedy and final action should be had on this base claim in order that the people of this territory may enjoy their homes with peace of mind. And parties guilty of forgery or the fabrication of papers that have caused so much trouble should be vigorously prosecuted by the government and that without delay. I recommend that the alleged grant should not be confirmed as it is prayed for, it being to my mind without the slightest foundation in fact and utterly void.”

The Baron of Arizona, James Reavis-Peralta,  responded as any good con man would respond when he was caught red handed. He sued the United States government for $11 million.

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STEALING ARIZONA - SEVEN

 

I think the most heinous crime James Reavis committed was what was he did to the woman known only as Sophia. She was an orphan, a woman and Latino, living in a sexist, racist culture.  And then she met a stranger who told her that she was from a noble family. And after a decade of teasing her and supporting her personal fairy tale, all he asked in return was that she marry him. 

In 1877 Sophia was an orphan servant girl in a hotel in the Stanislaus River ferry crossing village of Knights Landing (above), California –  20 miles north-west of Sacramento. She was facing a bleak future. The opening of the transcontinental railroad sent the community into a decline, the hotels and rooming houses closing one by one.  The appearance of Reavis saved her.

They were married on 31 December, 1882, right after his second scheme to steal from the citizens of Arizona faltered. And in January, she was enrolled in a convent school, to train her in the social skills expected of a well born lady. And while the girl began her studies, Reavis continued on to San Francisco.  

There were lengthy planning sessions with Collis Huntington and Charles Crocker (above) and other financial supporters. After a few weeks Reavis  collected letters of introduction to several important Washington power players. He also met with San Francisco banker Maurice Herr, who put up $25,000 to fund "The Arizona Development Corporation".  Where Reavis' "Peralta Grant" had only sought to blackmail the people of Arizona, this corporation could add investors world wide to its list of victims.  Reavis had finally learned the fundamental lesson of capitalism - that a thief is a man who robs a bank, while a financial wizard is a a man who robs everybody. 

At the same time James Reavis met John W. Mackay (above), whose holdings in the Comestock Lode produced half of all the silver mined in the United States each year.  Mackay wanted to get an inside track on the Peralta Grant, and offered to finance Reavis' new Spanish research, paying him a stipend of $500 (the modern equivalent of $11,500). a month.  And , after pausing to collect his "wife", the James Reavis party set out for Spain, traveling in style. 

They first stopped off in New York, where Reavis used his letters of introduction to bond with powerful Senator Roscoe Conkling,  former Congressman and lobbyist Dwight Townsend and Bankers Henry Potter and Hector de Castro. A few weeks later the Reavis party boarded ship for Spain; the reprobate ex-lawyer Cyril Baratt, the short, violent thug Pedro Cuervo, the newly minted lady, Baroness Sophia Reavis ne Peralta , and a new version of James Reavis himself, with his new title – James Reavis -Peralta, Baron of Arizona.

Once again, luck was with Reavis. His party arrived in Spain at the perfect moment. The 27 year old Alfonso XII (above - aka “The King without good fortune":) was entering his 10^th gilded year on the throne, his monarchy having been restored at the end of December 1874. Valuing noble blood was de regueire  in Spain at this time.  And fortuitously for Spanish society, at this opportune moment, a long lost New World royal cousin appeared, the lovely, regal Sophia Peralta, and her charming, debonair paramour, the man who had rescued her from commonality, James Reavis-Peralta. The public and the nobility were both primed to see her as Reavis wanted her seen - as a fairy tale come true.

Reavis made a tour of the great cathedrals of Madrid. The civil government of the Spanish municipios had only begun recording births and deaths in 1831. Records of all christenings, deaths and weddings before that could be found only in church records, in the cathedrals, like Iglesia de San Andrés or the San Pedro el Viejo for example. It took weeks before James was able to "discover" the codicil to the will of Don Miguel Perlata,  leaving everything he owned, including the Peralta grant, to his only surviving daughter, Sophia. 

When he was not laboring alone over the ancient dusty documents (and covering new ones with dust), Reavis-Peralta was wandering through the second hand shops and flea markets of Madrid, buying the occasional painting or daguerreotype of a forgotten nobility, who had lost their fortune during the brief Spanish Republic - before Alfonso's restoration. James picked those which showed a resemblance to Sophia, in other words those which could be presented as being her ancestors. And in his weaving the tale to his young bride, they became her ancestors. And the living members of the actual Peralta family were as willing to believe that this rich American had discovered an image of their long lost distant cousins. Wasn't she graceful? Didn't she carry herself like a baroness? You do not learn grace and culture in a California Catholic finishing school. Sophia Peralta Revis was obviously born with noble blood.

In December of 1885 the King, Alfonso XII, fell ill with tuberculosis and died.  He was succeeded by his pregnant wife, Queen Maria Christina. Her son, and the new king, would not be born until five months later. By then, the delightful Baroness Sophia Peralta Revis and her gracious American husband were so accepted by the nobility, they were even presented to the Queen. Then, in a cloud of fond farewells, the noble couple returned to America, arriving in New York City in November of 1886

As they say, everybody loves a winner, and the Peralta brand was clearly winning. On their return to America they received the endorsement the powerful Missouri Republican James Broadhead (above), who endorsed the claim, referring to James Reavis-Peralta as, “a man of remarkable energy and persistence."

Powerful Republican Senator Roscoe Conkling (above) vouched for the validity of the claim, and said he believed Sophia “to be the person she believes herself to be...the lineal descendant of the original grantee.”  Back in California in 1887, James was able to add to his list of supporting documents a testimonial from Alfred Sherwood, of San Diego County, who swore he had known Sophia all her life, and even knew her parents as well.

In August, the Revis-Peralta's journeyed by Southern Pacific train to Arizona. And fortuitously, while pausing in Phoenix, they took a carriage ride into the mountains, and stumbled across yet even more evidence, the "Inicial Monument”, the very great stone upon which Don Miguel Peralta had carved his family crest back in 1758. Wasn't that lucky. James even posed Sophia next to the carving (above), and included the photo in his new claim,  filed in Tucson on 2 September, 1887. 

Now his claim was simple and direct, and no longer rested on a single scrap of paper - that bill of sale (above) from the mining camp.  

He was the grantee, by benefit of his marriage to the direct ancestor of old Don Miguel Peralta,  Doña Sophia Micaela Maso Reavis y Peralta de la Córdoba, third Baroness of Arizona.

James Reavis-Peralta, Baron of Arizona, announced the formation of the "Casa Grande Improvement Company", to exploit his land. He sold $3 million in stock (above), based on his plans to build a massive damn on the Salt River (which he owned), which would allow irrigation systems to make the desert (which he owned) bloom. Never mind that most of the year, the Salt River was a bed with no water in it. But for all his plans, James barely paused in his fortress at Arizola. They had built or bought homes where Sophia's investors lived – in San Francisco, St. Louis, New York and Chihuahua, Mexico. It was while in New York City that Sophia adopted a two month old orphan and named him Fenton, after James' father.

It looked as if the land commissioners in Arizona had little choice but to approve the grant, and make James Reavis Peralta  a multi-millionaire and Sophia a real live princess. And I have no doubt that would have happened – except for one man – the Surveyor General for Arizona, Royal Johnson.

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STEALING ARIZONA - SIX

 

I think Guadalajara is one of the most surprising cities in North America. It's name has Arabic roots, wadi l-ijara, meaning “the valley of the stones”, which hints at the Medieval Moorish occupation of Spain, mother country to Mexico. And Guadalajara's university, founded in 1791, helped make the capital of Jalisco Province an economic power house.

But when James Reavis, Cryil Baratt and Rufus C. Hopkins arrived in the winter of 1882, the town was struggling from the Yaqui Wars (above), 60 years of racial bloodshed, during which Indian tribes rebelled 27 times against enslavement and oppressive government. It was only the Catholic church's obsession with order and precedent which saved the region's Spanish history.  And that is what drew our trio of gringos to this cultural island.

Seventy year old Rufus C. Hopkins was probably the worst man Surveyor General Robbins could have picked to send on this mission, as his only qualification was that he could read the Spanish used in old land grants. Reavis and Baratt hovered around the old man, distracting him by introducing him to the archivists, the priests and clerks. 

They were ever eager to point out important documents and even discovering a previously unknown copy of the 1748 "cedulare" approving the Peralta grant. This latest discovery was important, since nothing would discourage doubters looking closer into the grant than the threat they would only stumble over more evidence supporting it. The old man was clearly convinced. His report would confirm Reavis' claim. Unfortunately for James Reavis, back in Tucson Arizona, things had taken a turn for the worse.

Rufus Hopkin's boss, Joseph W. Robbins, had died of tuberculosis while the trio were down in Guadalajara. His replacement was his own chief clerk, Royal A. Johnson, and he was healthy and had a healthy skepticism about Rufus Hopkin's report on the Peralta grant. He noted that tucked away in the back of Hopkins' report was the note that the only records in Guadalajara which mentioned the Peralta Grant, were those which specifically dealt with it. In discussing the desire for Spanish troops to deal with the Apache, for instance, there was no mention of the grant, even though it was smack in the middle of Apache land, and it was claimed Don Miguel Peralta had been driven off “his” grant by the Apache. This was why Rufus Hopkins' report, like all good historical scholarship, could only say that after a cursory examination there was nothing to disprove the legality of the grant.

James Reavis (above), of course, took much more forceful interpretation of the report. He and Cryil Baratt began spreading the rumor that the American government was about to offer him $100 million for the Grant. And given Huntington and Croker's political friends in Washington, that was not impossible. Reavis had already refused to sell another right-away quick claim, similar to the one Huntington's Southern Pacific had bought, to the competing Texas and Pacific Railroad, which was trying to fulfill James Gadsden old dream of connecting the southern states to the Pacific ocean. With all land rights in Arizona now uncertain, and without a quick claim of its own, the banks withdrew their support for the Texas and Pacific, and progress on that railroad came to a halt. Crocker and Huntington's investment in Reavis was already paying dividends.

Meanwhile Reavis and his bodyguard, Pedro Cuervo, had recruited a small army of thugs who were shaking down every farmer, rancher, miner, home and business owner in Arizona for anything from $1,000 to a free meal in exchange for an immediate quit claim on their properties. Many paid up. Those who resisted found their businesses vandalized, their employees beaten, crops and barns burned and wells fouled. 

Typical of Reavis' methods was the treatment for Tom Weedin (above), editor of the "Florence Enterprise" in Pinal County, about 40 miles southeast of Phoenix.  Reavis offered Weedin the standard bribe, and when Weedin said no, his offices were burned to the ground. Weedin then responded by forming an “Anti-Reavis” committee, to raise money to oppose his thugs in court. Similar committees sprang up in Phoenix, Tucson and Tempe. To Weedin it felt like rowing against the tide. 

Cuervo's bandits squeezed an estimated $5.3 million out of Arizona in 1884 - the modern equivalent of one hundred sixty-two million dollars. That was a profit even Crocker and Huntington could appreciate. Organized crime had been turned loose on the libertarian wonderland of the Old West, where almost everybody carried a gun. And contrary to modern theory, the result was that citizens were left screaming for government activism – and immediately! 

Reavis was feeling confident enough to build himself La Hacienda de Peralta, a fortress with a nine foot wall enclosing servants quarters, stables, barns, a well, and a ten room redwood mansion, with running water inside. 

He built his outpost just south of the ruins of Casa Granda, about 80 miles south of Phoenix and about 60 miles north of the Mexican border - should a quick escape be required. He called it Arizola, and began referring to himself as the Baron de Arizona.

The only trouble was a lawsuit filed by the Territorial Attorney General, Clark Churchill (above), claiming that Reavis had no right to property owned by the Territory of Arizona, because he lacked clear title to the grant. It was the weak point in Reavis' claim. There were still people alive who had been in Black Canyon in 1864 and none of them could recall a Miguel Peralta working a mine there. And in May of 1885 the territorial court granted clear title to the Attorney General. The Tucson Citizen newspaper headlined, “Reavis Nailed Up”

In a letter dated 2 May, 1885, The Arizona Land Commissioner, W.A. Sparks, wrote to Surveyor Royal Johnson, “The essential foundation of a recognizable claim under the laws of Spain and the treaties and laws of the United States does not appear in this case. It is my opinion that the futile work in which you have been engaged for a year...should forthwith be discontinued.”  Johnson agreed, writing back that he hoped “...the many schemes concocted by bad men...will now cease....(and) we shall have no further connection with this grant.”

Almost over night, income from the shakedowns for quit claims dried up and Cuervo's thugs returned to whatever they had been doing before Cuervo had hired them. Feeling the ground shifting under his feet, Reavis caught a Southern Pacific train for California. But if James Reavis was looking for more support from his financial backers, Huntington and Crocker, he did not get it. The delay of the Texas and Pacific railroad had been their primary concern, and it had been stopped. 

But another ally did appear, when George Hearst (above), new owner of the San Francisco Examiner, and father to William Randolph Hearst, and friend to both Huntington and Crocker. He decided to back Reavis with favorable publicity in his paper.  Still, Mr Crocker, warned that the weak point remained the 1864 bill of sale to George Willing.  It had been written on a scrap of paper, and, frankly Mr. Huntington had doubts that it would stand up in court. Didn't Reavis have anything stronger?

Once again, as had happened so many times before in this story, James Reavis did have something more up his sleeve. He had a little lady he had met on a train back in 1871. Reavis had stayed in contact with her, exchanging letters, and even paying for her to attend "finishing" school. And now she was right where and when Reavis needed her to be, and she was even who he needed her to be; Sofia Peralta, sole surviving heir to the Peralta Land Grant. With her appearance, the bill of sale became irrelevant. 

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