Mysteries of the Murders at Mission San Miguel

It was one of the worst crimes in California history, unsurpassed until the 1960s. More striking is the fact that it took place in a fabled, romantic, pastoral setting of peace and respite. The California missions in the 1840s became derelict remnants of the vanished pride of Spanish colonization and missionary zeal. The missions were abandoned, turned into barns or saloons. Some were left to deteriorate and their adobe melt back into the soil. Mission San Miguel was closed, but later purchased by William Reed, who made the mission buildings and property into a ranch for his family. Hearing of high prices paid for livestock in the gold camps, he drove a herd north to sell. He returned with more gold, he said, than his young “son could lift.” At the same time, a gang of desperadoes began a crime spree in Monterey and headed south. Traveling along the missionaries’ trail, El Camino Real, they had to pass by Mission San Miguel. There in the old mission buildings, a horrifying crime took place....