The Aragonese Franciscan, Father Francisco Garcés, played a leading role as a missionary in the Sonora-Arizona area after the Jesuit period. His importance stems in large measure from his wanderings and from the accounts which he wrote of them. Particularly valuable are his comments on the ethnogeography of the Arizona Indian tribes, the focal point of his interest. His most extensive and noteworthy journey began on October 21, 1775, embraced more than two thousand miles of travel over desert, mountains, and river lands, and ended on September 17, 1776. Though some of the terrain was familiar as a result of earlier exploratory activity, Garcés also followed hitherto unknown paths. His route took him from Tubac to the Gila, via that stream to the Yuma crossing of the Colorado, upstream to the Needles, across the Mojave Desert to California, north for an early penetration into the Central Valley, back to the Needles, and across northern Arizona to the Hopi village of Oraibe. At the final point Garcés, who was customarily a great attraction and well received by the natives, was greeted with hostility by the local Indians.
Garcés concluded his account with a series of recommendations concerning steps which Spain should take to secure and solidify the recently reactivated northward expansion. Unfortunately, little heed was paid to his suggestions, and he was soon to lose his life in the Yuma massacre of 1781.
The manuscript version forms part of the personal collection of John Galvin, and it is published in elegant style and format, worthy of the contents. The book is both a collector’s item and a contribution to the published documentary record of the Southwest. The translation is satisfactory, although the footnoting is sparse. A single fault stands out amidst such high quality of production: the inclusion of color plates which have no relationship either to the area or to the period. Thus we find included from Bartlett’s surveys of the mid-nineteenth century a mounted Lipan Apache, some Pima women, and some Yuma Indians. Two maps, one by Fr. Pedro Font, O.F.M., and the other detailing the route of Garcés’ travels, are useful.
