Royal Presidio Chapel, Monterey: California's Oldest Stone Building

The Royal Presidio Chapel. Photograph by Carol M. Highsmith, Library of Congress.

Monterey, founded in 1770 by the Spanish captain Gaspar de Portolá and Father Junípero Serra, was Spain's northernmost outpost in Alta California and later California's capital under Spanish, Mexican and early American rule. The Royal Presidio Chapel of San Carlos de Borroméo de Monterey, completed in 1795 to replace buildings first put up in 1770, is a reminder of the city's Spanish and Mexican origins and of its importance to California's history. A National Historic Landmark, it is the only presidio chapel still standing on its original site in California, and the only 18th-century Spanish architecture left in Monterey.

From log hut to stone chapel

The Presidio of Monterey was founded on June 3, 1770, the second of four presidios Spain would set up in Alta California (San Diego was the first, San Francisco the third). Portolá, then governor, and Serra established it with about 60 Spaniards, the first Europeans in the area. Within weeks the colonists had put up rough log huts for housing and a primitive chapel, plastered with mud and roofed with layered twigs, leaves and earth.

The chapel was rebuilt in adobe in 1773. By 1776 Monterey was the Spanish capital of California, and the chapel served until fire destroyed it in 1789. The Academy of San Carlos in Mexico City designed its replacement, and Native American labourers under the master stonemason Manuel Ruiz built it. Completed in 1795, the sandstone chapel was a storey and a half high, rectangular, on a classic basilica plan, with a square, flat-roofed, two-storey bell tower at its northeast corner and an arched main roof of clay tile. Pilasters, niches and intricate sculpture decorate its front, and it is the most elaborate and ornate of all the Spanish-built churches in California.

Surviving the town around it

• In 1818 the Argentine pirate Hippolyte de Bouchard attacked Monterey. The Spanish garrison abandoned the presidio and its residents, and Bouchard ransacked the town and burned most of it, leaving much of it as bare adobe walls, but he did not destroy the stone chapel.
• After Mexico declared independence from Spain in 1821, Monterey rebuilt and became a busy Mexican capital and centre of trade again. The Spanish-era buildings decayed, and by 1841 the chapel was the only one left standing.
• In 1858 the chapel was lengthened by 30 feet and given transepts at its southern end, turning its plan into a cross; Gothic-style stained-glass windows were added about the same time.
• In 1893 the bell tower's flat roof was replaced by today's pointed pyramid roof, and the crosses along the roofline were probably added then.

The front, the main walls and much of the interior are still original to the 1790s.

The altar of the Royal Presidio Chapel. Photograph by Carol M. Highsmith, Library of Congress.

Today

The chapel is California's oldest stone building and the church that has operated longest on one site in the state. It was one of the nation's earliest National Historic Landmarks, in 1961, and became a cathedral in 1967, when a new bishop arrived in Monterey. Now called San Carlos Cathedral, it is the smallest Catholic cathedral in the continental United States, part of a complex with offices, a rectory and an early grade school.

• Inside are the original Stations of the Cross; the statues of St. John, the Sorrowful Mother and the Spanish Madonna; and a bas-relief of Our Lady of Guadalupe carved in chalk rock above the entrance, all fine examples of primitive art.
• A small museum and heritage centre beside the chapel holds Catholic relics, among them Father Serra's iron safe, chalice, cape and dalmatics, and a roughly carved reliquary made by Native Americans. Docents lead school programmes, and group and individual tours run daily; hours are on the San Carlos Cathedral website.
• The chapel is also part of Monterey State Historic Park, a California state park of historic houses and buildings across Old Monterey, linked by a two-mile walking path marked with yellow tiles.

Sources

• National Park Service, "Royal Presidio Chapel: The Oldest Stone Building in CA." https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/royal-presidio-chapel-ca.htm