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From:
Subject: Re: Tiburcio the Bandit
Date: 23 Jun 2003 00:13:18 -0600
This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list.
Surnames: Vasquez, Lorenzana, Rodriguez
Classification: Query
Message Board URL:
http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/4IUBAEB/238.1.1.1.1.1.1.1
Message Board Post:
I have to look around to find Tiburcio's birth. I believe I once saw in an old newspaper. It may be in the Mutnick books or Bancroft's information. The cousin I am talking about is Catarina Rodriguez de Berryessa. She dictated a story to a San Mateo college student around 1925 about some of the interesting events in her life, and she mentioned Tiburcio Vasquez.
Faustino de Jesus Lorenzana was born January 15, 1835 at his parent's adobe in Branciforte (Santa Cruz) He was the 11th child of Macedonio Lorenzana and Romualda Vasquez Lorenzana. Macedonio was a full-blooded Menteranea Indian who was born in Mexico City in 1787. He was orphaned as a young child and sent to the Lorenzana Orphanage; thus he was named Lorenzana. On June 2, 1800 he was sent from San Blas Mexico to Alta California. He was placed in the home of Francisco Castro, a resident of San Jose. He joined the army as a teenager and was stationed at the Presidio of San Francisco. On June 8, 1816 Macedonio married Maria Romualda Vasquez at Mission Santa Clara. She was the daughter of Antonio Vasquez and Maria Leocadia, an Indian neophyte of Mission Santa Clara. Their son Faustino spent his childhood in the company of his many brothers prowling about Branciforte. His real education came at the hands of vaqueros (cowboys) who tended the vast herds of cattle roaming !
across the area. He worked on his father's ranch and at the Rodriguez's ranchos in the Live Oak district. Faustino's first brush with the law came in Dec. 1859 at age 24 yrs. He was at a fandango and joined a drunken brawl. When the sheriff came in to break it up, everyone backed off except Faustino who was cursing loudly in Spanish and brandishing a pistol. The sheriff and his men jumped Faustino and hauled him off to jail. A trial was held, but due to fact that no one was hurt or shot, Faustino was left free. After that it was one thing after another, as well as, more fandangos and drunken brawls until he and his friends ended up killing the sheriff. That did it. From then on it was hiding from the law until a group of vigilantees got after him. Faustino escaped the vigilantees, but his brother Pedro was hung by them. Faustino headed for Southern San Benito County where there were many caves for the banditos to hide in. Here he eventually joined Tiburcio Vasquez!
and he received the name, Charole. He was finally found by a posse and they caught him while he was sleeping near Santa Barbara. He jumped up and started firing at the posse, but it was no use. They killed him. The date was August 29, 1870.
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