José Matías Moreno
[2] Moreno did not immediately follow his mother and stepfather to San Diego but remained in Baja California Sur to study with Father Gabriel González, a Spanish-born Dominican priest.
In 1842, he was involved in a rebellion that took place in La Paz, Baja California Sur, part of an effort organized by González in opposition to a decree that opened the ex-mission lands to colonization by private individuals.
[2] Doña Felipa Osuna de Marrón, at that time living at Mission San Luis Rey, recalled a visit by Moreno at the start of the Mexican–American War.
When armed men showed up to arrest Moreno, she hid him by ordering him into bed with a rag around his head so that he appeared to be sick.
[4] Moreno joined Governor Pío Pico in Mexico where they petitioned for arms, munitions, men, and money to defend Alta California.
Her mother was descended from Ignacio López, a Catalan soldier who came to Alta California with the 1774 expedition of Juan Bautista de Anza.
[5][6] In 1851, Moreno served briefly in a company of volunteers composed of San Diegans temporarily mustered into the U.S. Army to put down Antonio Garra's revolt against American settlers and government officials who encroached on Cupeño lands.
"[9] In 1861, Moreno was appointed subjefe político de La Frontera (deputy military chief) and commissioned to protect the interests of the Mexican government.
He and a garrison of troops made their headquarters at the Rancho ex-Misíon de Guadalupe where they worked to undermine filibusters, or unauthorized military expeditions that aimed to capture and annex Lower California.
[11] He made political enemies by enforcing an 1853 law prohibiting foreigners from owning land within 60 miles of the border, among them Juan Bandini, a Peruvian-born Californio.
!...The sentiment is more grand and sublime in these actual circumstances in which some traitor favored by the French despots wish to destroy our nationality, tearing down the Republic in order to place upon us a king.”[9] In 1858, in the wake of a mining boom in Baja California,[14][15] the Mexican government sold what it described as terrines baldíos or "unoccupied" lands, including the Rancho ex-Misíon de Guadalupe in the fertile Valle de Guadalupe located east of Ensenada.
[16] In 1863, Moreno secured a clear title to Rancho ex-Misíon de Guadalupe which included a ruined adobe house, 2,000 grape vines in poor condition, an orchard, and farmland.
