88 HISTORY OF PASADENA. 



ernment, and he preferred it to any English protectorate. With these 

 views, he and his brother-in-law, Arguello, had espoused the American 

 cause. The Mexican government had ordered all the ranchers to drive 

 their cattle, horses, hogs and sheep to the mountains, beyond reach of any 

 American troops that might land along the coast. Bandini then owned two 

 great ranches, Guadalupe and Tecate, in lyower California,* and he refused 

 to obey this order, but instead had armed all his tenants and employes, 

 ready to fight if any Mexican troops attempted to enforce that order on his 

 lands. This was the situation in November and December. Stockton's 

 army was literally " out of meat ;" and now he sent an expedition down in- 

 to lyOwer Caliiornia, which became very famous by reason of " a woman in 

 the case," Dona Refugio Bandini, who made from her children's garments 

 the first American flag ever made on the Pacific coast, and thus at the time 

 met a serious emergency for an American army officer marching without a 

 flag. 



THE ARMY FLAG MADE FROM CHILDREN'S DRESSES. 



During the winter of 1882-83 Mr. H. C. Dane learned from Col. R. S. 

 Baker and wife, and Dona Refugio Bandini and her daughters, Mrs. Dr. 

 Winston and Mrs. Charles R. Johnson the particulars of the first American 

 flag ever made on the Pacific coast. Mr. Dane wrote out the story and it 

 was published in The Home Guardian magazine of Boston, for April, 1883. 

 And from its pages, 154 to 157, (Vol XLV, No. 4,) I make the following 

 extracts :t 



" Cut off" from all other sources of supplies, the Commodore despatched 

 a vessel down to Todos Santos Bay, [now called Ensenada] opposite the 

 San Guadalupe rancho, with 200 men under command of Major Hensly, 

 with orders to land and proceed to Guadahipe, and there obtain the neces- 

 sary supplies of Don Juan Bandini. When the vessel arrived at Todos San- 

 tos Bay, Don Juan was there, secreted among the rocks, awaiting them. 

 With Major Hensly and his men Don Juan returned to his rancho, where he 

 gave to him 500 cattle, 200 horses, and eight carretas, or long, narrow carts, 

 usually drawn by four, six, or eight yokes of oxen each. 



"As the Mexican forces were hovering about Bandini's ranches, es- 

 peciall}^ about the San Guadalupe, in great numbers, and realizing that he 

 and his family would no longer be safe in their vicinit}^ Don Juan, with all 

 his family, left the rancho with Major Hensly and started overland for San 

 Diego, where he had a very large house — a kind of Spanish palace.;}: 



" In due time the party arrived at I^a Punta, fifteen miles below San 

 Diego, where they went into camp for the last night. In the morning 

 Major Hensly, wishing for a flag to head his column, to his chagrin and dis- 

 gust discovered that none had been brought with them from the vessel. 



*He had previously owned the Jurupa ranch [Riverside] and the Rincon de Santa Ana'ranch in the 

 San Gabriel district. 



fin the Centennial History of Los Angeles Co., pp. 32-33, Col. J. J. Warner gives some account of this 

 Bandini flag incident ; but there is no other accoxuit of it so full and authentic as this one by Mr. Dane. 



I" Our adminislrador, Don Juan Bandini's mansion, then in an unfinished state, bade fair when 

 completed to surpass any other in the country." — "/.;'/;' in California.^' f>. iS, March, 1S29. Bv Alfred 

 Robinson, who is still living (18941, and now a banker in San Francisco, although blind. 



