Vol. VIll] /.V MEMORIAM: THEODORE HENRY HITTELL 15 



of California. His experiences of six years as a San Fran- 

 cisco editor and his delving into historical records in connec- 

 tion with his law work, had revealed to him the wealth of 

 material for an amazing story. It was practically a virgin 

 field. Though up to that time there had been a number of 

 books on certain picturesque phases of San Francisco and 

 California, there had not yet appeared an orderly, continuous 

 and comprehensive record of the great drama of the discov- 

 ery, settlement and development of this State. His literary 

 imagination leaped at the visioned opportunity. 



The principal material for the early history of the State 

 was buried in that immense and practically undigested mass 

 of documents known as the "Archives of California." These 

 were in manuscript, mostly in Spanish, a very few in English, 

 German and Russian. Soon after California was admitted as 

 a State, the vital value of these early documents was seen, 

 both in reference to the complex land titles and also as his- 

 torical records. They consisted of letters, proclamations, 

 Mexican and Spanish official orders and various memoranda. 

 At length, by order of the United States Government, they 

 were collected and bound. Though there was an attempt to 

 segregate them into convenient classifications, it was a diffi- 

 cult if not an impossible task. In consequence, documents 

 germane to a given subject would be found in widely scat- 

 tered volumes, which made the gathering of material much 

 more complicated and vexatious. 



These "Archives of California" comprised nearly three 

 hundred bound volumes of about 800 pages each and con- 

 tained about 250,000 written pages. They were in the office 

 of the U. S. Surveyor General in the U. S. Treasury Build- 

 ing, on Commercial street. In the great fire of 1906 the 

 larger portion was burned, but many of the documents can 

 possibly be restored due to the Spanish system of preserva- 

 tion. Some certified copies are now in Mexico or Spain, and 

 some may be found in the British Museum and various li- 

 braries in this country. 



For historical purposes the Archives were absolutely indis- 

 pensable, and in them Mr. Hittell found a great part of the 

 material for the early period. As a rule, the chirography was 

 good, though in many instances the ink had faded. Since 



