San Juan Capistrano

The story begins in 1775, when Mission San Juan Capistrano was first founded by Father Lasuen, on October 30th. But just a few weeks after the party of padres and soldiers arrived, they received word of the revolt occurring in San Diego. The founding padres and soldiers decided to leave San Juan Capistrano and go back to San Diego to help there. Once things had settled in San Diego, Saint Serra personally led a party to re-found Mission San Juan Capistrano on All Saint's Day, November 1, 1776.

Mission San Juan Capistrano became the seventh of twenty-one missions to be founded in Alta California. Like the previous six missions, San Juan Capistrano was established to expand the territorial boundaries of Spain and to spread Christianity to the Native peoples of California. Unlike the British colonies on the East Coast of North America, which brought people from their homeland to form colonies, the Spanish believed they could transform the Native peoples into good Spanish citizens. The idea was to make colonial outposts called missions, led by Franciscan padres and Spanish soldiers. The missions would be a center of learning and training of Native peoples. The Spanish government and Catholic Church wanted to convert the people to Christianity and train them in a Spanish or European lifestyle so that the Native peoples would eventually live in towns and pay taxes, like good Spanish citizens.

In reality, the Spanish padres and soldiers had a huge task ahead of them. Moving into the frontier, making a community from scratch, and trying to communicate with and convert the Native Americans was not an easy task.

For over the next 30 years, Mission San Juan Capistrano grew in population, buildings, livestock, and prominence. By 1806, Mission San Juan Capistrano had a population of over 1,000 people, over 10,000 head of cattle, and a completed architectural gem, The Great Stone Church.

After 1812, the Mission began to decline. Many factors were involved in the Mission's decline, including the earthquake in December of 1812, which caused the Great Stone Church to collapse; the decline in birth rate; the increasing mortality rate of the population due to disease; and the inability of the Spanish government to adequately protect and supply the Missions with needed goods.

By 1821, Mexico won its independence from Spain, which made Alta California a territory of Mexico. Under new governmental direction, the Mission faced continued decline. By 1834, the Mexican government decided to end the mission system entirely. Soon after the decree of secularization, or the ending of the missions, the landholdings of Mission San Juan Capistrano were divided and sold to 20 prominent California families. By 1845, Governor Pio Pico even sold the Mission itself. The Mission was sold at auction to John Forster, Governor Pio Pico's brother-in-law, for $710, when it was valued to be worth more than $54,000. For the next 20 years, the Mission was a private ranch property of the Forster family.

Mission San Juan Capistrano, like California, saw yet another government take over California when the United States won the Mexican American War in 1848. As part of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, California and other western territories were ceded to the United States. With the Gold Rush beginning and millions of Americans moving to California, Mission San Juan Capistrano would see another great change.

Only a few years after acquiring the territory of California, the United States declared it a state in 1850. Many California dioceses and parishioners petitioned the government to have mission buildings and lands returned to the church. People were saddened at the state of the missions. Some mission buildings had been turned into stores, bars, inns, or even stables. Most were falling apart and not maintained.

(History courtesy of San Juan Capistrano website)

Address: 26801 Old Mission Road, San Capistrano, CA 92675

Phone: 949-234-1300

Owner: Catholic Church

Website: https://sanjuancapistrano.org

Hauntings: An LA Times article states that most of San Juan Capistrano’s alleged ghosts can be found at the mission. There are claims that a faceless monk roams the corridors at night.

There is also said to be the ghost of a headless soldier and of a girl named Magdalena. She died during the earthquake of 1812 (it killed 42 Native Americans and also destroyed the mission’s church).

It’s said her face can sometimes be seen in the remaining window of the church’s ruins. The sound of bells can sometimes be heard at night.

Scents of tobacco sometimes are encountered.

The Ghost Research Society investigated the Mission San Juan Capistrano on Aril 25, 2024 and the team members included: Charles Williams and Dale Kaczmarek.

Equipment setup: only hand-held equipment was used like the Ovilus V, digital recorder, Melmeter with telescopic probe and 4k camcorder.

Experiments performed: one single Ovilus V was conducted at the site of the old chapel.

Personal experiences:

Dale Kaczmarek: I did not fell anything unusual while visiting or investigating this site. It was a very beautiful place with a lot of history associated with it.

Evidence collected: None!

Words spoken by the Ovilus V: cousin, strength, weeps, us, eggs, (background noise), creek, pendant, ledge, off, (children noise nearby), stay, hold, threshold, cell and sign.

Conclusions: Even though there was a lot of tragedy due to an earthquake and the killing of a soldier on the property, no intelligent responses were received in response to questions asked. However, a few words spoken by the Ovilus V were interesting including: weeps, pendant and threshold.

Our single EVP session was conducted at the old chapel ruins where a female’s face is still occasionally seen in one of the chapel’s windows.

This location is absolutely beautiful with the flowers, structure itself and the legends of the swallows that still return every year but a lot of the birds roost in the eaves of nearby homes that line the perimeter of the mission.