Today marks 172 years since Don Andres Pico, General of the California Lancers, met with Lt. Col. John C. Fremont, of the California Battalion of Mounted Naval Dragoons (sic), at Campo de Cahuenga to accept American rule of Alta California.

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The morning was drizzly and cold, just like today, and the spot was on land that Don Andres thought of as his own. His enemy, Fremont, had spent the previous night encamped around Pico’s Rancho Ex-Mission San Fernando.

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Pico had stopped at this Campo many times, on trips through the Cahuenga Pass to and from Los Angeles. (Pico once may have had a mayordomo living at the Campo, managing his interests.) Nevertheless, for his own sake, and charged with the greater interests of California, Pico accepted Capitulation.

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The paper was signed on a porch, giving on the rainy Valley Village View.

That moment, Pico and Fremont ended the Mexican War in California. Manifest Destiny had completed its work, the continent west of the Rockies became America, and the Californios were brought into the American people with the very highest honors that humanity knows — the rights of free and equal citizens in a democracy. It’s true: all this happened right here in Studio City.

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These rights, the Californios had fought and died to vouchsafe. The Lancers had liberated their capital Los Angeles from the Yankee invaders; trounced the U.S. Marines at San Pedro, and scourged the regular Army at San Pasqual in the months leading up to Cahuenga. But Fremont offered honorable terms to achieve what most Californios wanted most dearly: that their land would remain theirs. (The other two commanders in California, Stockton and Kearny, wanted to hang the Californio leaders, loot and dispossess the ranchos, and let the coyotes nip the heels of the hindmost Californios fleeing “back to Mexico.” Stockton, in particular, vowed that he would achieve victory if he had to “wade through the Los Angeles Plaza with the blood of Mexicans lapping over the tops of his boots.”) Upon hearing of Fremont’s publicity-hogging masterstroke, Stockton reputedly had a connitption, but then wisely accepted that Manifest Destiny would have the last word in history.

Kit Carson was Fremont’s guide, sidekick, and stalwart friend. Thanks to “Golden West” mythologizing, Carson remains the only figure of that day remotely remembered by the American public. Sadly, Carson’s savage record as a man-killer probably helped the dime-novel myths take root.

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As the ink on the armistice dried, and a somewhat garbled Spanish translation was written out, Gen. Pico rode with his Lancers over the Pass to Los Angeles, into the Plaza, and there under the American flag they lay down their arms, with the colors of Mexico (above). Fremont (who had hurried ahead to gussy up in his epaulettes and ostrich plumes) received them in triumph, mounted on his horse “Sacramento” beside a humiliated, out-foxed, and up-staged Stockton. Still, the Commodore from Princeton had his crack Marine Brass Band unit on hand to play out the old regime, and play in the new. Surely it’s only a legend, that the relieved Angelenos brought out their guitars and aguardiente, let out their daughters, and lit off fireworks while the senoritas danced for the Yankees all night long.

During the weeks after the conquest, while he was Jefe of California, Fremont reportedly infuriated his envious commanding officers by sauntering around Los Angeles in a silver-spangled sombrero and colorful serape, kicking his boots up onto the desk as he presided over the LA ayuntamiento, and generally endearing himself forever to the people of Los Angeles. He had gone native. His court-martial followed soon after.