The Garden

The garden became a formal part of the Mission after the rebuilding of the church in 1931 and contains plants including palm trees, bougainvillea, allow vera roses. It also contains crosses made from original mission tiles in remembrance of Indian neophytes who died during the mission period. A statue of St. Joseph represents the patron saint of the expedition to San Diego, whom many believed miraculously saved the expedition and prevented the abandonment of the Mission after padres and soldiers, under Padre Serra's guidance, offered a novena of prayers in March 1770 for the arrival of a supply ship. On March 19, St. Joseph's Feast Day, a ship bound for Monterey was sighted on the horizon and entered San Diego after losing an anchor, sparing the men from starvation and allowing the expedition to establish missions in Alta California to continue. From 1891 to 1908, Fr. Antonio Ubach and the Sisters of St. Joseph Carondelet conducted an Indian School at the Mission, and the large white building west of the garden served as a girls dormitory. The wishing well statue of St. Francis of Assisi represents the founder of the Franciscan Order; Saint Francis devoted his life to preaching, teaching the faith, caring for the sick, loving nature, and restoring abandoned churches, and the padres who established and worked at the 21 missions in Alta California were Franciscans.

San Diego, California · United States