24. Hewett and Fisher, Mission Monuments , p. 81.

25. Scholes discussed the origins of the position of custos and ascertained when the title was first used. He concluded that although there had been other Franciscans who had earlier headed the missionary program in New Mexico, it was Fray Estevan de Perea who actually served as the first custodian. Scholes, "Problems in the Early Ecclesiastical History," pp. 32-75.

The custody was established in part as a response to the Oñate crisis and to the problems involved with canceling colonization in New Mexico and the concomitant abandonment of those Indians already converted—said to number more than 2,000. "Hence, it was finally decided to turn the colony over to the crown as a mission station with control in the hands of the clergy, the entire area being converted in a custodia , with the military there only to protect the missionaries." Beck, New Mexico , p. 59.

26. Prince, Spanish Mission Churches , pp. 45-49.

27. Spicer, Cycles of Conquest , p. 167; cited in Dozier, The Pueblo Indians , pp. 48-49.

28. Hewett and Fisher, Mission Monuments , p. 102.

29. Walter, "Mission Churches," p. 116.

30. "Against smallpox, measles, whooping cough, and cholera, they had no natural resistance, and they died in droves. . . . Other epidemics in the 1660s further thinned their ranks." Simmons, New Mexico , p. 65.