Fremont House

This simple two-story adobe, typical of the Mexican period, was long been thought to be the headquarters of John C. Fremont, known as “The Pathfinder,” when Fremont and his “heavily armed” topographers came to Monterey in July of 1846. But several contemporary diaries – including Fremont’s, Lt. William Tecumseh Sherman’s, and that of Fred Walpole, a British Naval officer who was serving on a ship anchored in Monterey Bay at the time of Fremont’s arrival, contradict the old story.

Walpole described their encampment thus: “They were marched up to an open space on the hills near the town, under some large firs, and there took up their quarters in messes of six or seven in the open air.”

Walpole also had this to say about Fremont and his men: “Here were true trappers, the class that produced the heroes of Fenimore Cooper’s best works. These men had passed years in the wilds, living on their own resources; they were a curious set.”

It was later thought that Fremont and his wife Jessie stayed in the adobe in 1849, during the Constitutional Convention where Fremont was a delegate.

What is known about its construction reveals that its thick, sturdy, walls are veined for strength with straight and flowery grasses of pre-American Monterey. Actual ownership of the little adobe has been traced through several Monterey families. In 1861, it was sold by Antonio Maria Vasquez and his wife, Asuncion Boronda Vasquez, for $200. By the late 1800s it was the family home of Crisimo Castro, who came to Monterey during the Gold Rush period.

A campaign to save the Fremont Adobe in 1960 was successful, with the cooperation of the Federal Government, the City of Monterey, Monterey History & Art Association, and the Monterey Peninsula Foundation. MHAA purchased the building and a minimum of land beneath it to preserve it for future generations.

Fremont Adobe
539 Hartnell Street
Monterey, California
Latitude: 36.596372
Longitude: -121.895921
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