Search California Death Records

•  California Newspapers, Full Search (1846-2016), 459 titles
•  California Obituary Search, (1865-current)
•  California Birth Records Database, (1846-1899)

Mission Santa Barbara Cemetery
Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara County, California

Bishop Francisco Garcia Diego

Bishop Francisco Garcia Diego is interred within the church sanctuary, separate from the church crypt.

There is a plaque in the cemetery which provides some information, which I copied below:

Bishop Francisco Garcia Diego

The burial in the church, but not in the crypt, as that of California's first bishop, Fray Francisco García Diego y Moreno, who maintained his residence at the mission between 1842 and 1846. He was a native Lagos, Mexico, born on Sept. 17, 1785. He became a Franciscan at the College of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Zacatecas in 1803. There he was master of novices, professor and home missionary. He came to California in 1833 and labored at Santa Clara until 1836 when he returned to Mexico on official business. On Apr. 27, 1840, Pope Gregory XVI appointed García Diego first bishop of both Californias. Mission Santa Barbara was his pro-cathedral and mission dwellings his episcopal hospice. He died at the mission on Apr. 30, 1846, his funeral taking place on May 3. He was buried in the floor of the sanctuary on the epistle side at the juncture of the side and rear walls. An entablature on the side wall indicates the site of his grave.