| Notes: Padre Middendorf professed his vows on October 21, 1741, arrived in the New World from Germany in company with Padres Gerstner, Pfefferkorn, Och, and Hlava in 1756. Assigned to a punitive expedition led by Governor Mendoza and Captain Elias Gonzales of Terrenate in November of 1756, after the attack on Padre Espinosa at San Xavier, he later returned to San Ignacio in December where he waited for a permanent assignment. On January 5, 1757 he was sent among the Indians at Santa Catalina-Tucson to found a mission. He had a ten-soldier escort. With gifts of dried meat he soon attracted some seventy families. However, on a May night his beginnings were destroyed by about 500 Indians who ravaged the village. He fled, arriving at San Xavier by daybreak. Father Middendorf stayed two weeks at Guevavi on his way to another unfortunate experience at Sáric, and Tucson reverted again to a visita of Bac. He baptized eight children while staying with Padre Pauer at Guevavi between August 6 and 21, 1757. By 1764 he was at Batuc completing the stone church that Padre Rapicani had started. He was arrested at Movas at the time of the expulsion, and eventually found his way into exile in his home country of Germany. |
