Rancho San Lorenzo (Randall)
Rancho San Lorenzo was a 22,264-acre (90.10 km2) Mexican land grant in present-day Monterey County, California given in 1842 by Governor Juan Alvarado to Francisco Rico. The grant extended along San Lorenzo Creek in Peach Tree Valley.
Andrew Randall (1819–1856), a native of Rhode Island, came to California in 1849 as the newly appointed customs inspector for Monterey. Randall was an entrepreneur with training as a geologist. He founded, and was elected chairman of the California Academy of Sciences. In addition to Rancho San Lorenzo he was the claimant for Rancho Cañada de la Segunda in Monterey County; and Rancho Punta de los Reyes and Rancho Punta de los Reyes Sobrante in Marin County; and Rancho Aguas Frias in Butte County - a little over 110,000 acres (445 km2). However he had stretched his credit to the limit, and Randall could not or would not pay immediately. Joseph Hetherington a creditor undertook to force payment by hounding him on every occasion with insults and threats. Hetherington fatally shot Randall in a San Francisco hotel on July 24, 1856, and the Committee of Vigilance hanged Hetherington July 29, 1856.
With the cession of California to the United States following the Mexican-American War, the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo provided that the land grants would be honored. As required by the Land Act of 1851, a claim was filed with the Public Land Commission in 1853, and the grant was patented to Andrew Randall in 1870.
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