From this time California was not so well governed. Mexico, which was then an empire but soon became a republic, had its hands full looking after its own affairs, and little attention was paid its far-off province. Its best men were needed at home, and the governors sent up the coast were not always wise or pleasing to the people. There were several revolutions with but little bloodshed. One governor was sent back to Mexico. At one time the Californians declared that theirs was a free state, and a young man named Alvarado was made governor. General Vallejo, who was his uncle, was given command of the army. But soon the Californians quarreled bitterly among themselves, so that this government did not last long and the territory went back under the rule of Mexico. That government, in order to have peace in the province, confirmed Alvarado and Vallejo in their positions. During the war between Mexico and Spain a South American pirate paid a visit to the coast of Upper California. Monterey was attacked and partly destroyed, also the mission of San Juan Capistrano and the rancho El Refugio, the home of Captain Ortega, the discoverer of San Francisco Bay. In the crew of the pirate ship was a young American named Chapman, who had found life among his rough associates not so interesting as he had hoped it would be, so he deserted, but was taken prisoner by the Californians and imprisoned in a canyon near the present site of Pasadena. Later he was brought down to Los Angeles and set at liberty. He found the people of the pueblo planning to build a church on the plaza, and he told them that if they would let him have some Indian workmen he would get some large timbers down from the canyon. He accomplished this successfully, and it was considered a wonderful work. The stumps of the trees can yet be seen far up on the mountain side, and the timbers are still in the plaza church. Visiting San Gabriel, young Chapman found the padres having trouble to keep the flour which they ground in their new stone mill from being dampened by water from the mill wheel. Knowing something of machinery, the American remedied the defect by means of a flutter wheel, and there was no more trouble. For years the catching of otters for their fur along the lagoons and bays about San Francisco and Monterey brought considerable money to the northern missions. Chapman, finding that the padres of San Gabriel were anxious to engage in this trade, built for them the first sea-going boat ever constructed in southern California. It was a schooner, the various parts of which he made in the workshop of the mission. They were then carried down to San Pedro, where he put them together and successfully launched the vessel.