On January 13, 1847, Mexican Gen. Andrés Pico formally surrendered to U.S. forces under Col. John C. Frémont, effectively ending hostilities between the United States and Mexico in California.

The agreement, known as the Treaty of Cahuenga, was signed near present-day Universal City and served as a cease-fire that brought the fighting in Alta California to a close.

The treaty came one month after the decisive Battle of San Pasqual in present-day northern San Diego County, where Edward F. Beale and famed frontiersman Kit Carson played key roles in defeating Pico’s forces.

Frémont, who had mapped many western routes, including the Santa Clarita Valley in the early 1840s, had also camped in the valley on January 9-11, 1847, while pursuing Pico’s troops through the San Fernando Valley.

Although they had been battlefield enemies, the end of the war marked the beginning of a new chapter for both men in the Santa Clarita Valley.

After the conflict, Pico lived at the San Fernando Mission and began extracting asphaltum from an area east of present-day Newhall, now called Pico Canyon. He would collaborate with Charles H. Brindley and James R. Vineyard to create a deep slot-like road cut through the San Fernando Pass.

This roadway would later be taken over by Beale and widened into the main thoroughfare between the Santa Clarita and San Fernando valleys, named Beale’s Cut Stagecoach Pass.

To read the previous Today in SCV History, click HERE.

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