"The Franciscan missionaries stationed at San Carlos Mission (established in 1770) recruited converts from the Carmel River basin and nearby areas from the 1770's through the first decade of the nineteenth century.
The Indian population increased in size until the last phase of active recruitment occurred in the 1803-7 quinquennium, during which period the missionaries baptized 108 converts, 71 in the year 1806 alone. After 1807 only 24 more converts came to the mission, and the population of the mission began a steady decline.
The numbers reached a recorded maximum of 876 in 1795, to a mere 165 in 1834, on the eve of the secularization of the mission.
The mission population experienced a net decline of 62 percent per generation and mean life expectancy was low, averaging 7.6 years at birth. "
From: Indians, Franciscans, and Spanish Colonization by Jackson and Castillo, 1995
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