Bolivar: American Liberator
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It was a stucco house, etc.: Details from a personal visit and research by the docent staff, Museo Casa de Bolívar, Plaza Bolívar, Pueblo Libre, Lima, Peru, March 2011.
might even take up arms, etc.: Inés Quintero, paper presented at the symposium “Creating Freedom in the Americas, 1776–1826,” LOC, Nov. 19, 2010.
rarely . . . paid a salary: Murray, For Glory and Bolívar, 37. Murray explains that Sáenz’s salary was paid out from SB’s account. Since he had refused a salary from Peru, this may well have been from his expense allotment.
a cavalry soldier, a hussar: SB to O’Leary, Lima, Sept. 28, 1823, Alvarez Saá, Manuela, 76.
When she read of it in a routine report: Sáenz to SB, Lima, Feb. 27, 1824, ibid., 77.
called on President Torre Tagle to negotiate: SB to Col. Heres, Pativilca, Jan. 9, 1824, SBO, II, 872–76.
a title he found odious: SB to the Peruvian Congress, in Larrazábal, Vida, II, 235. “I would have preferred never to have seen Peru again—preferred even our defeat—to the frightening title of Dictator.”
still hallowed by a republican aura: Wu, 14.
On February 27, he and his top ministers, etc.: Sáenz to SB, Lima, Feb. 27, 1824, Alvarez Saá, 77. Also O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 289. Joining Torre Tagle were the famous Diego Aliaga (whose ancestor had come to Peru with Pizarro) and Minister of War Berindoaga.
including Manuela Sáenz: Heres to SB, Chanquillo, Feb. 13, 1824, O’L, V, 67.
He wrote to his generals, etc.: SB to Gen. Salom, Pativilca, Feb. 10, 1824, SBO, II, 916–18; SB to Santander, Feb. 10, 1824, ibid., 918–21; SB to Sucre, Feb. 13, 1824, ibid., 921–26; SB to Gen. La Mar, Feb. 14, 1824, ibid., 926–27.
stronger ties to Spain: S. O’Phelan, “Sucre en el Perú,” La independencia en el Perú: De los Borbones a Bolívar (Lima: Pont. Univ. Católica del Perú, 2001), 379–406.
mixed-race ruffians: Ibid.
They had learned to be patriots: The historian is Morote, Bolívar: Libertador y enemigo no. 1 del Perú, 48.
“I’m through making promises”: SB to Santander, Pativilca, Jan. 23, 1824, SBO, II, 887–89.
“itinerant government”: SB to Santander, Pativilca, Jan. 25, 1824, SBSW, II, 433–35.
full battle plan for General Sucre: SB to Sucre, Pativilca, Jan. 26, 1824, SBO, II, 896–901.
“Send troops and we’ll win”: SB to Santander, Pativilca, Feb. 10, 1824, ibid., and Trujillo, March 16, 1824, ibid.
turned Trujillo into a teeming arsenal, etc.: O’Leary Bolívar y la emancipación, 296.
Silver was seized from church: SB to Sucre, Trujillo, March 21, 1824, SBO, II, 939–42.
more than 100,000 pesos, etc.: Morote, 57.
ordered seamstresses, etc.: O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 296. Also Lecuna, Crónica, III, 396.
cattle necessary to feed his troops: SB to La Mar, Huaraz, June 14, 1824, SBO, II, 984–85.
Lambayeque and Piura, etc.: Ibid., 58.
Panama, greater Guatemala, Mexico: SB to Sucre, Trujillo, April 9, 1824, SBSW, II, 444–47; also SB to Heres, Huamachuco, April 23, 1824, SBO, II, 958–59.
as if Mars had sprung: O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 297.
an army of eight thousand: Lynch, Simón Bolívar, 191.
In April, it became evident, etc.: SB to Heres, Otuzco, April 15, 1824, SBO, II, 953–54.
Bolívar eventually wrote to Olañeta: SB to Olañeta, Huaraz, May 21, 1824, ibid., 975–77.
“For God’s sake, send me”: SB to Pérez, Huamachuco, May 6, 1824, ibid., 963–65.
spread out a map of Peru, etc.: O’Connor, 67.
Valdés and five thousand men: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 402, 404. The royalists had 20,000 troops in Peru. Sixteen thousand were active soldiers; the rest were guarding garrisons around the area.
“As far as I can see”: O’Connor, 68.
“This youngster has just given us”: Ibid.
rich fields of sugarcane, etc.: Paulding, 48.
only a day’s ride away: Murray, For Glory and Bolívar, 38.
“an irresistibly fresh doll,” etc.: From the great nineteenth-century Peruvian essayist-historian Ricardo Palma, Mis últimas tradiciones peruanas (Barcelona: Editorial Maucci, 1908), 146.
“You will note that though I beg”: SB to Santander, Huamachuco, May 6, 1824, SBO, II, 966–68.
regards to the unattainable Bernardina: Ibid.
the wittiest, most profoundly human: Madariaga, 479.
“The general has written me only twice,” etc.: Sáenz to Santana, Huamachuco, May 28, 1824, Lecuna, “Cartas de mujeres,” 332.
“My sir,” etc.: Sáenz to SB, Huamachuco, May 26, 1824, Las más hermosas cartas (Caracas: Editorial El Perro y La Rana, 2006), 35.
they reunited at the end of June: Murray, For Glory and Bolívar, 38.
seventy-four years later: Palma, Tradiciones, 162 fn.
“So, how is Bolívar’s old lady?”: Ibid.
the equivalent of $12 billion: Cerro de Pasco had produced £170 million by 1803. According to http://www.parliament.uk/documents/commons/lib/research/rp2002/rp02-044.pdf the value today would be over $12 billion. Report of the Commissioner of General Land Office, for the year 1867 (Washington: GPO, 1867); The Colliery Engineer, 27 (1907), 134; Dan De Quille, History of the Big Bonanza (San Francisco: Bancroft, 1876), 463.
But Sucre had prepared the way, etc.: Miller, II, 122–28; O’Connor, 66–68.
strange concert of anxious calls: Miller, II, 122–28.
Following behind them, were the Rabonas, etc.: Flora Tristan wrote about the Rabonas in her Peregrinations of a Pariah, 179–81. Also see A. García Camba, Memorias del General Camba, Rufino Blanco-Fombona (Bib. Ayacucho, 1916), VII, 205; R. Gil Montero, “Las guerras de independencia en los andes meridionales,” Memoria Americana, no. 14 (Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires, 2006), online version ISSN 1851–3751.
a brilliantly prepared army: Miller, II, 122–28; O’Connor, 64–67; O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 305.
Bolívar gloried in the sight, etc.: Masur, Simón Bolívar, 530.
nine thousand disciplined soldiers: Miller, II, 122–28; O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 297.
from as far away as Caracas, etc.: Miller, II, 122–28. O’Connor, 64–67.
six thousand cattle: Miller, II, 125.
the finest patriot force, etc.: Masur, Simón Bolívar, 530.
delighted in sitting with his officers: Paulding, 53–60.
His two thousand men, etc.: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 410.
well regimented, well armed, etc.: Miller, II, 125.
only six hundred, etc.: Wu, 14; O’Connor, 85.
assuring him that Bolívar was no threat: Valdés to Canterac, Cochabamba, May 3–4, 1824, Documentos para la historia separatista del Perú por el conde de Torata, nieto del General Valdés, IV (Madrid: Minuesa, 1898), 291–94.
Sucre’s minions swarmed through: Miller, II, 128.
fallen into a great slumber: Ibid., 128–29.
Clearly, he was confident: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 405.
On the crisp, clear morning: Miller, II, 128–29.
reviewed 7,700 troops: O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 305. General Miller (II, 128) cites 9,000, but he is probably including the 1,500 guerrillas, whom O’Leary mentions, and who may not have arrived until later.
on a towering mesa, etc.: Miller, II, 128–29.
“Soldiers! You are about to complete”: O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 306.
The air was filled, etc.: Miller, II, 129.
a glimpse of one of Canterac’s divisions, etc.: López, 115; Miller, II, 130.
quivering for a fight: Miller, II, 130–1.
reconnaissance with thirteen hundred troops, etc.: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 414.
with the chill of surprise: A. García Camba, Memorias, II (Madrid: Hortelano, 1846), 254–55.
Bolívar and nine hundred horsemen: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 415.
looking to provoke th
e Spanish general to battle: Ibid., 412.
he decided to circle the lake: Canterac to Viceroy La Serna, quoted in O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 312. This was revealed in a letter intercepted by the patriots. There is no reason to doubt Canterac’s word that he was after the patriot rear guard, but O’Leary adds that the Spanish general was rushing south to block SB from marching on Jauja, since they appeared to be going in that direction.
battle at five o’clock: Santa Cruz, Parte oficial de la batalla de Junín, in O’L, XLIV, 422.
fought entirely with swords and lances, etc.: O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 308.
directed the veteran general Miller, etc.: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 415–19.
lance was fourteen feet long: Miller, II, 133.
“made the earth tremble”: O’Connor, 76.
darken the sky an hour later: Miller, II, 133. Miller claims the action lasted three quarters of an hour. Larrazábal (Vida, III, 253) says it took an hour. Masur (Simón Bolívar, 532) cites one and a half hours.
the effects of high-altitude combat: The plains of Junín are 13,232 feet above sea level. Encyclopaedia Britannica, 21 (1911), 267.
could not have gone on much longer, etc.: O’Connor, 76–77, for subsequent details.
“Victory!”: Madariaga, 482.
sent squadrons of sharpshooters: Ibid.
José Palacios, the loyal manservant: Ibid.
“The brilliant skirmish of Junín”: Larrazábal, Vida, II, 253.
“Our losses may have been few in number,” etc.: Canterac to Rodil, O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 312–13.
shut himself up in the fortress of Callao, etc.: Baralt and Díaz, II, 134.
collected all the equipment, etc.: Larrazábal, Vida, II, 254.
had burned whole villages: Gen. Miller to Sucre, O’L, XXII, 417; Lecuna, Crónica, III, 409–11.
executed hundreds, etc.: Larrazábal, Vida, II, 255.
“They were Caligula; we were Caesar”: Santander, “El General Simón Bolívar en campaña,” Gazeta de Santa Fé, Oct. 4, 1819, JCBL.
installed municipal governments, etc.: Bulnes, 547–48.
he threatened to shoot councilors: Ibid. Also Madariaga, 484.
Soldiers who looted, etc.: Madariaga, 484.
“You’re out of your mind if you think”: Villanueva, 151.
There was no town in the area: Bulnes, 549.
while his army rested: Larrazábal, Vida, II, also SB to Sucre, Huancarama, Sept. 28, 1824, SBO, II, 993–94.
dozens of villages: See the list of these in SBO, II, 991–93.
she settled for a while: Murray, For Glory and Bolívar, 39. A number of historians—Rumazo González, Alvarez Saá, Claire Brewster—have claimed that Sáenz marched with SB over Cerro de Pasca and fought in the Battle of Junín. But there appears to be no basis for that claim. Murray and many serious Latin American scholars hold that the legend (and material that supports it) is apocryphal.
The rain came earlier than usual, etc.: Bulnes, 551.
he had been stripped of all his powers, etc.: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 436–37.
“man of laws”: SB to Santander, Lima, Feb. 9, 1825, SBO, II, 1044–46. “You are the man of laws and Sucre is the man of war.” Also Monsalve, El ideal político del Libertador, 56.
“Without a law expressly passed”: Santander to SB, Bogotá, Feb. 6, 1824, O’L, III, 137.
Some congressmen had even begun to object, etc.: This growing resentment was eventually described in the letter from Santander to SB, Bogotá, May 6, 1825, O’L, ibid., 168–76.
news to Sucre in two memoranda: Heres to Sucre, Oct. 24, 1824 (two letters with this date), O’L, XXII, 525–26. Heres was Bolívar’s secretary general.
to be destroyed: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 436–37.
to separate the Liberator from it: Heres to Sucre, ibid. (the first, personal letter).
submitted a heated protest: Sucre to Heres, O’L, XXII, 542. Also Lecuna, Crónica, III, 437–38.
correspondence was clipped: See SB to Santander, Chancay, Nov. 13, 1824, SBO, II, 1008–9.
more republican now: This sentiment was surely aided by Lima’s despotic royalist commandant Ramírez, “the Robespierre of Peru,” who sat in the Convent of La Merced and entertained himself by shaving the head of every young male passerby he suspected of being a republican. Liévano Aguirre, 342.
imposed a siege, etc.: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 440.
“serve as a brain trust”: SB to the governments of Colombia, Mexico, Argentina, Chile, and Guatemala, Lima, Dec. 7, 1824, SBO, II, 1016–18.
South America did not need a burly, etc.: Arciniegas, Bolívar y la revolución, 133–36; A. Lleras Camargo, El primer gobierno del Frente Nacional, II (Bogotá: Imprenta Nacional, 1960), 21.
he had no intention of relying: Arcieniegas, Bolívar y la revolución, 133–36; Lleras Camargo, 21.
Nine thousand royalists: López, 141; Larrazábal, Vida, II, 268.
not worried by those maneuvers, etc.: Sucre’s report to the Minister of War, Dec. 11, 1824, quoted in O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 354.
in a torrential rain, etc.: Miller, II, 158–59, and for subsequent details.
frantic defections occurred: Ibid., 10, 174.
His notion was to keep the Spaniards, etc.: O’Connor, 100.
pressed close to the foot of Cundurcunca, etc.: López, 134.
exactly where Bolívar would have wanted: SB to Sucre, quoted in Masur, Simón Bolívar, 536.
brought a resplendent sun, etc.: López, 137; Miller, II, 167.
according to one soldier: López, 137.
a scruffy behemoth of dirt, etc.: Ibid., 138.
the sound of cornets and drums, etc.: Ibid., 143.
no choice for them but to win: Ibid., 141; O’Connor, 99.
“Soldiers! On your efforts”: O’Connor, 99.
At eight o’clock, as the sun, etc.: López, 143–44.
as one chronicler put it: Ibid.
General Monet asked Córdova, etc.: López, 145–50, and for subsequent details.
helmets glinting in the sun: Miller, II, 174.
dark, somber overcoats: Madariaga, 488.
“Horsemen! Lancers! What you see,” etc.: López, 151.
a young Spanish brigadier was first to attack: This was Col. Joaquín Rubín de Celis, my great-great-grandfather. My great-grandfather Pedro Cisneros was fighting him on the patriot side. (See Acknowledgments.)
splitting their formation, etc.: López, 154.
“Soldiers! Man your arms!”: Miller, II, 168.
snatching their silver helmets: Ibid., 174.
By mid-afternoon, etc.: Ibid., 172.
three thousand royalists were taken: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 463.
found him by chance in one of the huts, etc.: Miller, II, 176. Apart from his gallantry to La Serna, Miller invited Canterac to bed down in his hut, along with other officers. Canterac talked into the night, saying: “General Miller—General Miller—all this appears to be a dream! How strange is the fortune of war! Who would have said twenty-four hours ago, that I should have been your guest? but it cannot be helped: the harassing war is now over, and, to tell you the truth, we were all heartily tired of it.” Ibid., 178.
The dead amounted to, etc.: Lecuna, Crónica, III, 463.
The terms Sucre offered, etc.: Ibid.; Sucre to SB, Dec. 10, 1824, quoted in O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 364–67.
His heavy wool socks, etc.: Bulnes, 614.
“I drink . . . to the man”: Ibid.
ambushed and killed by Indians: Miller, II, 170 fn. By Indians of the Huando tribe.
“The battle for Peru is complete”: Sucre to the Minister of War, Dec. 11, 1824, O’Leary, Bolívar y la emancipación, 364–67.
the Pandora’s box that Peru had become: O’Leary, Junín y Ayacucho, 211.
“Victory! Victory! Victory!”: Blanco-Fombona in a footnote to the 1915 edition of O’Leary’s Bolívar y la Emancipación, 368.
Epigraph: “My hope is that our republics”: SB to Hipólito Unanue, Plata, Nov. 25, 1825, O’L, XXX, 154–56.
“to General Simon Bolívar,” etc.: National Intelligencer, Jan. 3, 1825; quoted in R. V. Remini, Henry Clay (New York: Norton, 1991), 257.
Not Alexander, not Hannibal, etc.: Pérez Silva, Bolívar, de Cartagena a Santa Marta, 18 (Introduction). And for subsequent comparisons.
“European ambition forced the yoke”: Gaceta de Caracas, No. 30, Dec. 31, 1813, quoted in Larrazábal, Vida, I, 251.
“this splendid victory is due entirely”: SB, Decreto, Dec. 27, 1824, O’L, XXII, 605–6.
He tendered his resignation: Dec. 22, 1824, cited in Lecuna, Catálogo, III, 368.
planned to leave Colombia someday: SB to Santander, Lima, Dec. 20, 1824, SBO, II, 1022–26; also SB to Santander, Lima, Jan. 23, 1825, ibid., 1040–41.
assembly fell into a stunned silence, etc.: Lynch, Simón Bolívar, 194.
“the greatest man and most extraordinary”: Hamilton, I, 230.
“will be the day of my glory”: DOC, IX, 480.
presented him with a gift of one million pesos, etc.: O’L, XXVIII, 340–43.
Monteagudo, whose agile mind: Monteagudo, Ensayo sobre la necesidad de una federación general entre los estados hispano-americanos y plan de su organización (Lima: J. González, 1825; uncompleted and posthumously published.)
found facedown on a street, etc.: A. Íñiguez Vicuña, Vida de Don Bernardo Monteagudo (Santiago: Imprenta Chilena, 1867), 171.
might be part of a royalist plot: SB to Santander, Lima, Feb. 9, 1825, SBO, II, 1044–46.
a black cook, who worked in the kitchen: Íñiguez Vicuña, 173–74.
in private, in a dimly lit room: Mosquera, Popayán, Sept. 20, 1878, quoted in Ricardo Palma, Cachivaches (Lima: Torres Aguirre, 1900), 233. Mosquera would later become president of Colombia.
had paid him 200 pesos: Ibid.
The Liberator was flabbergasted: Ibid.
a Peruvian general had poisoned him, etc.: Mosquera, 233–34.
It was a murky chain of events: SB himself thought it might be a plot undertaken by the Holy Alliance: SB to Santander, Feb. 9, SBO, II, 1044–46. Others have posited that it was a Masonic intrigue, since Sánchez Carrión was leader of the secret society that had pledged to exile Monteagudo from Peru and kill him if he ever returned. Indeed, Sánchez Carrión had written an article for El Tribuno, saying that every Peruvian had a right to exterminate Monteagudo: Ricardo Palma, Mis últimas tradiciones peruanas (Barcelona: Editorial Maucci, 1908), 541–70.