Juan Antonio Lavalleja

Juan Antonio Lavalleja y de la Torre (Minas, Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata, June 24, 1784 – Montevideo, Uruguay, October 22, 1853) was a Uruguayan military man and politician, head of the Thirty-Three Orientales and president of Uruguay in the Triumvirate of Government of 1853.

Life and career

First fights for freedom

He was the son of Manuel Esteban Pérez de la Valleja Gómez - a Spaniard originally from Huesca, a well-to-do rancher - and Ramona Justina de la Torre Ábalos - also Spanish.

His brother, Manuel Lavalleja (1797-1852), was also a soldier, and was one of the Thirty-Three Orientals who accompanied him in the independence epic of 1825.

The uprising of his country in response to the uprising that occurred on May 25, 1810 in Buenos Aires had in Lavalleja a determined and enthusiastic soldier from its beginning, who fought in the Battle of Las Piedras in 1811, being promoted to captain in 1814.

Accompanying José Gervasio Artigas and initially under the orders of his lieutenant, Fructuoso Rivera, in the fight against the Unitarians, he fought with Manuel Dorrego in the fields of Guayabos on January 10, 1815, the latter being defeated.

Performance during the Portuguese invasions

In 1816, the United Kingdom invaded Portugal, Brazil and the Algarve, well regarded by Artigas' enemies, and Lavalleja was able to perform successfully against the foreigners in the Minuan region, whose places he knew well.

In 1817 he stood vigorously alongside Rivera in the Battle of Paso Cuello, against a much superior number of soldiers of the Portuguese general Carlos Federico Lecor. That same year he married Ana Monterroso, daughter of Marcos Monterroso and whose mother, Juana Bermúdez Artigas, was Artigas' first cousin. On April 3, 1818, a Portuguese force took him prisoner in the Valentín stream (current department of Salto). Sent to Montevideo, he was transferred to Rio de Janeiro, where he was confined to a pontoon; Later he was transferred to the Cobra Island along with Fernando Otorgués, Manuel Francisco Artigas and Leonardo Olivera.

In 1821 his return to Montevideo was authorized and he immediately took service in the Union Dragoon Regiment, whose leader was Colonel Rivera.

When the independence of what is now Brazil was proclaimed to become the Empire of Brazil, Rivera and Lavalleja were together with Lecor in favor, signing the act of acclamation and recognition of Emperor Pedro I of Brazil, on October 17, 1822.

When he moved to Buenos Aires in 1824, the imperial authorities declared him a deserter, confiscating his property.

Landing of the Thirty-Three

His background meant a lot to the eastern emigration spread throughout the United Provinces of the Río de la Plata, and the plans to revolutionize the Cisplatina Province that were slowly being woven, took on a reality. And in combination with the leaders who had some command in the Eastern Band who were willing to support an attempt at revolt, surely with the advice of Colonel Fructuoso Rivera, in the service of Governor Lecor, before anyone else, they managed to gather, after many efforts, the money necessary for the equipment of the small expedition that, landing on the eastern coast, was to provoke the uprising of the province against its occupants.

Lavalleja was chosen as head of the dangerous company, recommended for his reckless courage and proven audacity. Finding himself in Entre Ríos, and with the purpose of ensuring the success of the company, at the beginning of 1823 Lavalleja commissioned Gregorio Sanabria, who at that time was in Buenos Aires, to go to the Eastern Province and contact the patriots of your confidence. Sanabria met with Pedro Pablo Gadea in Mercedes and appointed various patriots as commanders of the departments of San José and Colonia, transmitting a message from Lavalleja, who stated that the time had come to "shake off the yoke of the tyrants" (cf. correspondence of Sanabria and Gregorio Salado with Lavalleja, March 14-16, 1823, Entre Ríos Archive; a copy exists in the National Historical Museum of Uruguay).

In the town now called Beccar, on the shore of the Uruguay River, Agraciada beach, on April 19, 1825 he landed with a few weapons at the head of an indeterminate group of eastern companions and from other provinces, which tradition He calls thirty-three orientals, mostly chiefs and officers.

Offensive operations were undertaken and on the 24th he managed to enter Santo Domingo de Soriano and then continue in search of Colonel Rivera, who was found in the place called Monzón on the 29th. After a short interview, Rivera was incorporated into the forces. patriots with the soldiers at their command.

This historical event is referred to by the name of Abrazo del Monzón, about which there is controversy as to whether Rivera was surprised and taken prisoner by Lavalleja in Monzón, as he says in a letter to his wife dated in San José on 2 May, and in such circumstances Rivera chose to join the invading forces, or whether that was the consequence of a previously combined arrangement.

The accession of Rivera, an individual with great prestige and involvement in the campaign, was undoubtedly equivalent to a first battle won. Continuing the operations, the towns of San José and Canelones fell into the power of the patriots, and on June 14, a Provisional Government was established in Florida under the presidency of Manuel Calleros and there, on August 25, 1825, the Chamber of Representatives He proclaimed the independence of the province and immediately declared its union with the others of the Río de la Plata.

Rivera defeated his opponents in Rincón de Haedo on September 24 and on October 12 Lavalleja obtained his victory in Sarandí Grande.

Subsequent actions

The government of Buenos Aires, actuated by the growing pressure of public opinion, accepted the Eastern Province as united to the others, which meant war with the Empire of Brazil, beginning hostilities in January 1826 (War Rio de la Plata-Brazilian). However, the first dissensions had already emerged between Lavalleja and Rivera which, although they were silenced almost immediately, were at a point where they would explode again.

Lavalleja was incorporated into the Republican Army precisely to remove him from the field of politics and he marched to the Río Grande del Sur campaign, having to find himself on the victorious day of Ituzaingó on February 20, 1827. His disaffections with the general continued in chief Carlos de Alvear, which produced the inaction of the Republican Army, while the imperials were actively preparing to reopen hostilities. There was a need to withdraw and Alvear settled in Cerro Largo and Lavalleja in Durazno, until upon Alvear's separation, in July 1827, Lavalleja was invested with the superior command of the Army.

Wrapped in dissidence and ambitions of the time, desirous of command and without diplomacy, an essential attribute of men of government, General Lavalleja soon became involved in a series of political-administrative violence, culminating in the execution of his order of October 12, 1827 in which the Government Board chaired by Joaquín Suárez was dissolved.

The Preliminary Peace Convention that was agreed in 1828 between the Empire of Brazil and the United Provinces, made Lavalleja depose his dictatorship and General José Rondeau took charge of the Provisional Government of the newly created Eastern State on the 1st of December.

In the first elections that took place in the nascent republic, in August 1830, several of its supporters gained access to the legislative chambers. However, Rivera obtained an enormous amount of support, being proclaimed in October of that year as the first president of the Republic.

Lavalleja rebelled against Rivera's presidency, taking up arms in July 1832, being defeated and forced to take refuge in Brazil. In 1834 he was the protagonist of a new armed uprising, invading the Eastern Republic with the help of Juan Manuel de Rosas. On this occasion he was also defeated.

In the presidency of Manuel Oribe (1835-1836), while he was an emigre in the Argentine Confederation, Rosas supported him against Oribe. However, when General Rivera rebelled against the government, in mid-1836, Lavalleja came to offer his sword to Oribe, landing in Colonia on August 1, 1836 at the head of a hundred men. His rank in the national army was restored, and he shared with General Ignacio Oribe the victory in the Battle of Carpintería, on September 19, 1836, but he was also responsible for the defeat of Palmar, on June 15, 1838.

Upon Oribe's resignation in October 1838, Lavalleja, after surrendering the Plaza de Paysandú to the Riveristas, crossed to Buenos Aires to put himself in direct service of Rosas, accompanied General Pascual Echagüe in the invasion of 1839 and the December 29 they suffered a resounding defeat in the Battle of Cagancha. They returned and in 1840 they were defeated at Don Cristóbal.

The long period of the Great War passed darkly for him, residing since 1845 in the Cerrito countryside, where Oribe had his government. He went unnoticed and, in the words of Antonio F. Díaz, suffered true material deprivation.

After the peace of October 8, 1851, he was discharged into the army as a brigadier general, entrusting him with the Military Command of the departments of Cerro Largo, Minas and Maldonado.

He was included along with Rivera and Venancio Flores in the Triumvirate that on September 25, 1853 replaced the constitutional government of Juan Francisco Giró, but before completing a month in office, he died suddenly while serving in the Government Fort. from Montevideo.

Posthumous tributes

Juan Antonio Lavalleja was captain of Artigas, chief of the Thirty-Three and general of Sarandí, which is why he has inscribed his name on the List of the Greats of Uruguay, consecrating him as one of its heroes.

In Minas, the city of its cradle, the first equestrian statue erected in the Eastern Republic was erected in the main square on October 12, 1902, and by law of December 26, 1927, the department of Minas took the name of Lavalleja.

An important avenue in the center of Montevideo bears his name, as do streets in several cities and towns in Uruguay, and in the city of Buenos Aires (Argentina).