The Mexican Independence
(1810–1821) was an armed conflict between the people of Mexico and the
Spanish colonial authorities which started on 16 September 1810. The Mexican War of Independence movement was led
by Mexican-born Spaniards, Mestizos and Amerindians who sought independence
from Spain.
It started as an idealistic peasants' rebellion against their colonial masters,
but finally ended as an unlikely alliance between liberals
and conservatives.
It can be said that the struggle for Mexican independence dates back to the
decades after the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire,
when Martín Cortés, son of Hernán Cortés and La Malinche,
led a revolt against the Spanish colonial government in order to eliminate the
issues of oppression and privileges for the conquistadors.
Beginning of the War
After conspiracy was betrayed by a supporter, Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla declared war
against the colonial government on the late night of 15 September 1810, in what
has become known as the Grito de
Dolores. On the dawn of 16 September, the revolutionary army
decided to strike for independence and marched on to Guanajuato,
a major colonial mining centre governed by Spaniards and criollos. There the
leading citizens barricaded themselves in the granary. The rebel army captured
the granary on 28 September, and most of the Spaniards and criollos were
massacred or exiled.
On 30 October 1810, Hidalgo's
army encountered Spanish resistance at the Battle of Monte de las Cruces,
fought them and achieved victory. However, the rebel army failed to defeat the
large and heavily armed Spanish army in Mexico
City. Rebel survivors of the battle sought refuge in
nearby provinces and villages. The insurgent forces planned a defensive
strategy at a bridge on the Calderón
River, pursued by the Spanish army.
In January 1811, Spanish forces fought the Battle
of the Bridge of Calderón and defeated the insurgent
army, forcing the rebels to flee towards the United States-Mexican border, where they
hoped to escape.
However they were intercepted by the Spanish army and Hidalgo
and his remaining soldiers were captured in the state of Jalisco,
in the region known as "Los Altos".
He faced court trial of the Inquisition and found guilty of treason.
He was executed by firing squad in Chihuahua,
on 30 July 1811. His body was mutilated, and his head was displayed in
Guanajuato as a warning to Mexican rebels.
Following the death of Father Hidalgo,
the leadership of the revolutionary army was assumed by José María Morelos. Under his leadership the
cities of Oaxaca and Acapulco
were occupied. In 1813, the Congress of Chilpancingo was convened and on 6
November of that year, the Congress signed the first official document of
independence, known as the "Solemn Act of
the Declaration of Independence of Northern America. It was followed
by a long period of war at the Siege of Cuautla. In 1815, Morelos was captured
by Spanish colonial authorities, tried and executed for treason in San
Cristóbal Ecatepec on 22 December.
Independence
From 1815 to 1821, most of the fighting by those seeking independence from Spain
was done by isolated guerrilla bands. Out of these bands rose two men,
Guadalupe Victoria (whose real name was Manuel Félix Fernández) in Puebla and Vicente Guerrero in Oaxaca, both of whom were able to command
allegiance and respect from their followers. The Spanish viceroy, however, felt
the situation was under control and issued a general pardon to every rebel who
would lay down his arms.
After ten years of civil war and the death of two of its founders, by early
1820 the independence movement was stalemated and close to collapse. The rebels
faced stiff Spanish military resistance and the apathy of many of the most
influential criollos. The violent excesses and populist zeal of Hidalgo's and Morelos's
irregular armies had reinforced many criollos' fears of race and class warfare,
ensuring their grudging acquiescence to conservative Spanish rule until a less
bloody path to independence could be found. It was at this juncture that the
machinations of a conservative military caudillo coinciding with a successful
liberal rebellion in Spain
made possible a radical realignment of the proindependence forces.
In what was supposed to be the final government campaign against the
insurgents, in December 1820, Viceroy Juan Ruiz de Apodaca sent a force led by
a royalist criollo officer, Agustín de Iturbide, to defeat Guerrero's army in Oaxaca. Iturbide, a
native of Valladolid, had gained renown for the
zeal with which he persecuted Hidalgo's
and Morelos's rebels during the early independence struggle. A favorite of the
Mexican church hierarchy, Iturbide was the personification of conservative
criollo values, devoutly religious, and committed to the defense of property
rights and social privileges; he was also disgruntled at his lack of promotion
and wealth.
Iturbide's assignment to the Oaxaca
expedition coincided with a successful military coup in Spain against
the new monarchy of Ferdinand VII. The coup leaders, who had been assembled as
an expeditionary force to suppress the American independence movements,
compelled a reluctant Ferdinand to sign the liberal Spanish constitution of
1812. When news of the liberal charter reached Mexico,
Iturbide saw in it both a threat to the status quo and an opportunity for the
criollos to gain control of Mexico. Ironically, independence was finally achieved when
conservative forces in the colonies chose to rise up against a temporarily
liberal regime in the mother country. After an initial clash with Guerrero's
forces, Iturbide switched allegiances and invited the rebel leader to meet and
discuss principles of a renewed independence struggle.
While stationed in the town of Iguala, Iturbide proclaimed three
principles, or "guarantees," for Mexican independence from Spain; Mexico would be
an independent monarchy governed by a transplanted King Ferdinand or some other
conservative European prince, criollos and peninsulares would henceforth enjoy
equal rights and privileges, and the Roman Catholic
Church would retain its privileges and religious monopoly. After
convincing his troops to accept the principles, which were promulgated on
February 24, 1821, as the Plan of Iguala, Iturbide persuaded Guerrero to
join his forces in support of the new conservative manifestation of the
independence movement. A new army, the Army of the Three Guarantees, was then
placed under Iturbide's command to enforce the Plan of Iguala. The plan was so
broadly based that it pleased both patriots and loyalists. The goal of
independence and the protection of Roman Catholicism brought together all
factions.
Iturbide's army was joined by rebel forces from all over Mexico. When
the rebels' victory became certain, the viceroy resigned. On September 27,
1821, representatives of the Spanish crown and Iturbide signed the Treaty of Córdoba, which recognized Mexican
independence under the terms of the Plan of Iguala. Iturbide, a former royalist
who had become the paladin for Mexican independence, included a special clause
in the treaty that left open the possibility for a criollo monarch to be
appointed by a Mexican congress if no suitable member of the European royalty
would accept the Mexican crown.
Iturbide became emperor in the ensuing First Mexican Empire.
