José Gervasio Artigas

José Gervasio Artigas Arnal (June 19, 1764 – September 23, 1850) is celebrated as Uruguay’s founding father and a national hero. Born in Montevideo, he joined the Spanish military in 1797 at age 33, fighting the British during the Anglo-Spanish War. When the Spanish-American wars for independence began, he sided with Buenos Aires’s Primera Junta against Spain. He won the Battle of Las Piedras and besieged Montevideo, but Portuguese forces forced him to retreat. Breaking with Buenos Aires’s centralist government, he took control of Montevideo in 1815 and established the Federal League, a union of six provinces under a federal system. In 1816, the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil, and the Algarves invaded the Banda Oriental, eventually annexing it. Artigas fled to Paraguay, where he lived in exile until his death in 1850. Artigas was born in Montevideo on June 19, 1764. His grandparents, from Zaragoza, Buenos Aires, and Tenerife, had fought in the War of the Spanish Succession and moved to the Americas in 1716 to escape poverty, settling in Buenos Aires. His parents, Martín José Artigas and Francisca Antonia Arnal, were wealthy. They sent him to the Colegio de San Bernardino for religious studies, but he rejected the strict discipline. There he befriended Fernando Otorgues, a future collaborator. At 12, he moved to the countryside to work on family farms, where gaucho and Indian customs deeply influenced him. As an adult, he distanced himself from his family and turned to cattle smuggling, making him a target for landowners and the Montevideo government, which placed a bounty on his head. The Anglo-Spanish War changed his fortunes. Viceroy Antonio de Olaguer y Feliú negotiated a pardon with Artigas’s family on condition that he join the Corps of Blandengues with 100 men. He began his military career in 1797 as a lieutenant. When William Beresford invaded Buenos Aires in 1806 during the first British invasion of the River Plate, Artigas’s unit was assigned to patrol the Brazilian frontier. He requested to join Santiago de Liniers’s expedition from Montevideo to expel the British, was granted permission, and helped defeat them. Afterward, he returned to Montevideo to report the victory to Governor Pascual Ruiz Huidobro. During the second British invasion, Montevideo fell, and Artigas was captured. He escaped, hid in the countryside, and organized gaucho guerrilla groups against the British. The British failed to take Buenos Aires again and returned Montevideo to Spain under surrender terms. Artigas was promoted to captain in 1809. Enlightenment ideas and the Peninsular War (1807–1814), along with King Ferdinand VII’s capture, sparked turbulence across the Spanish Empire. Patriots sought republics or constitutional monarchies; royalists wanted absolute monarchy. Artigas, believing gauchos were mistreated, supported the patriots. In 1810, Buenos Aires deposed the viceroy in the May Revolution and formed the Primera Junta. Spain declared Buenos Aires a rebel city, naming Montevideo the new capital with Francisco Javier de Elío as viceroy. In February 1811, Elío declared war on Buenos Aires, igniting the Banda Oriental’s independence movement. Argentine secretary of war Mariano Moreno saw Artigas as a key ally against Montevideo’s royalists and summoned him for talks. But by the time Artigas reached Buenos Aires, Moreno had left the government. Though welcomed, Artigas received little support—only a promotion to colonel, some weapons, money, and 150 men. He never saw Buenos Aires again. The alliance with the Argentines saw early success from late 1810 to mid-1811. Montevideo faced financial troubles, and Elío’s harsh measures angered the countryside, allowing Artigas to channel popular discontent. A hundred men gathered near the Asencio stream and issued the Cry of Asencio, a pronouncement against the viceroy. They captured many towns in the Banda Oriental, including Mercedes, Santo Domingo, Colla, Maldonado, Paso del Rey, Santa Teresa, and San José, as well as Gualeguay, Gualeguaychú, and Arroyo de la China west of the Uruguay River. Elío sent soldiers to kill Artigas, but they failed.