History of Central America, Volume 3, 1801-1887 / The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft, Volume 8

by Hubert Howe Bancroft

REVOLUTION IN NICARAGUA.

The royal officials at Masaya having called for assistance from Guatemala, Bustamante had 1,000 or more troops placed there under command of Sargento Mayor Pedro Gutierrez. The people of Leon had ere this accepted an amnesty from Bishop Jerez, and thereafter took no part in movements against the crown. Granada, more firm of purpose, resolved upon defence; caused intrenchments to be built to guard all avenues leading to the plaza, and mounted thereon twelve heavy cannon. A royalist force, under José M. Palomar, on the 21st of April approached Granada to reconnoitre, and reached the plazuela de Jalteva.[I-32] Early in the morning he opened a brisk fire on the town, and kept it up for several hours. After a parley, next day the citizens agreed to surrender, on Gutierrez solemnly pledging the names of the king and Bustamante, as well as his own, that they should in no wise be molested. But after the royal troops were allowed to enter the city on the 28th, Bustamante, ignoring the solemn guarantees pledged by his subordinate, ordered the arrest and prosecution of the leaders. The governor accordingly named Alejandro Carrascosa fiscal to prosecute the conspirators of Granada. The proceedings occupied two years, at the end of which the fiscal called for, and the court granted, the confiscation of the estates, in addition to the penalties awarded to those found guilty. Sixteen of the prisoners, as heads of the rebellion, were sentenced to be shot, nine were doomed to the chain-gang for life, and 133 to various terms of hard labor.[I-33] The sentence of death was not carried out, however. The condemned were taken to Guatemala, and thence transported to Spain, where the majority died as exiles. Four others were removed as convicts to Omoa and Trujillo. The survivors were finally released by a royal order of June 25, 1817.[I-34]

The conduct of the Leonese in leaving Granada to bear alone the consequences of the revolution had, as I remarked, a bad effect upon the country.[I-35] From that time dates a bitter feeling between Leon and Granada, and between Managua and Masaya on the one part and Granada on the other.[I-36]

Notwithstanding the existing grievances and the generally depressed condition of business, the people did not fail to respond to the calls from the home government upon all parts of the Spanish dominions for pecuniary aid to meet the enormous expenses of the war against Napoleon's forces, and other pressing demands. In 1812 there were collected and remitted as donations $43,538. The citizens of San Salvador also agreed to give $12,000 for 1812, and an equal sum in 1813, if they could obtain a certain reform for the benefit of indigo-planters.[I-37]

FANATICISM.

We have seen how the first steps toward independence failed. Nor could any other result have been expected from the degraded condition, socially and intellectually, of the masses. The people were controlled by fanaticism, in abject submission to king and clergy. Absurd doctrines and miracles were implicitly believed in; and every effort made to draw the ignorant people out of that slough was in their judgment treason and sacrilege, a violation of the laws of God, an attempt to rob the king of his rights; certain to bring on a disruption of social ties, and the wrath of heaven. The lower orders had been taught that freedom signified the reign of immorality and crime, while fealty to the sovereign was held a high virtue. Hence the daily exhibitions of humble faithfulness, the kneeling before the images of the monarch and before their bishops, and the more substantial proof of money gifts to both church and crown.[I-38]

The first efforts on behalf of emancipation were not wholly lost, as they led to definitive results in the near future. The next attempts also met with failure, and brought upon their authors the heavy hand of Bustamante. The first one, in 1813, was known as the Betlen conspiracy, which derived its name from the convent where the conspirators usually assembled. Much importance was given to this affair by the government and the loyalists. The meetings were presided over by the sub-prior Fray Ramon de la Concepcion, and were sometimes held in his cell, and at others in the house of Cayetano Bedoya, under the direction of Tomás Ruiz, an Indian.[I-39] All were sworn to secrecy, and yet the government suspected the plot, and arrested some persons who had the weakness to divulge the plan and the names of their associates.[I-40]

The conspirators, all of whom were men of character and good standing, soon found themselves in prison, excepting José Francisco Barrundia, who remained concealed six years, and afterward was one of the most prominent statesmen of Central America. Major Antonio del Villar was commissioned fiscal to prosecute the prisoners. He spared no one in his charges, and managed to bring into the meshes of the prosecution several persons who were innocent.[I-41] On the 18th of September, 1814, he asked the military court for the penalty of death, by garrote, against Ruiz, Víctor Castrillo, José Francisco Barrundia pro contumacia, and Joaquin Yúdice, who were hidalgos; and the same penalty, by hanging, against the sub-prior and ten others who were plebeians.[I-42] Ten years of hard labor in the chain-gang of the African possessions, and a life exile from America, were pronounced upon others against whom no guilt was proved. The prisoners were all set free, however, in 1819, under a royal order of the 28th of July, 1817.

THE PLOT OF BETLEN.

Among the men regarded as the most dangerous, and strongly suspected of being the real managers of the Betlen plot, was Mateo Antonio Marure, who had been confined two years in a dungeon for the part he took in the disturbances of 1811.[I-43] Bustamante dreaded his presence in Guatemala, and in 1814 despatched him as a prisoner to the supreme council of regency in Spain, with his reasons for this measure. After recounting the Betlen affair, and naming Marure as the real instigator and manager of it, he adds that the conspirators counted on him as a fearless man to carry it out, and that his bold language and writings rendered his sojourn in America a constant menace to Spanish interests.