The provinces which bordered on the Gulf of Mexico had a larger intercourse with Europe than their sister States, and were the first to become imbued with the liberal ideas which were now gaining prevalence among the European people. They had constant communication with the West India islands, on one of which they had long been familiar with the mild rule of England, while on another they had seen a free Negro State arise and vindicate its liberties against the power of France. 1797 A.D. The island of Trinidad, lying near their shores, had been conquered by England, who used her new possession as a centre from which revolutionary impulses could be conveniently diffused among the subjects of her enemy. Bordering thus upon territories where freedom was enjoyed, the Colombian provinces learned more quickly than the remoter colonies to hate the despotism of Spain, and were first to enter the path which led to independence.
1810 A.D. Seven of these northern provinces formed themselves into a union, which they styled the Confederation of Venezuela. They did not yet assert independence of Spain. But they abolished the tax which had been levied from the Indians; they declared commerce to be free; they gathered up the Spanish Governor and his councillors, and, having put them on board ship, sent them decisively out of the country. Only one step remained, and it was speedily taken. Next year Venezuela declared her independence, and prepared as she best might to assert it in arms against the forces of Spain.
One of the fathers of South American independence was Francis Miranda. He was a native of Caraccas, and now a man in middle life. In his youth he had fought under the French for the independence of the English colonies on the Northern Continent. When he had seen the victorious close of that war he returned to Venezuela, carrying with him sympathies which made it impossible to bear in quietness the despotism of Spain. A few years later Miranda offered his sword to the young French republic, and took part in some of her battles. But he lost the favour of the new rulers of France, and betook himself to England, where he sought to gain English countenance to the efforts of the Venezuelan patriots. He mustered a force of five hundred English and Americans, and he expected that his countrymen would flock to his standard. But his countrymen were not yet prepared for action so decisive, and his efforts proved for the time abortive. It was this man who laid the foundations of independence, but he himself was not permitted to see the triumph of the great cause. 1812 A.D. The patriot arms had made some progress, and high hopes were entertained; but the province was smitten by an earthquake, which overthrew several towns and destroyed twenty thousand lives. The priests interpreted this calamity as the judgment of Heaven upon rebellion, and the credulous people accepted their teaching. The cause of independence, thus supernaturally discredited, was for the time abandoned. Miranda himself fell into the hands of his enemies, and perished in a Spanish dungeon.
His lieutenant, Don Simon Bolivar, was the destined vindicator of the liberties of the South American Continent. Bolivar was still a young man; his birth was noble; his disposition was ardent and enterprising; among military leaders he claims a high place. His love of liberty, enkindled by the great deliverance which the United States and France had lately achieved, was the grand animating impulse of his life. But his heart was unsoftened by civilizing influences. Under his savage guidance, the story of the war of independence becomes a record not only of battles ably and bravely fought, but of ruthless massacres habitually perpetrated.
For ten years the war, with varying fortune, held on its destructive course. Spain, blindly tenacious of the rich possessions which were passing from her grasp, continued to squander the substance of her people in vain efforts to reconquer the empire with which Columbus and Cortes and Pizarro had crowned her, and which her own incapacity had destroyed. She was utterly wasted by the prolonged war which Napoleon had forced upon her. She was miserably poor. Her unpaid soldiers, inspired by revolutionary sympathies, rose in mutiny against the service to which they were destined. But still Spain maintained the hopeless and desolating strife.
When the terrors of the earthquake had passed away, the patriots threw themselves once more into the contest, with energy which made their final success sure. On both sides a savage and ferocious cruelty was constantly practised. The Royalists slaughtered as rebels the prisoners who fell into their hands. Bolivar announced that “the chief purpose of the war was to destroy in Venezuela the cursed race of Spaniards.” Soldiers who presented a certain number of Spanish heads were raised to the rank of officers. The decree of extirpation was enforced against multitudes of unoffending Spaniards—even against men in helpless age, so infirm that they could not stand to receive the fatal bullet, and were therefore placed in chairs and thus executed. In South America, as in France, the revolt against the cruel despotism of ages was itself without restraint of pity or remorse. The severity which despotism calmly imposes, under due form of law, is in the fulness of time responded to by the passionate and savage outburst of the sufferers’ rage. It is lamentable that it should be so; but while tyrant and victim remain, Nature’s stern method of deliverance must be accepted.
When Miranda first sought the help of England, he received a certain amount of encouragement. Englishmen served in the ranks of his first army, and English money contributed to their equipment. 1810 A.D. A little later England was in league with Spain for the overthrow of Napoleon, and her Government frowned upon “any attempt to dismember the Spanish monarchy.” But when the purposes of this union were served, the inalienable sympathy of the British people with men struggling for liberty asserted itself openly and energetically. 1819-20 A.D. Ample loans were made to the insurgent Governments; recruiting stations were established in the chief towns of England; many veterans who had fought under Wellington offered to the patriot cause the invaluable aid of their disciplined and experienced courage.
Thus reinforced, Bolivar was able to press hard upon the discouraged Royalists. The protracted struggle was about to close. June, 1821 A.D. Four thousand Spaniards, unable now to meet their enemies in the field, lay in a strong position near Carabobo. Bolivar with a force of eight thousand watched during many days for an opportunity to attack. Of his troops twelve hundred were British veterans. Bolivar succeeded at length in placing his forces on the flank of the enemy and compelling him to accept battle. The Spaniards at the outset gained important advantage, and broke the first line of the assailants. Unaware of the presence of British auxiliaries, they advanced as to assured victory. But when they saw, through the smoke of battle, the advancing ranks and levelled bayonets of the British, and heard the loud and defiant cheers of men confident in their own superior prowess, their hearts failed them and they fled. The victory of Carabobo closed the war in the northern provinces. Henceforth the liberty of Venezuela was secure.
The revolutionary movement which originated on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico extended itself quickly into all the continental possessions of Spanish America. The overthrow of government in Spain imposed upon every province the necessity of determining for itself the political system under which its affairs should be conducted. The course pursued in all was substantially identical. There came first the establishment of a native government, administered in the King’s name. Gradually this insincere acceptance of an abhorred yoke was discarded, and the colonies were unanimous in their resolution to become independent. In each there was a Royalist element which struggled bravely and bitterly to uphold the ancient rule of the mother country, with all its pleasant abuses and unfathomable evils. In each it was the care of Spain to strengthen the Royalists and maintain the contest. During many years Spanish America was the theatre of universal civil war. Evils of appalling magnitude flowed from the prolonged and envenomed strife. Population sunk in many localities to little more than one-half of what it had formerly been. The scanty agriculture of the continent became yet more insignificant. Commerce lost more than one-half its accustomed volume. The supply of gold and silver well-nigh ceased. In some years it fell to one-tenth, and during the whole revolutionary period it was less than one-third of what it had been in quieter times. Never before had war inflicted greater miseries upon its victims or extended its devastations over a wider field.
Peru was the last stronghold of Spanish authority. Spain put forth her utmost effort to maintain her hold upon the mineral treasures which were almost essential to her existence. The desire for independence was less enthusiastic here than in the other provinces; the insurrectionary movement was more fitful and more easily suppressed. When independence had triumphed everywhere besides, the Peruvian republic was struggling, hopelessly, for existence. The Spaniards had possessed themselves of the capital; a reactionary impulse had spread itself among the soldiers, and numerous desertions had weakened and discouraged the patriot ranks. The cause of liberty seemed almost lost in Peru; the old despotism which had been cast out of the other provinces seemed to regain its power over the land of the Incas, and threatened to establish itself there as a standing menace to the liberty and peace of the continent.