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The Apuntaciones Of Modesto de la Torre: Mexican Nationalism as Seen by a Spanish Military Officer, 1821–1822

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2015

Claudia Guarisco
Claudia Guarisco*
Affiliation:
El Colegio Mexiquense, A.C., Zinacantepec, Estado de Mexico
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Extract

In the Mendel Collection at the Lilly Library at the University of Indiana, Bloomington, is an unpublished diary of over 400 pages written by a Spanish soldier during his voyage from Spain to New Spain, and his return voyage to the Iberian Peninsula, between May 30, 1821, and May 17, 1822. The document is titled Apuntaciones que en su viaje a ultramar ha tomado el oficial de infantería Modesto de la Torre (Notes Written by Infantry Officer Modesto de la Torre During His Voyage Overseas). Lieutenant De la Torre was part of the delegation that accompanied General Juan O'Donojú when he assumed the position of captain-general and chief policy officer of New Spain, the highest-ranking office in Spain's overseas territories, following the reinstatement of die Constitution of Cádiz in 1820. The diary discusses a wide variety of topics, including the defeat of the Royalist army at Puerto Cabello (Carabobo, Venezuela) and the subsequent exodus of loyalist officers and troops to Havana. The diary also presents portraits of the people, cities, villages, towns, and flora and fauna that the lieutenant saw during his journey.

Type
Research Note
Information
The Americas , Volume 69 , Issue 4 , April 2013 , pp. 509 - 528
Copyright
Copyright © Academy of American Franciscan History 2013

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References

I am grateful to Peter Guardino and Carlos Garriga for the helpful comments they made on earlier versions of this text, to Janice Jaffe for her translation of this article into English, and to the reviewers of this article for The Americas.

Translator’s note to reader: In all quotations from Modesto de la Torre’s text I have been fairly literal in the translation to give the reader as clear a sense as possible of the original, but have not attempted to preserve its nineteenth-century grammatical idiosyncrasies or spelling errors, with the exception of proper names, which I have left as they appear in the manuscript. Where a term or expression in the original text lacked an equivalent in English, I have included the Spanish in brackets next to the English translation.

1. Apuntaciones que en sus viajes a Ultramar ha tomado el oficial de infantería Modesto de la Torre (Notes Written by Infantry Officer Modesto de la Torre During His Voyage Overseas. Lilly Library, Mendel Collection, Latin American Manuscripts, Mexico, 1821, May 29–1827, June 2, 95, 371. The preceding numeric codes are those used by the Lilly Library. Courtesy Lilly Library, Indiana University, Bloomìngton, Ind. The manu-script contains an appendix with transcriptions of documents written by Generals Juan O’Donojú, Jose Garcia Dávila, Agustín de Iturbide, and Antonio López de Santa Anna, and Brigadier Francisco Lemau.

2. Brading, David, The First America: The Spanish Monarchy, Creole Patriots, and the Liberal State, 1492–1867 (Cambridge, U.K: Cambridge University Press, 1991), p. 581.Google Scholar

3. Eastman, Scott, Preaching Spanish Nationalism across the Hispanic Atlantic, 1759–1823 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2012), pp. 143–144, 170.Google Scholar

4. Ibid., p. 126.

5. Olmedilla, Carlos, ”Mexico 1808-1821. Algunas aportaciones históricas,” Historia Mexicana 36 (1959), pp. 586–600;Google Scholar Zeuske, Michael, Francisco de Miranda y la modernidad en America (Madrid: Fundación Mapfre Tavera, 2004), p. 58.Google Scholar

6. Chez F. Schoell Libraire, Paris, 1811.

7. The lower-ranking nobility made up a large part of the population of Castile. Up to the end of the nineteenth century, the hidalgo class was known for enjoying special tax privileges, and, in general, for its limited economic resources. Many hidalgos made their living by forming; others, like the author of this diary, earned their income through military service. de Durana, J. Ram ón Díaz, “Hidalgos e hidalguía en la cornisa cantábrica, Alava y las montañas de Burgos en la Baja Edad Media (1250–1525). Propuestas para una futura investigación,” in Espacios de poder y formas sociales en la Edad Media, Quijano, Gregorio del Ser and Viso, Iñaqui Martín, eds. (Salamanca: Aquilafiiente, 2007), pp. 49–56.Google Scholar

8. Floren García Merino, ”Modesto de la Torre y Ozcáriz, 1793-1853. Mariscal de campo, director general de los carabineros y diputado en Cortes.” Unpublished text, n.d., generously given by its author, excellently made and amply documented with materials from the Archivo Parroquial de Huércanos, the Archivo Histórico Provincial de La Rioja, the Archivo General Militar de Segovia, the Archivo Histórico Nacional, the Archivo Histórico del Congreso de los Diputados, the Archivo de la Villa de Madrid, the Archivo Histórico Diocesano de Madrid, the Biblioteca Nacional de Madrid, and the Museo Zumala Cárregui de Ormáiztegui.

9. After the restoration of the absolutist monarchy in Spain in 1823, officers and soldiers in the Spanish military who were suspected of treason to the crown were subjected to “causas de purificación,” literally, purification hearings.

10. José Santos Vargas, for example, tried throughout his life to publish the military campaign diary that he wrote during his participation in the independence wars in Upper Peru. See Démêlas, Marie Danielle, “Le journal de José Santos Vargas (1814–1825). Deux manuscrits,” Bulletin de L’Institut Français d’Etudes Andines 26:2 (1997), pp. 247–268.Google Scholar By contrast, José Miguel Carrera wrote his military-political diary in 1815 in Buenos Aires, removed in rime from the events he recounts concerning the Chilean struggle for independence (1810–1814). Carrcra’s goal was to defend himself from attacks over his performance of his duties. See Diario de José Miguel Carrera (Chile: Editorial Quimantú, 1973). In Spain, José Vargas Ponce published his military diary in 1812, before being subjected to a trial tor possible treason and support for the French. See López, Fernando Durán, José Vargas Ponce. Ensayo de una bibliografia y crítica de sus obras (Cadiz: Universidad de Cádiz, Servicio de Publicaciones, 1997), p. 28.Google Scholar

11. Lejeunc, Philippe, On Diary (Manoa: University of Hawaii Press, 2009), pp. 61, 93, 133.Google Scholar

12. Apuntaciones, p. 3.

13. Apuntaciones, p. 1.

14. Apuntaciones, p. 299.

15. Apuntaciones, pp. 279–280.

16. Schmitt, Karl M., “The Clergy and the Independence of New Spain,” Hispanic American Historical Review 34:3 (August 1954), pp. 289–312.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

17. Apuntaciones, p. 182. Additional references to the clergy are found on pp. 179–188. The word paraninfo can mean best man; it is also a historical term for the individual at universities who ceremonially inaugurated the start of the academic year with an exhortative speech to students. Here, De la Torre uses it pejoratively.

18. Alaman, Lucas, Historia it Mexico, Tomo V (Mexico: Jus, 1972), pp. 246, 187.Google Scholar

19. Apuntaciones, p. 105.

20. Apuntaciones, pp. 109–110.

21. Apuntaciones, p. 117. Similarly, on his return to the port of Veracruz, the lieutenant was escorted by officers and soldiers of the Dragones de México Regiment: Apuntaciones, pp. 286–287. Also present on that trip were the muleteer Don Antonio Briseño, born in Morón (province of Seville) and his cook: Apuntaciones, p. 286.

22. Apuntaciones, p. 287.

23. Apuntaciones, p. 294.

24. Apuntaciones, pp. 154–156,321–322.

25. Apuntaciones, p. 94.

26. Alamán, Historia de México, Tomo V, p. 187. About the role of literary salons and taverns as new social sites for the emergence of nationalisms and nations, see Guerra, François-Xavier, Modernidad e independencias. Ensayos sobre las revoluciones hispánicas (Mexico: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2000), pp. 92–98.Google Scholar

27. Apuntaciones, pp. 143, 168–169.

28. Apuntaciones, p. 196.

29. Apuntaciones, p. 245. Regarding the tides, ancestors and relatives of the Marquesa de San Rom án, see Ángela Carballeda, “Género y legislación en la segunda mitad del siglo XVIII. El caso de los marqueses de Moneada,” in Estudios sobre América, siglos XVI-XX, Antonio Gutiérrez Escudero and María Luisa Laviana Cuetos, coords. (Seville: Asociación Española de Americanistas, 2005), pp. 1173–1191.

30. Apuntaciones, p. 259.

31. Apuntaciones, pp. 306–307.

32. Apuntaciones, pp. 330–331.

33. Apuntaciones, pp. 118–123.

34. Apuntaciones, pp. 262–264.

35. Apuntaciones, pp. 255–256.

36. Balbé, Manuel, Orden público y militarismo en la España constitucional (1812–1983), (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1983), p. 52.Google Scholar

37. Valdés, Roberto L. Blanco, Rey, Cortes y fuerza armada en los orígenes de la España liberal, 1808–1823 (Madrid: Siglo XXI Editores, 1988), pp. 51–58.Google Scholar

38. Ibid, pp. 63–67.

39. Apuntaciones, pp. 298–299.

40. Apuntaciones, pp. 307–308. Additional references to the Indians of New Spain are found on pp. 156, 287–288, 295–297, 300–305, and 312. For reflections on class distinctions, where the lieutenant draws on Humboldt’s views, see pp. 245–246.

41. Junco, José Alvarez, Mater Dolorosa. La idea de España en el siglo XIX (Madrid: Taurus, 2001), pp. 40, 70, 73, 314.Google Scholar

42. Apuntaciones, pp. 267–268.

43. Apuntaciones, p. 257. Additional references to ritual cannibalism and human sacrifice are found on pp. 97–99, 322–324.

44. Apuntaciones, p. 169.

45. Apuntaciones, p. 322.

46. Apuntaciones, pp. 333–334.

47. Alamán, , Historia de México, vol. 5, pp. 323–324.Google Scholar

48. Apuntaciones, p. 371.

49. Apuntaciones, p. 89.

50. Apuntaciones, p. 198. The lieutenant’s diary contains additional references to O’Donojú on pp. 84–87, 94–95, 141, 144, 196, 198–199, 217–223, and 301.

51. Valdés, Blanco, Rey, Cortes y fuerza armada, pp. 188–210.Google Scholar

52. Apuntaciones, pp. 51–52.

53. Valdés, Blanco, Rey, Cortes y fuerza armada, pp. 166–170.Google Scholar

54. Garcia Merino,“Modesto de la Torre,” without pagination.

55. Woodward, Margaret L.,“The Spanish Army and the Loss of America, 1810-1824,” The Hispanic American Historical Review 48:4 (November 1968), pp. 586–607.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

56. Ibid., pp. 586–607.

57. Apuntaciones, pp. 52–54.

58. Apuntaciones, pp. 281–282.

59. Apuntaciones, pp. 182–183.

60. Alvarez Junco, Mater Dolorosa, p. 317; Junco, Alvarez, “The Nation Building Process in Nineteenth-Century Spain,” in Nationalism anil the Nation in the Iberian Peninsula. Competing and Conflicting Ideas, Mar-Molinero, Clare and Smith, Angel, eds. (Washington, D.C.: Berg, 1996), pp. 89–106, 90-91.Google Scholar

61. Alvarez Junco, The Nation Building Process, p. 90.

62. Alvarez Junco, Mater Dolorosa, pp. 105, 122.

63. Eastman discusses in detail how this theme developed and spread in Preaching Spanish Nationalism.

64. Alvarez Junco, Mater Dolorosa, p. 49.

65. Ibid., p. 75.

66. Apuntaciones, p. 145.

67. Apuntaciones, p. 328.

68. Apuntaciones, pp. 89–93.

69. Apuntaciones, pp. 25–26.

70. García Merino, “Modesto de la Torre.”