[Gutenberg 47838] • Notes on the History of Argentine Independence

Excerpt from Notes on the History of Argentine Independence: A Paper Read by Mr. C. W. Whittemore, February 6th, 1920, Before the American Club, Buenos Aires

The establishment of the Viceroyship in 1776 and the consequent formation in Buenos Aires of a locally semi-autonomous Government, facilitated and stimulated commercial activity. Wine came from Mendoza, rum and dried fruits from San Juan, textiles and laces from Tucuman and Salta Where the Inca arts and industries persisted and flourished, hides andskins from the plains, yerba, tobacco and fine woods from Paraguay. This internal comm'erce varied in value from to pesos annually. Paraguay sold mules to Peru every year, and sent 2000 tens of yerba to Chile. Argentine exporta tions to Spain included crude and tanned bull and horse-hides; sheep-wool, jerked beef, wax, feathers and skins. Freedom of trade with Africa was obtained and other fields of activity were developed. Mexico and Lima were Colonial Courts, but Buenos Aires had become a market place.

A Spanish traveller who visited Buenos Aires during the Viceroyship said The Ar gentine creoles have a great idea of their equal ity with the Europeans adding, There exists a sort of aversion of the creoles or sons of Spaniards born in America, towards the Europeans and especially toward the Spanish Government. Incoherent and crude though they were, handicapped by ignorance and superstition, especially in the rural regions, democratic tendencies accompanied the Argen tine as it emerged from its two hundred years of isolation and prepared it for its mission of self-emancipation and for the salvation of South American independence.

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