In the meantime, Goyeneche, blind with rage and thirsty for vengeance, was about to turn back against the untamable Oropesa.
When he had continued his triumphant march “to Buenos Aires” after the battle of Amiraya, he believed that the hordes of Pumacagua and Choqueguanca, combined with the regular forces from his army assigned to that area under the command of Lombera, would easily extinguish the fire that seemed to be starting again behind his back in the province of La Paz. And he certainly did not figure that Cochabamba would rise up again, as completely helpless as he had left it.
He continued on his way to the city then known as Charcas confident about his rear, receiving as he went the surrender of the defenseless towns, the cheers of the few supporters of the Colonial regime, and the incense burnt for him at the church altars by the weak souls who, after having joyfully welcomed the nascent homeland, believed that it had now been drowned in the blood of the martyrs of the 16th of July and in the very plentiful amounts spilled at Huaqui and Amiraya.
The patriots who still had hope and spirit fled before he arrived and gathered again once they had crossed the border with Argentina. From the entire auxiliary army—whose leaders Castelli and Balcárcel had fallen into disgrace and had been called by the Junta of Buenos Aires to account for their actions—there were only two small groups of brave soldiers left: the first, led by Pueyrredón, traveled through unfrequented roads with the fortunes from the Mint of Potosí, with which Belgrano’s glorious army would later be formed; and the second, which had survived the defeat of Amiraya, followed the lively and courageous Díaz Vélez, and much later they would make up the nucleus of the vanguard of Belgrano’s army.
The evil American, the unworthy compatriot from Melgar, could consider himself, at that time, the master of Upper Perú, and promise himself that the dreams that stirred his treacherous, vulgar soul would very soon be realized. He would be the Grand Pacifier of the Viceroyalty of Buenos Aires! He would arrive triumphantly from the mountains of Cuzco to the mouth of the Río de la Plata! Victory would accompany his carriage for over six hundred leagues, through the mountain ranges, plains, valleys, and pampas of South America! Arbiter then of so many provinces, he would choose the master who best suited him from among Fernando VII, Joseph Bonaparte,1 and Carlota2—whichever one he chose to lavish him with honors, to double his copious fortunes, to name him the Grandee of Spain or of Portugal, and to give him the right to appear donning his hat before the majestic presence of the monarch! The outcry of his brothers—of the anxious criollos, of the contemptible mestizos, and of the brutish Indians among whom he was born—did not matter to him at all. He did not think that following behind him, counting his victims, rummaging through the rubble and the ashes that he was leaving behind, most grave and indignant, was History, the only one who allots men their eternal rewards or their eternal punishments, and that she would call him, throughout the centuries to come, voiced from a thousand different mouths—including from that of the poor child who was then locked up under bread and water by the obese Father Arredondo—a vicious and vile snake that fed on the heart of the great American homeland!
But the “shout” of my noble and valiant Oropesa did not take long to dispel all his dreams and show him the dreadful reality. Murillo’s fire was indeed inextinguishable! The cold ashes would burn forever, as hot as a wildfire, the very moment the victor’s foot ceased to be on them! Goyeneche would never reach as far as the Argentine pampas, where, thanks to Cochabamba’s sacrifices, the invincible “Centaurs” were to be formed!
It is said that when he learned of the new uprising, he was overcome for the first time by the violent and painful convulsions that would later serve as his excuse for abandoning the impossible enterprise that he had undertaken, and eventually to retire to the Peninsula to vegetate, feeling quite smug with his title of Count of Huaqui—which I, my readers, would never exchange for mine, that of Commander and Aide-de-Camp of the Grand Marshal of Ayacucho, which I am honored to have here in my small vineyard, hidden deep in the Valley of Caracato, next to my sweet and loving companion Merceditas.
His fury rose to delirious levels when the unfortunate Santiestevan—who, as I have previously recounted, had surrendered on the 29th of October of 1811—appeared before him. Goyeneche exploded, shouting all manners of vulgarities at him, and he jumped on him, swinging his fists, so that his followers had to forcefully hold him back. He wanted to have him executed by firing squad at once and did not consent to holding a court-martial for him until they convinced him that this would be a better way to make the judgment more solemn and have it serve as an example to others. But when the court-martial absolved the offender, Goyeneche became enraged, and he decided on his own that if Santiestevan’s life was to be spared, he would have his honor destroyed instead. Thus, Goyeneche declared in a general order that: “Santiestevan was unfit for duty, and that he was not to be assigned to any position requiring of his personal responsibility.”
The truth was that the poor Don Miguel Santiestevan was a good soldier and that he had been rightfully absolved by his military judges. It would have been impossible to expect the future hero of Mount San Sebastián, with only one hundred soldiers, to resist an entire people whom Goyeneche himself found it necessary to resort to all of his forces to subjugate. And if Santiestevan had resisted on the 29th of October, it would have been even less prudent than Cardogue’s course of action, which led to his being torn to pieces with all of his men by the multitudes who were led by my ancestor, the silversmith Alejo Calatayud, in the year of 1730.
It was not possible for Goyeneche, nor would it have been possible for anyone else in his position, to leave behind him an adversary like the Cochabambian people. For disarmed as they were, which made them very weak against a well-organized and hardened army, they had instead an untiring and even a feverish spirit and ability to bring in an instant the whole of Upper Perú into upheaval and to spread their traditional hatred against the Spanish domination, and the courage that they had already proven more than once, and their resources of resistance—such as, for example, their famous tin harquebuses and their no less famous bronze and glass grenades. The victor of Amiraya could already feel them stirring, beginning to surround him everywhere. Without making the efforts necessary to organize a strong government or regular army troops, the impatient patriots who exercised influences over any group or territory were content to form large or small bands of guerrillas armed with lances, slings, and macanas; they asked the new Prefect and the Junta for whatever resources they could send them, and sometimes they would make do without; and each one rushed on his own to spread the uprising, to sever the lines of communication between Goyeneche and the Viceroyalty of Perú and to antagonize the enemy of the homeland in every conceivable way. I have already recounted how Arze did not pause for even an instant before bursting into Oruro, and then immediately rushed against Chayanta, where he had more success and obtained the triumph at Caripuyo. Don Mateo Zenteno followed his example, stirring the uprising in the area of Ayopaya and leading groups at times as far as the outskirts of La Paz, and at other times retreating across the heights of Tapacarí to antagonize Lombera’s troops,3 which were then crossing the Altiplano. While Don Carlos To-boada, with his inexhaustible Mizqueños, would threaten Chuquisaca as quickly as he would retreat to the Valle-Grande. Other guerrillas who did not become as well known, but who were no less active and enterprising, carried out incursions as far as the outskirts of Potosí on one side, and as far as Santa Cruz de la Sierra on the other, achieving successes over small groups of enemy troops. The most noteworthy triumph gained by one of these was by Don José Félix Borda’s second in command, whom his superior did not even mention in the report sent to the Provincial Junta. It occurred in Samaipata, on the 26th of March, against the reinforcements for which Goyeneche had sent. The fighting lasted sixteen hours, was extremely bloody, and left the leader of the enemy troops, Joaquín Ignacio Alburquerque, a Portuguese Brazilian, dead on the battlefield.
Goyeneche wanted to retrace his steps immediately. I do not believe that he wavered between continuing his march to the provinces of the Río de la Plata and taking this course, as some writers of history have proposed without any proof. If he remained in Charcas and Potosí for five months, it was only because the rainy season did not allow him to come back on the road that cuts through the valleys, as he would have had to cross the unfordable Río Grande. Nor was it possible for him to take the road through the Altiplano, as it is even colder and more rigorous there during this season than in winter. This road, besides, is also cut, like the other one, by the torrential floods from the Arque and Tapacarí ravines.
His forced stay in the south of Upper Perú gave him time to execute contemptible acts of vengeance as he pleased. The hypocrite ordered the presidential house that had been previously inhabited by “the infidel Castelli” to be purified with solemn religious rites before he proceeded to move into it. The same man who confessed like a good penitent and took the Holy Communion every eight days, kissing the tiles of the church, and who boasted of his generosity and liberality—this same man had respectable ladies accused of having called him a sambo or a cholo gagged and publicly displayed, while he had others, even with small children, exiled, driven away on their feet. He confiscated goods, ordered bloody executions daily, and watched from his balconies as half a dozen men were hung to death at the mere hint of being suspected of conspiring against him.
He did not miss the opportunity, either, of utilizing the time to take possession of as many fortunes as could be found in what had been an affluent province. And not just for the service of the King, either, but also for his own personal hoard, as is well known and has already been brought to light by other historians.
He was aided in this last act by his accomplice in Carlotist schemes,4 the Archbishop Don Benito María Moxó y Francoli.5 This Prelate, a fanatic for the cause he embraced, be it in favor of the legitimate king or of the Infanta, dealt out excommunications to patriots who were just as good Catholics as he was; he said that the war of the people against the kings was horribly impious; he preached the doctrine of dejection of “these Caligulas and Neros”; and he willingly handed over to his accomplice the treasures of the wealthy church, which were under his charge.
The plundering was confirmed before the dignitaries of the Cabildo—
But: “Les chanoines vermeils, et brillants de santé,”6 one of them said at last, daring to protest; “d’abord pole et muet, de colére inmo-bile.”7 The Basque canon Areta, a hero who eclipses all of those recounted in the heroicomical poem Lutrin by Boileau,8 then spoke—the illustrious and brave Areta spoke, that is. Thus, putting his arms round one of the gigantic candelabrum that still remained, he said the following memorable words, which could only have been uttered at that time by a Spaniard from the Peninsula and which reveal the contempt that everyone felt deep down toward the criollo general:
“That zambillo9 Goyeneche is mocking us!”
At which point all the other canons stood up, following his example. They felt overwhelmed by holy indignation and swore to die as martyrs if need be to protect, as was their duty, their blessed candelabra.
The desired season arrived. The month of April was drawing to a close—the time when, according to the farmers of my land, “it rains a thousand rains, but it doesn’t fill a single barrel”—and the flooded rivers and torrents could no longer protect the heroic Oropesa. Goyeneche took one last glance at the road toward Buenos Aires and let out a long and loud sigh. His vanguard, under the command of the brave Picoaga, had cleared out the Argentine border for him; Díaz Vélez was running to hide on the other side, with Belgrano; this most eminent American was making extraordinary, but quite useless efforts to reorganize the auxiliary army, for he barely had two or three hundred men with him. Without the evil Oropesa, the Grand Pacifier could have reached the Río de la Plata without firing a single shot, while the Brazilian troops drew the attention of the Junta of Buenos Aires down the other side!
He made his decisions then, full of rage. He planned to surround the ceaselessly rebellious province in a circle of fire and steel and pull it tighter and tighter until the queen city of the fertile and lovely valleys was crushed. He ordered Huisi, who was then destroying the Laguna, to take the road through the Valle Grande. Lombera received the charge to come down from the Altiplano on the route across Tapacarí or Chayanta, whichever one was preferable; he even asked for reinforcements from as far as the distant Santa Cruz de la Sierra; and he himself, with the core of his best troops, took the road through the Valley of Mizque, placing the atrocious, unforgettable Imas10 in charge of his vanguard.
“Soldiers!” this villain would say, removing the mask with which he had tried to convince everyone of his magnanimity, but that never truly covered the stigma of his horrendous crimes of 1809. “You are the owners of the rebels’ lives and of their properties. The only thing that I forbid,” the hypocrite who desecrated the churches would add, “I forbid you only, under penalty of death, to invade the holy houses of the Lord!”
Was Goyeneche really a Christian? Did that villain ever think about God? I believe not. I can concede to him, at best, the superstitious religion of the Calabrian brigands, who light tall candles by the image of a saint before or after committing a robbery or a murder. As I have stated, Goyeneche confessed very often, but he could not possibly have revealed the entire leprosy of his soul to the priest. He must have set out, more likely, to quite shrewdly fool the Father in order to continue to count on the support of the powerful Church. Much more of a believer was Belgrano, the great caudillo of the homeland who tried to dispel the prejudices of a section of the common people, which had been fomented by Moxó in consequence of the indiscretions and imprudences committed by Castelli.
The patriots of Cochabamba realized the need to gather their forces and prepare for a vigorous defense. But the caudillos, who until that moment of imminent danger had been accustomed to leading their own republiquetas11 or groups of montoneros,12 each following his own initiative, created a breeding ground ripe with disputes and personal grudges. In a book like this one, which follows a specific plan that is quite different from the dry and certainly more useful investigations of a critical historical study, I only mention these lowly events here in passing.
The best organized forces were those that followed the untamable Arze. He aspired to discipline them and unbendingly punished those who used the cause of the homeland as an excuse to carry out criminal excesses. I have before me several of his proclamations and general orders that have not yet been published in any book in print so far. Many villains paid the ultimate penalty, imposed on them by Arze himself, because of the little respect that they held for the people whom they called tablas and sarracenos, or for their goods and properties.
Arze had more or less four thousand men in the area of Cliza, with Tarata serving as his general headquarters. The infantry was, by then, already much larger than the cavalry. In addition to the thousands of horses that had been destroyed in the war, Goyeneche had seen to it that not a single one was left alive after the battle of Amiraya. The only ones saved were the ones that were led away by their owners to the most inaccessible peaks of the Cordillera. It is the weapons and equipment of these troops that will leave for all posterity the clearest idea of the enthusiasm and determination with which these men battled for the sublime ideal that filled their souls, without consideration of the immense obstacles before them, or of the weakness of their material resources. The number of rifles they had managed to gather, and after incredible efforts at that, did not reach five hundred, and not all of these were in regular operating order. I saw many that only had a functioning barrel and were attached to very crude butts, without anything other than a loose fuse tied to the vent, therefore requiring someone other than the man aiming the weapon to light it. Of the tin harquebuses, which I talked about earlier in some length, there must have been around six hundred in total, but Don Esteban only received half of these, while the other half were distributed among Zenteno’s troops. There must have been over a hundred cannons—also made of tin, of course—mounted on gun-carriages that were so crude and primitive, that, as I have already stated, they resembled small carts used for carrying heavy rocks. And there were not even two thousand of the famous bronze and glass grenades. Thus, the majority of the defenders of the homeland were only armed with slings, macanas, and lances; and these, although they had proven so successful in the victory at Aroma, did not stand a chance against forces of the likes of Goyeneche’s. But those men were driven by the most joyful of illusions, and would have gone after the tablas naked, armed with only stones and sticks if they had to. They likewise cared very little about the personal privations that they had to put up with. The clothes that they were wearing when they left their homes were now falling off their bodies in shreds, and when they received their handful of toasted maize and a bit of charqui, they yelled: “Long live the homeland!” They followed their bold caudillos through rugged hills and cold, barren plateaus. I also have, right before me on the table where I am writing, an order from Don Esteban to his majordomo in Caine to hand out a certain ration of corn to each of the soldiers who were to accompany him to Chayanta.
The number of troops with which Zenteno was to defend whichever road Lombera chose to take did not reach three thousand men, and their discipline and weapons were considerably inferior to those I have just briefly described. Try to imagine, my dear readers, what they must have been like! Tell me, more importantly, if today’s men can be compared with the ones from back then! Tell me. . . . But, no, for God’s sake, don’t tell me anything! For the blood rushes to my head and the pen falls from my hand!
The two caudillos who I have been speaking about met their corresponding adversaries at the same time. Zenteno courageously stopped Lombera for a few hours at the heights of Quirquiave, but he was defeated, for there was no possibility other than for him to be defeated. And he fled to the mountains of Hayopaya, in that area of the territory of Upper Perú where the Andes themselves form very deep ravines, quite different from the ones that barely open between the barren spurs of the gigantic Cordilleras—to Hayopaya,13 in a word, which holds quite a glorious name in its own right, and does not need to be called the Asturias of Perú, as American historians insist on doing.
Arze headed out to face Goyeneche. . . . But this caudillo, for a thousand reasons, deserves our attention more than any other from those times. Therefore, we will follow the details of his moves a little more slowly.
The eastern border of the vast Valley of Cliza is composed of a wide and tall ridge of the Yurackasa Cordillera, which separates it from the Valleys of Mizque and Pocona, and forms a tableland that is not as cold, and is consequently more fertile and cultivated, than the great Puna, which geographers today call the Bolivian Plains. Goyeneche had to climb precisely to this area by one of two roads, either through Curi or through Pocona, both of which were equally steep and rugged. Then he had to cross the whole length of the tableland, opening him up for possible attacks, first by the infantry along the slopes, then by the cavalry in the high plateau. Arze understood this perfectly. Therefore, he decided to take his troops to the town of Vacas, which is located in the center of the tableland, on the shores of the large lakes after which the town and the tableland are named, and from which he could keep a lookout over both of the roads I have mentioned.
But time—that element that is more precious in war than in all other human things—did not suffice for the caudillo of the homeland to carry out his well-conceived strategic plan.
On the morning of the 24th of May, he learned in Sacabamba—which is on the heights of Tarata, the position he had first occupied—of the entrance of Goyeneche into the old city of Mizque on the night of the 21st, and of the clever retreat of the caudillo To-boada, who, sliding back to the left of the enemy, had tried to break up its rear and force it across to the other side of the Río Grande. Certain, then, that Goyeneche would come through the Vacas meseta, he set out to occupy that town, as I have said, pushing the pace of the march and not allowing his men to rest for even an instant, until, well after night had fallen, he accepted having to make camp in Paredones, not far from the town of Vacas.
One of his men has recounted to me how Arze did not want the horses to be unsaddled that night; that he ordered the march to recommence the moment the first bugles had blown; and that, in his hurry, he rushed ahead on his horse down the road many times. He has also assured me that it must have been four in the morning when Arze learned—from an Indian from the area who had gone to Pocona the day before and returned through hidden paths—the news that the enemy was probably going to pick up camp from the town of Chapín de la Reina* before sunrise. At that point, letting out a loud, angry scream, he ordered that the agreed-upon signal to take up the march be sounded at once.
He wanted to take the top of the slope before the enemy could reach it. From such an advantageous position, he could have brought down enormous harm on Goyeneche, forcing him to retreat from all the punishment, or perhaps even defeating him definitively. The disadvantage of the patriots’ weapons would have been compensated by those offered there by nature’s hand. The robust vallunos would have buried their dominators under the rocks of the slope, like the mountaineers of Switzerland, who fought in this same manner for their liberty without weapons. But time did not suffice, as I have said, and the caudillo of the homeland found himself in the position of having to fight in the worst of circumstances. By the time the patriots could distinguish the slope in the first rays of sunlight on that ominous day of the 24th of May, the vanguard of the enemy, led by Imas, had already crowned its peak.
Tricked cruelly by fate, the brave Arze decided at that point to wait for the enemy where he was, which was called Quehuiñal, and which was as far as he had been able to get despite the efforts he had made to move quickly. He placed his large tin cannons on a small mount to his left; he formed the front lines with the few riflemen and harquebusiers he had; and he ordered the cavalry, in an advantageous formation, to make up the rear, placing himself at its head. He understood that on that terrain the only thing he could count on were his lances. In the meantime, Imas was spreading out his band of guerrillas, and the core of Goyeneche’s troops was quickly mounting the last steps of the slope of Pocona.
From the very first shots exchanged by the combatants, the patriots understood the tremendous disadvantage of their weapons. The projectiles fired by the tin cannons and harquebuses barely harmed the enemy, while the other side’s bullets were already starting to spread death among their files. The same occurred, but to an even larger degree, with the grenades. Very soon, too, the explosions of the real bronze cannons of the enemy artillery resounded, and they found themselves exposed, without any defense, to the case shot from the blasts. What else can I tell you? The only real serious threat that the patriots could, and did, offer was the charge of their brave squadrons, led by their caudillo. But Goyeneche’s soldiers had been trained, above all, to resist cavalry in cadres, and this is what their enemies relied on primarily. They would fall into these formations, assembling together at the opportune moment, without even having to wait to hear the orders from their leaders. Thus, Arze’s squadrons, small to begin with, crashed uselessly against those walls of men bristling with bayonets that are seldom broken even by the strongest and best organized cavalry units.
An hour after Imas’s band of guerrillas had fired their first shots, Goyeneche found himself once again the joyful victor, for the third time, of “those incorrigible rebels from Cochabamba.” The field was littered with more than a few bodies. They say that only thirty of the casualties were from the victorious army. I do not believe it, but I shall not quarrel about it. What I can assure you is that there were many patriot deaths—but no one bothered to take the time to count them.
“What were we going to count them for?” one of the Spanish leaders said. “What good was that rabble of mestizos anyway? All they did was force us to come back to kill them off when we could have been well on our way to Buenos Aires!”
Don Esteban Arze fled with a few of his soldiers from the cavairy, taking the road through Curi to their right. But he did not do so to save his own life, as the victor claimed—having the audacity to call him a “frightened, cowardly rebel”—but rather to meet up with Taboada immediately. Together, a few days later, they tried the bold undertaking of attacking Chuquisaca, with the idea that from there they could then attack their enemy again from the least expected of places. But pursued by the bad luck that all the great caudillos of the Independence Movement shared in the first few years of the war and which was only to be overcome by their extremely admirable heroic perseverance, Arze was once again defeated, this time by the garrison troops from the main plaza of Chuquisaca, at the point of the Molles, barely one league away from the old city of Charcas. He could see, from the battlefield, the white towers and elegant buildings of the city where he longed to raise his flag, and he was forced to retreat to the Valle-Grande, continuing to fight for his homeland his whole life, suffering many bitter disillusionments along the way. Eighteen patriots who were taken alive at the hands of the victors at the Molles were executed by firing squad that same day. Taboada went further south with a few of his followers; he was captured at Tinguipaya and hung to death, along with three of his men, in Potosí. His head, dried out with salt, was sent to Chuquisaca, and displayed at the Molles for a long time. And the last of the patriots from those brave and untiring troops, who undertook grave dangers to cross the border with the hope of joining the auxiliary army, were finally captured in Suipacha. Of this group, those who were not hung to death were sentenced to suffer slowly in the dreadful prison of Casas Matas, about which I shall have plenty to relate to you at the appropriate time and place.