Peruvian War of Independence

At the time of the Napoleonic invasion of the Iberian Peninsula and the degradation of the Royal power took place, and under the attack of Buenos Aires armies in Upper Peru, the oligarch Peruvians support the Royalist army. The Creole rebellion of Huánuco arose in 1812 and the rebellion of Cuzco between 1814 and 1816 was suppressed. These rebellions were supported by the armies of Buenos Aires.

Years after the fear of indigenous rebellion from 1780 to 1781 that was headed by Tupac Amaru II, and under commercial and nacionalist reasons, the Viceroys gain the support of the "Lima oligarch" in opposite to Buenos Aires or Chilean commercial interest. The Viceroyalty of Peru became the last redoubt of the Spanish Monarchy in South America. This Viceroyalty succumbed after the decisive continental campaigns of José de San Martín (1820-1823) and Simón Bolívar (1824). While San Martin was in charge of the military land campaign the newly built Chilean Navy led by Lord Thomas Cochrane transported the fighting troops and launched a sea campaign to fight the Spanish fleet in the Pacific. [http://www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/PlainTextHistories.asp?groupid=916&HistoryID=aa91] San Martín, who had displaced the royalists of Chile after the battle of Maipu, and who had disembarked in Paracas in 1820, proclaimed the independence of Peru in Lima on July 28, 1821. Four years later, the Spanish Monarchy was defeated definitively after the battle of Ayacucho.

After the war of independence the conflict of interests that faced different sectors of the Creole society and the particular ambitions of the caudillos, made the organization of the country excessively difficult. Only three civilians: Manuel Pardo, Nicolás de Piérola and Francisco García Calderón could accede to the presidency in the first seventy-five years of independent life. After the splitting of the Alto Peru in 1815, the Republic of Bolivia was created. In 1837, the Peru-Bolivian Confederation was also created but, it was dissolved two years later due to the Chilean military intervention.

See also

* Battle of Ayacucho
* Battle of Junín
* Primer Congreso Constituyente del Perú de 1822

External links

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KM4h-j331Kc Video: The Independence of Peru]
* [http://www.ucsm.edu.pe/arequipa/peru2.htm Peruvian Act of Independence]
* [http://www.wombastis.com/1900_ayacucho/ Ayacucho República Aristocrática photo gallery]