Manuel de Mier y Terán

Manuel Mier y Terán
Manuel Mier y Terán
6th Minister of War and Marine
	In office; 12 March 1824 – 18 December 1824
President	Guadalupe Victoria; (since 10 October 1824)
Preceded by	José Joaquín de Herrera
Succeeded by	José Castro
Personal details
Born	February 18, 1789; Mexico City, Viceroyalty of New Spain
Died	July 3, 1832 (aged 43); Padilla, Tamaulipas, Mexico
Military service
Allegiance	Mexican insurgents; First Mexican Empire; First Mexican Republic
Branch/service	Mexican Army
Years of service	1811—1832
Rank	Brigadier General
Battles/wars	Mexican War of Independence:; Battle of Tehuacán; Barradas Expedition:; Battle of Pueblo Viejo;

José Manuel Rafael Simeón de Mier y Terán (February 18, 1789 — July 3, 1832), generally known as Manuel de Mier y Terán, was a leader in Mexican War of Independence and in the post-independence period was a military figure and politician.[1]

Early career

Mier y Terán studied at Mexico City's School of Mines before the outbreak of the insurgency for independence in 1810. He joined the insurgents in 1812 and rose to a leadership position.[2] He was one of the few American-born Spaniards to fight on the side of the insurgency, serving under José María Morelos until Morelos's death in 1815.[3] Following independence, he was elected to the First Mexican Congress as the representative for Chiapas and served on its committee for the colonization of unoccupied territory. Two years later, he made brigadier general and served as Minister of War under President Guadalupe Victoria, although he resigned within nine months over differences with the administration. He served with Antonio López de Santa Anna in repelling the Spanish reconquest of Mexico in 1829.[4]

He then served as State Inspector at Veracruz, part of a Mexican mission to England, and director of the Mexican School of Artillery until 1827. The same year, he went to Tamaulipas and Texas.

Commandant

After returning to Mexico, General Terán served as second in command to Santa Anna during his defense of Tampico against the Spanish invasion of 1829. He participated in the Capitulation of Pueblo Viejo. Their success made them both national heroes. Considered a strong candidate for president, he lost his chance when Santa Anna and Zavala's coup d'etat briefly gave the position to Vicente Guerrero. The next year, another coup elevated Anastasio Bustamante, who named Mier y Terán as his commandant general for the northeastern provinces, giving Terán military and civil authority over the provinces of Coahuila y Tejas, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas.

Headquartered at the recently renamed city of Matamoros, he arrived in Galveston Bay in November 1831, to review the port of Anahuac and install the Serb George Fisher as its new customs agent. Texian scofflaws had been smuggling and evading taxes, so he granted Fisher authority over the mouth of the Brazos River, as well. The general instructed John Bradburn to enforce title fees and remove an unauthorized ayuntamiento installed at Liberty. These administrative changes led directly to the Anahuac Disturbances, an uprising that was a precursor to the 1836 Texas Revolution.

Following a Federalist victory near Matamoros on July 3, 1832, there was pressure on Mier y Terán to become a candidate for the presidency. He was considered a moderate conservative, which placed him in between contending factions of liberals and conservatives. He was one the creole elites who felt that they had failed in the post-independence period to forge a nation. As commander in Texas, he saw the northern region slipping away to the Anglo-Americans, and he became increasingly worried about another Spanish attempt to reconquer Mexico. He wrote, "I believe that the Spaniards can only cause us temporary damages; the serious and permanent ones are reserved for our own hands, and those of the North American neighbors."[5] He also wrote Lucas Alamán the day before he ended his life, asking how Mexico could hold Texas if they could not stop killing each other.[6] In despair, he committed a highly symbolic suicide by throwing himself on his sword in Padilla, Tamaulipas. It was the same location where Emperor Agustín de Iturbide had been executed in 1824, following his return from exile by the men of General Felipe de la Garza Cisneros. Mier y Terán's remains were buried with Iturbide's as were his wishes.[7] In 1838, when the emperor's bones were re-interred in Mexico City.

Family

General Terán was the youngest of the three sons of Manuel de Mier y Terán and his wife María Ignacia de Teruel y Llanos.

Legacy

The city of General Terán in Nuevo León, Mexico, is named in his honor. Ciudad Mier, Tamaulipas, however, was named after Francisco Mier y Torre, the governor of Nuevo León from 1710 to 1714.

He was also the namesake of Fort Terán on the Neches River in modern Tyler County, Texas.

References

Rodríguez O., Jaime, "Manuel Mier y Terán" in Encyclopedia of Latin American History and Culture, vol. 4, p. 47. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons 1997.
Rodríguez O. "Manuel Mier y Terán", p. 47
Krauze, Enriue. Mexico: Biography of Power. New York: Harper Collins 1997, p. 135.
DePalo, William A., Jr. The Mexican National Army, 1822-1852. College Station TX: Texas A&M University Press 1997.
quoted in Green, Stanley C. The Mexican Republic: The First Decade, 1823-1832. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press 1987, p. 223.
Green, The Mexican Republic, p. 223.
Krauze, Mexico: Biography of Power, p. 138.

External sources

Margaret Swett Henson: Manuel de Mier y Terán from the Handbook of Texas Online. Retrieved 3 February 2010.
McKeehan, Wallace. Manuel de Mier y Terán 1789-1832. Sons of DeWitt Colony, Texas, Website.

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[1] Rodríguez O., Jaime, "Manuel Mier y Terán" in Encyclopedia of Latin American History and Culture, vol. 4, p. 47. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons 1997.

[2] Rodríguez O. "Manuel Mier y Terán", p. 47

[3] Krauze, Enriue. Mexico: Biography of Power. New York: Harper Collins 1997, p. 135.

[4] DePalo, William A., Jr. The Mexican National Army, 1822-1852. College Station TX: Texas A&M University Press 1997.

[5] quoted in Green, Stanley C. The Mexican Republic: The First Decade, 1823-1832. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press 1987, p. 223.

[6] Green, The Mexican Republic, p. 223.

[7] Krauze, Mexico: Biography of Power, p. 138.