Juan Domingo de Monteverde y Rivas (1773-1832) was the Captain General of New Granada from 1812 to 1813. He led a royalist reaction that quelled the independent republic declared in Venezuela in 1811 in 1812 during the South American Wars of Liberation.
Biography[]
Born in the Canary Islands, Monteverde was made a commander of the Spanish Army. In 1812 he left Puerto Rico for Venezuela with an army of 1,550 troops and Monteverde began to recruit soldiers from the local population in order to put down the rebellion of Simon Bolivar, who was fighting for Fernando VII of Spain against Napoleon I's government of Spain (1808-1814). He overwhelmed Venezuela in a royalist reaction in 1812, but in October 1813 he was defeated by Bolivar and wounded. He returned to Puerto Rico and in 1816 moved to Spain, and died in Cadiz with the rank of Brigadier.